She knew she should protest the violation. He’d said he would not force her, but at this rate, there would be little force involved. She craved something, craved it so badly that her heart felt it would jump from her chest. His hand slid abruptly higher, so that the heel of his palm now caressed her woman’s hair. She struggled to her elbows, dislodging her breast from his mouth.
“Don’t!” she cried, trying to clamp her legs together.
“I told you already, I won’t force you.” His voice was as hypnotizing as the hand, moving now in slow, thorough circles, pressing where she was most sensitive.
The pleasure was so exquisite, so intoxicating, that further protests died in her throat. She sought the Slayer’s gaze in the shadows. His eyes glittered with a sensual intent that snatched her breath away. She realized with awe that he was touching her. This dangerous man whom everyone feared, whose savage scowls made peasants run for cover, was touching her most private places and wreaking havoc on her senses.
She gasped at the wanton realization, and her breasts rose and fell, her nipples so hard that they stabbed the air. The moisture between her legs spread. The Slayer shifted to one side, and his hand shifted also, so that it was not his palm that caressed her but his long, dexterous fingers.
He lowered his head again and kissed her lips, stifling the whimper of uncertainty that vibrated her vocal chords. His fingers traced the delicate petals of her womanhood.
Slippery with her excitement, his index finger eased neatly into her passage. At the same time, his thumb pressed against the nub that pulsed above it.
Clarisse ripped her lips from his. “Stop,” she begged, disconcerted by the unfamiliar tightness. “You mustn’t do that.” She could not let her maidenhead—a precious commodity for a woman who wished to be a virgin bride—be taken from her.
“Your virtue is safe,” he assured her, as if reading her mind. “Your maidenhead is firmly lodged. ’Twould take more than this,” he stroked her again as he spoke, “to break it.”
“Why are you doing this?” she demanded, with belated panic. “You said you only wanted to kiss me.”
“I do.” He recaptured her mouth. The hot insistence of his tongue was more than she could resist. His finger moved in and out of her, and his tongue mimicked the plunge and retreat, driving her to an instant frenzy. Tension coiled in Clarisse’s belly. Then his thumb began to play with the nubbin of flesh that pulsed ever-so pleasurably at his touch.
Clarisse forgot to breathe. Something powerful, inexorable, and sweet beyond her imagining threatened to roll over her and wrap around her. Again and again, the Slayer’s finger plumbed her softness. Again and again, his tongue thrust into her mouth. His thumb slicked mercilessly over her pouting flesh, and then it happened.
She spasmed, rocked by her first climax. It flung her to a place she’d never been before. Stars seemed to flicker behind her eyelids. Her muscles clamped down hard, squeezing, pulling, milking the pleasure that went on and on.
Then with a ragged sigh, she released the breath she hadn’t realized she was holding. Her muscles went limp with exhaustion. She spasmed once again as the Slayer’s finger slipped out of her. He eased slowly away, smoothing her skirts down as he did so. Her breasts were still naked, glowing like pale orbs in the semidarkness.
He moved to her side so that he was no longer touching her. Lying with his head propped on one arm, he regarded her watchfully.
In the awkward silence that followed, Clarisse scurried to gather her wits. She sat up swiftly, fumbling with the laces at the front of her gown. Her fingers trembled so badly that she could not tie them. Shame burned up her throat and singed her cheeks. She was painfully aware of the Slayer’s silent perusal.
How could she have responded with such abandon? She was a maiden, by heaven, still betrothed to Alec Monteign—should he decide to leave the priesthood. Yet she'd behaved like the wanton leman she had once professed to be!
She wanted to die! She wanted to leave Helmsley Castle and never set eyes on the Slayer again. Yet he'd promised to take up arms for her, so that was impossible. She forced herself to focus on their agreement. After all, the arrangement had just been sealed, hadn't it?
“Now you'll take up arms for me and free my family?” She was dismayed to find her voice so thin.
His hungry gaze caused an unwanted wave of desire to surge through her. “Not quite,” he corrected. “First, you’ll agree to be my leman.”
