To Capture a Warrior, A Revelry’s Tempest Novel 5, (EBOOK)

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{ Chapter 1 }
 
Western Spain, deep in the midst of the Peninsular War
July 1812

“Rifle.”

The order thundered across the room, cutting through the echo of the last blast from the spent rifle the soldier was holding out.

Bridget’s look whipped to her father. Perched on his knees on the floorboards, his arms flew about him, gunpowder spilling as he manically measured and poured it into one of the four rifles scattered about his legs. He grabbed the ramrod, jamming a linen-wrapped lead shot deep into the barrel. Without looking up to her, he thrust out the Baker rifle to her, his other hand already reaching for the gunpowder to load the next.

She snatched the rifle from her father’s hand, her fingers clutching the still warm barrel from the last shot.

Bridget ran across the room, her hands so quick to get rid of the rifle she tossed it into the soldier’s waiting hand, then snatched the spent one from his grip. He pulled the butt of the rifle to his shoulder, aiming out the window, his dark eyes trained on the cobblestone lane below.

A dream. This had to be a dream.

An hour ago she had been dressing wounds.

They were supposed to be safe here. Safe. The lieutenant colonel had guaranteed it.

But they weren’t. And now they only had one man defending them against the oncoming French troops.

What had made the building so safe as an infirmary—two stories high, built of dark grey stone and with sight lines in all directions above the neighboring cottages—had also made it a target.

It was the safest place in the village. Also the most strategic.

But this wasn’t a dream. The stench of burnt gunpowder searing her nose and the constant barrage of lead balls picking at the exterior stone wall just two feet away from her assured her this was horrifyingly real.

Bridget stared at the man perched along the side of the open window. Careful, practiced, only a sliver of his body would show along the window’s edge to the oncoming soldiers. His dark eyes intense, unflinching as he set his aim, he didn’t blink as a bullet tore into the grey stone next to his head, exploding shards of rock onto the side of his face.

 He was hard. He was war. And beautifully, tragically, the last thing set between her and death. A brutal, horrifying death.

Within seconds of gaining control of the building, Boney’s soldiers would dispose of her father, of the ten wounded men that were under their care in the adjoining room—most of them already touching death and of no help to them.

Her…her they would most likely keep. Keep until her body had been defiled and ravaged and torn in two. And then maybe, if she was lucky, they would kill her.

She had accepted that possibility when she followed her physician father into this war. She had come, willingly, because her father depended upon her like no other.

Her father was a physician that could actually save men with his abilities—not just blithely saw off appendages and let soldiers bleed to death like so many of his compatriots. Even as a physician, surgery was where he excelled, and he had taught her everything he knew. It would have been reprehensible for him not to serve the crown—to serve the brave men where he could. And that meant Bridget had needed to come with him to the continent. To this blasted war.

Bridget’s gaze locked onto the soldier’s forefinger. The slightest twitch and he slowly pulled the trigger.

A slight nod was the only indication he had hit his target, his hand flinging out the empty rifle as he yelled again, his look not leaving the cobblestone street below.

“Rifle.”

Even though it thundered, the calm of his voice was like no other. Low. Commanding. Gentle as it cut into the acrid air of the flash of gunpowder.

Bridget jumped, grabbing the stock of the spent rifle and spinning back to her father. She grabbed the next two primed and loaded rifles by the barrels, the metal of one of them burning into her palm as she rushed back to the soldier and shoved it in his hand.

The soldier had burst into the building, running up to these rooms with five rifles bundled in his arms and a heavy satchel of ammunition in a knapsack. He’d dropped all of that to the floor in a frenzy, rushing from window to window, desperate for the perfect vantage point. Her father had gone to lock every door he could between them and the approaching French soldiers outside.

But they had come. And they were getting closer.

This soldier—a marksman of the highest order—had held them at bay for a half hour. Picking off Boney’s soldiers one by one.

But it wasn’t enough.

The cries, the French yelling below, filling her ears was close—too close. They had made it to the corner of the building if the voices she heard were any indication.

Crack.

Another shot off. Screams from below.

No matter how fast her father loaded the rifles. No matter how quickly she delivered them to the soldier. No matter how many men the soldier shot down.

They were here.

Bridget pushed another rifle into the soldier’s waiting hand as she took the spent rifle.

This time, her hands were shaking as her fingertips touched his.

He hadn’t looked at her. Hadn’t acknowledged her other than the legs that brought the rifles to him, but at that moment, he paused, looking to her.

His dark eyes, almost the color of ink, pierced her. “You will survive this, lass. You will.”

She froze, his words hitting her.

He told the lie so effortlessly, so calmly and without a hint of doubt that she wanted to believe him.

Hell, she did believe him.

Before she could move again, spin back to her father to retrieve the next rifle, he turned back to the window, squinting his left eye closed. Not a second passed before he shot.

But as he opened his eye, lifting his head, he didn’t immediately fling the rifle out for her to take.

“Our forces. They’re almost here.” His mouth pulled back, almost to a terse smile.

Bridget stepped to the side of the window, hiding her body behind stone as she searched through the peaks of the surrounding cottages.

A flicker of movement, and she leaned forward to see a number of men moving along a far off lane.

With a wicked curse the soldier shoved her away from the window, sending her stumbling. Another shot blasted into the stone of the windowsill where she had just been. Jagged flecks of stone sprayed into her eyes.

Crack. Crack. Crack.

More shots.

And then a very distinct sound. A door slamming open.

“Blast it to hell.” The soldier swore under his breath, the first indication she had seen from him of any alarm.

He stepped away from the window, pointing to her father. “All of them, I need all of them loaded now.” He ripped his spent rifle from her hand and rushed to her father, bending down next to him, his fingers flying as he loaded it.

“Five. Dammit, five bloody rifles. I should have grabbed more.”

Crack. Crack.

The floorboards shook under her boots as another door below them crashed open.

And then the terrifying sound of feet thundering up the stairs.

Not looking at his hands as he loaded the last rifle, the soldier looked up to her father. “The window.”

With a nod, her father jumped to his feet and grabbed her arm, yanking her across the floor to the open window. The soldier followed him, juggling every rifle with him and lining them up on the floorboards in front of him.

Her father stuck his head out the window, then quickly pulled himself back in, his panicked hazel eyes on her. His words flew in a frenzy. “Our forces are coming. You can make the jump, Bridget. You’ll be safer out there than in here.”

Crack.

A shot blasted through the lock of the door.

The door to their room exploded open, the wood splintering.

Bridget screamed, gripping her father’s arm. “You can—”

Her words ripped from her throat as she went flying through the air.

Shoved—pushed through the open window to fall through the air.

Terror like she had never known seized her.

Falling.

Falling.

Falling.

She hit the ground.