Page 47 of The Good Daughter

“If you’d helped him then I would have come willingly.”

Vorst shrugged. “Well, I guess I’ll know that for next time. Anyway; you’re free, which I don’t think is nothing. You ought to be showing me a little gratitude.”

A cold shiver passed through my body.

“If you help Uther, then I’ll be ‘grateful’ to you.” I was aware that in my own backing and forthing on the subject of Devon, I’d rather ignored the fact that my father was in danger, as well.

But Vorst shook his head. “Frankly, I don’t want your gratitude while the old man is watching. ‘Gratitude’ should be a private thing between a man and a woman.”

“I’d rather die,” I growled at him

Vorst shook his head again. “You can do that when you reach Gaunt. Yeah, I may as well own up; once we’ve had a bit of fun, I’ll be selling you on. But first things first.”

I started to run, but Vorst grabbed my arm, dragging me back. I lashed out at him, a panicked blow but it caught him nicely.

“You little bitch!”

I managed to get a few steps away, but he came after me fast, tackling me to the ground, pinning me with his weight while I kicked and beat at him with my fists. I needed to focus and remember my training. And, so, that is exactly what I did. I drove my knee up into the small of his back and he went forward, meeting my fist coming the other way. That knocked him dopey and I was able to push him off and scramble free, running into the dark.

If it wasn’t for that damn dark, then I would have made it away, but the wilderness was no place to be running blind. My foot caught on something and I went down hard on my face.

In the next instant, Vorst was on top of me.

“Just for that, I’m not going to play nice. You’re lucky they want you alive. But there’s no rules about what condition you’re in.”

I cried out as he twisted my arms behind my back, managing to hold both wrists with one hand as he used the other to haul up my skirt.

“Thrash around all you want, but this is happening.”

“Oh, no, it isn’t.”

I choked out a sob of relief as Devon’s voice came out of the night. In the next instant, there was a smack of flesh on flesh and Vorst’s weight was off me as he flew backwards with the force of Devon’s punch.

“Are you alright? Selena, are you alright? I’ll kill him if he’s hurt you.”

“I’m okay,” I gasped, trembling and trying to mask my tears.

“She’s not your property you treacherous bastard!” snarled Vorst.

“I know that,” said Devon, his voice heavy with guilt. “I’m as bad as you. In some ways. Which is why I’m letting you live. But get the bloody hell out of here.”

“The hell with you!”

In the moonlight, I saw the flash of a sword being drawn.

“Don’t do this, Vorst,” said Devon, calmly.

“Scared?” asked Vorst slyly. “You talk a big game, Devon, but a game is all it truly is.”

He rushed at Devon, sword raised for action. Devon moved with speed and confidence. I barely even saw his hands as he drew his blade and in the same movement slashed up from Vorst’s belly to his chest.

For a few steps, Vorst kept moving, as if it had happened so fast that his body didn’t know it was dead yet. He tried to look back at Devon, but just collapsed, dead before he hit the ground.

“Sorry, Vorst,” Devon said. He wasn’t sorry for saving me, of course. I wasn’t completely convinced that he was sorry for killing the other man either. But he was sorry for being so much better with a sword, and he was sorry that he was killing someone who was, in some ways, no worse than he was. Devon would never have done to me what Vorst had tried to do tonight—that much we’d established—but he’d kidnapped me and planned to sell me, just as Vorst had intended to do.

“Are you alright?” he asked me again.

I hadn’t seen Devon fight before. I wasn’t sure I’d really seen it now—it had been over so fast. But it had given me some idea of what must have happened in the camp of the Latran soldiers the night that he rescued Uther and me. Devon was one hell of a swordsman.

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