His answer hit her like the broadside of a sword. Clarisse reared back at the unexpectedness of it. “Nay!” she cried in protest. “You said I owed you a kiss and that was all!”
“The way I tally it, lady, you owe me a great deal more than a kiss,” he retorted. “You have taken advantage of me since your arrival at my gates. If you want me to kill Ferguson, you will have to give me something in exchange. What I want is you—all of you.”
Her pulse quickened with excitement, betraying her. Her mind exploded with rage. A bright red haze rose up before her eyes. “You low-life, sneaking bastard,” she hissed, pulling back an arm to strike him.
Moving swifter than she would have thought possible for such a large man, he caught her descending wrist. Just as suddenly, he let her go. She scooted wisely off the bed, surprised to find her legs so weak as she surged to her feet.
“How dare you promise me one thing and then raise the price,” she raged at the side of the bed, wishing she could do him lasting harm.
He said nothing at all, frustrating her desire to do battle.
“Oh!” She stamped a foot on the rush mat “You ... you unchristian blackguard! How dare you blackmail me in such blatant fashion! Why, you’re nothing but a—”
“Save your breath, my lady,” he drawled. “I’ve been called those things before. Go on now,” he added, jarring her with his demand that she leave. “Simon may have awakened by now, and Nell may have need of you.”
To be thrust from his room was just as humiliating as his ultimatum. With a cry of outrage, Clarisse cast her eyes about and spied an earthenware pitcher. Snatching it up, she hurled it with all her might at the Slayer. To her chagrin, it bounced harmlessly on the mattress and landed by his thigh. She wished, then, that it had been full of water.
“Go to the devil!” she raged, marching for the door. Tears of humiliation smarted her eyes as the sound of his laugher followed her.
She gained only small satisfaction in slamming it as hard as she could behind her.
With a low whistle, Christian fell back against his pillows. Clarisse’s passionate nature was evident not only in her body’s sensual response to him but also in her formidable temper. He hoped he had not ruined everything with his vile ultimatum.
Yet from the moment he’d returned to his castle and laid eyes once more on Clarisse du Boise, he had known he would accept nothing less than having her in his bed. Even with the doubt of her lies swirling in his brain, of one thing he was certain—he wanted her. She was the most valuable prize he could imagine.
As for himself, he knew he was no prize, scarred and damaged; he’d done terrible things that he was certain made him not only unlovable but had damned his soul to hell. He could not hope to woo and win the likes of Clarisse du Boise, not to be his lady wife. That was certain. Hadn’t she just once more called him a low-life bastard? He was, but he wanted her body for his sole possession. He wanted to be around her, over her, and in her for as long as he could keep her bound to him by obligation.
While he had his hands full and his resources stretched overseeing Glenmyre as well as Helmsley, there was little allure in engaging in a long siege to oust Ferguson and seize Heathersgill. Yet he would do so for Clarisse’s sake; she had saved his son and he owed her, even with his own life.
Adding to that, he’d seen her mother and could not turn his back on the woman who had already endured such pain as his own mother had known. Nor could he imagine condemning to death Clarisse’s sisters at Ferguson’s hand.
He sighed and rolled onto his side, sta
ring at the door through which she’d exited in such a huff. Aye, whether Clarisse agreed or not, he would do his best for her family. Moreover, he could not even pray to God that she accepted his proposal for God would have no hand in such a terrible deal as he’d offered her. Yet he hoped she would consent to his bawdy proposition—in fact, he was certain she would.
She would agree to be his wagtail because she knew him not well enough yet to understand that he would help her anyway. She would sell her soul to the devil to get what she wanted. And he would accept her sacrifice willingly.
Perhaps by tomorrow evening, he would sink his aching shaft into her softness and know true fulfillment.
Chapter Fourteen
Clarisse read aloud the entire chapter on the life of St. Dunstan without absorbing a word of the text.
If you want me to kill Ferguson, you will have to give me something in exchange. What I want is you. All of you.
The Slayer’s words echoed in her head, making other thoughts impossible. She found herself at the end of the chapter with no memory of what she’d read.
Across the trestle table, Harold wore a wistful expression. Sunbeams slanting through one of the high windows bleached his flyaway hair to white. A lingering aroma of trout griddled in herbs filled the empty hall. Simon was pressed against her in his sling, lulled to deep sleep by the sound of her voice, as Clarisse fulfilled her promise to the steward. Reading, he said, was something his niece had done for him. The girl, apparently, had died quite recently.
“Did you like the story?” she asked, wresting his attention from a corner of his mind known only to him.
Harold smiled at her sheepishly. “Aye.” He sighed. “My Rose read to me like you.”
“Was that your niece?” Clarisse asked, closing the book. “Rose, that’s a pretty name.”
“Our pretty Rose has wilted,” he intoned in a singsong voice. His vague blue eyes darkened with loss.
Sympathy wrung Clarisse’s heart. She reached across the scarred plank table and touched his hand. “She is with the saints now,” she comforted, knowing Harold’s fascination for saints and martyrs.
Harold’s gaze drifted until it landed on her face. “My Rose had a baby,” he told her mournfully. He frowned as though struggling to remember something.
“Did she die in childbirth? ’Tis such a common occurrence. Simon’s mother also died,” she reminded him.
“Not Doris,” he said, sounding relieved.
“Nay, Doris is well, thank God. ’Twas her babe that died,” she clarified, thinking him confused.
He scratched the bristles on his jaw. “She was a baby once, my Rose. I rocked her on my knee. Here’s your horsey.” He clicked his tongue to imitate the clip-clopping of hooves.
“You must have been a wonderful uncle.”
“Harold, brother of John,” he said, as though introducing himself.
Awareness stirred at the edges of Clarisse’s mind, but with her thoughts elsewhere, she failed to grasp what niggled at her. Instead, she found herself recalling the conversation she’d shared with the Slayer over breakfast.
She’d had no intention of speaking to him at all, for as yet, she had no answer to his indecent ultimatum. However, hearing him recount for his men-at-arms Ferguson’s attack on Glenmyre, she’d realized he had seen her mother with his own eyes, and she’d longed for reassuring word of her.
“How did my mother look?” she’d asked, buttering her bread to avoid eye contact. Nonetheless, her face flushed crimson, and she was certain that anyone looking at her just then would have guessed her indignity of the night before.
He had turned his attention from his men to her. “Not well,” he’d said with a frown. “She seemed desperate to enter the gates.”
Desperate. The word cut into her heart like a blade, and her eyes swam with tears. “Could you not have tried to let her in?” It was useless to hide her dismay.
“I did try, lady.” He had reached out unexpectedly then, capturing her hand under his and squeezing with reassuring strength. “The foot soldiers were too close, and a second wave of men hid in the trees. The most I could do was protect her from our arrows when Ferguson called her back.”
She had almost told the Slayer then and there she would become his leman. The Scot had put her mother in the direct path of the enemy’s arrows! How could she risk the lives of her family by waiting even one more day to free them?
But pride kept her in check. There was yet another option, one that did not involve the threat to her senses, the indignity of trading her body for the Slayer’s aid. With the Abbot of Revesby’s help, there was still a chance that she could contact Alec.
The scuffle of sandals roused her to the present moment as Ethelred stepped into the great hall having come from the chapel. This morning’s service, followed by a service of prayer for Doris’s babe, had afforded no opportunity to speak with him alone. Perhaps now, she thought, seizing what might be her only chance.
“Excuse me, Harold.” She abandoned the Slayer’s book on the tabletop and hastened toward the abbot, keeping her footsteps light so as not to wake Simon.
Ethelred’s face lit up at her approach. They met by the empty fire pit.
“Lady Clarisse,” he greeted her. “Can you show me the castle’s herb garden?”
“By all means,” she agreed. It was the perfect place to talk. “However, I’ve only stepped foot in it once,” she admitted. “I believe Dame Maeve knows more about herbs than I.”
“Nevertheless,” he said, “I believe I would rather tour it with you. She is … fearsome,” he added with a grimace.
“Ah, well, the housekeeper is feeling ill in any event.” Suffering from a case of wounded pride, she nearly added. “Shall we go now? In any case, I would speak with you about a certain matter.”
She glanced surreptitiously over her shoulder. The hall was deserted at midmorning. The Slayer had left with his master-at-arms to run through drills in the outer ward.
“Lead the way,” Ethelred said, gesturing for her to precede him.
“What exactly are you looking for, Your Grace?” she asked minutes later as he paced ahead of her down a walkway of crushed shells. The cleric looked hot in his black robes. Sweat beaded on his brow as he regarded the rows of aster, tansy, and feverfew. He paused, stroking his beardless chin in contemplation.
“I wish I knew, my lady,” he cryptically confessed. His gaze hovered over a bright patch of horehound, then inspected the heavy stalks of foxglove. At last, he glanced at Clarisse.
“Do you know much about healing?” he inquired.
She shook her head regretfully. “Not I, Father. My sister Merry is being trained in the herbal arts and is already quite skilled. What little I know, I learned from her. Why do you ask?” she inquired, feeling a chill despite the heat.
He clasped his hands together and looked away. “’Tis a matter the archbishop has asked me to look into,” he answered vaguely. He turned away and paced down another shell-strewn path.
Clarisse followed his gaze and managed to summon the names of just a few of the plants crowding the narrow beds. Pink lady’s mantle, pale St. John’s wort, and purple pennyroyal. There were others, but she could neither name them nor list their attributes. She noted yet another pigeon cote next to the garden and, along with the larger coop near the livestock, she wondered at Dame Maeve’s fondness for the birds.
For the moment, Ethelred seemed content with his inspection. Then he turned toward her suddenly. “What is it you wished to speak to me about?”
Clarisse hesitated. She had waited so long for a priest to assist her. At the same time, she felt as though she were bent on a secret mission, one that the Slayer would disapprove of should he catch wind of it.
“Your Grace,” she began, plucking the folds of her salmon-pink gown. “There is a novice monk at Rievaulx, an old friend of mine. I’ve been unsuccessful at reaching him, either by missive or in person, and I fear,” she added, feeling the heat of embarrass
ment on her cheeks, “that he may be stricken by illness there.”
“What is this brother’s name?” the abbot inquired.
His probing blue gaze was not without sympathy, causing Clarisse to take heart. “Alec Monteign. He was once my betrothed,” she admitted. “But when Glenmyre fell under attack, he fled to Rievaulx.” As her words tumbled out, she was startled to find that his desertion no longer pained her.
“I believe I met him once,” Ethelred mused. “Is he a man of average stature, with golden hair and light eyes?”
“He is!” she cried. “When did you see him?”
“This winter past. He was newly come to Rievaulx, quite zealous to live the life of a monk. I remember he approached me and asked me questions about my book.”
Alec had never shared his religious zeal with her. It came as a surprise to hear of it. Had he only agreed to marry her to please his father?
“Is it at all possible to get word to him?” she asked, wishing she had more confidence in Alec’s skills as a warrior.
Ethelred thought for a moment. He gave the garden a quick but thorough inspection. Walls surrounded them on every side. The air was saturated with birdsong and the distant gurgling of the moat.
“I think I can,” he told her quite decisively. “As you know, I go to Rievaulx this afternoon to question Gilbert about the interdict. I will look for Alec while I’m there.”
“But what if Gilbert denies you entrance? After all, Rievaulx is quarantined. He might say that in your best interest, you must keep away.”
Ethelred’s eyes sparkled with adventure. “I was a master novice at Rievaulx for two years. Whilst there, I discovered something Gilbert likely doesn’t know.”
“What would that be?” she asked, intrigued by his mischievous expression.
“A second entrance into the abbey.”
“Verily?” She found herself smiling in wonder.
“Aye, in a cave on the side of the abbey hill, there is a hole, big enough for a wild animal or a small man like me. The cave leads to an underground passage and thence to the chamber where I used to gloss Psalters. Therefore, should Gilbert deny me entrance, I will still find my way inside.”
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