by Tamara Leigh
Squaring her shoulders, she skirted the corral and entered the building that smelled of horses and fresh-cut hay. In the doorway she peered to the left and right, wondering which stall Gilbert had disappeared into. She had just determined to go left when a whinny brought her head around. Triumphant, she changed directions, coming upon Gilbert just as he began to brush his destrier's coat.
Her breath caught at the sight of him, her eyes widening as something inside her stirred to life. He'd removed his tunic, and his bare back glistened with the warmth of the smithy, the thick muscles rolling beneath his skin as he applied himself to his task.
Thinking her presence unnoticed, she hesitated a moment longer to allow her gaze to stray lower, past a tapered waist, to the cream-colored breeches riding upon his hips.
Finding herself uncomfortably warm, she swallowed hard and forced her eyes to the back of his head. "Are there not grooms to do that?"
He must have heard her approach—known she watched him—for he showed no sign of surprise at her voice. "There are," he answered indifferently. Without turning to look at her he drew the brush over the animal's flank.
Refusing to be put off, Graeye stepped into the stall and began to pick her way across the hay-strewn floor.
"Come no nearer," Gilbert ordered before she had taken more than a few steps.
"But—"
"No nearer!" he repeated. "I would not have you trampled beneath this animal's hooves."
For the first time she turned her attention upon the horse and saw what Gilbert already knew. The high-strung destrier was agitated by her presence, its limbs tense and its great eyes rolling. Snorting a warning, it tossed its head and began to paw at the ground.
"Step back," Gilbert demanded, glancing over his shoulder at her. If he was startled by her appearance, which she'd spent an inordinate amount of time on, it did not show.
Frowning, she stepped back to the stall entrance. All was not going as planned. She finally had caught him alone, and she could not get near enough to him to catch his interest.
"What is so important it cannot keep?" he asked.
"You have been avoiding me."
Though he spared her a glance—and only that—he did not pause in his labors. "Aye," he admitted, "for good reason."
She was surprised he would acknowledge it. "What reason is that?"
He kept her waiting a long time on his answer, moving about the destrier as if she had not even asked the question.
"Twas I who was not yet ready to speak of Philip," he finally said as he applied himself to the tangled mane. "The memories are still too vivid. Speaking them aloud made them come alive again."
Wanting desperately to ease the torment behind his reserve, she took a faltering step forward. "Gilbert—"
"Stay where you are," he ordered, glaring across at her. "If you do not have a care for yourself, then have a care for the babe."
He was right of course, but acknowledging it did little to assuage the hurt his angry words wrought. "Gilbert," she implored, "if I cannot come in, won't you come out? I do not wish to talk to your back."
"There is naught to talk about," he said, though he did cease with the grooming to level his unmoving stare upon her.
Graeye fought the angry fire his nonchalant words fanned to life, but she could not check the retort that sprang to her lips. "You are a stubborn man, Gilbert Balmaine. I come to make peace with you and you scorn me. Are we to live together in constant turmoil?"
It was all she could do to stand her ground and not turn and flee to the comfort of her chamber. It would be too easy to do, yet it would solve nothing.
Sighing harshly, Gilbert set aside the brush and strode over to her. Placing a hand on either side of the stall entrance, he looked down at her. "Is it peace you desire, Graeye, or merely another truce?"
With him towering so far above her, the heat from his body enveloping her, it was difficult to think straight. Drawing a broken breath, Graeye gave in to the desire to touch him. She leaned toward him and placed her palms on his chest. " 'Tis peace I seek," she whispered.
As if she had scalded him, he swept both her wrists together and lifted her hands from him. "I have warned you before," he bit off. "Do not touch me unless you are willing to suffer the consequences."
A slight, uncertain smile curving her lips, she stared up at him. "I am willing. 'Tis verily the reason I have come to you."
The anger upon his face dissolved into disbelief. "Is it a game you are playing?" .
To prove otherwise, she attempted to free her hands from his grasp, but he would not release her. Having accepted that if there ever was to be a future for them, she must yield first, she boldly stepped nearer.
"Ah, Gilbert," she sighed. "I am well and truly done fighting you."
The declaration only served to intensify Gilbert's disbelief. What did she mean she was done fighting him? That she would no longer argue with him? That she would set aside her belligerence? That she would come willingly to him that they might both find pleasure in each other's body?
As if she'd read his thoughts, Graeye leaned nearer until her breath was on his, her belly pressed to his hips. "There will be peace between us," she said as she raised herself to her toes, offering her mouth in silent invitation.
Astounded by her acquiescence, Gilbert did not immediately take what she offered, what he had so long desired. Instead he searched her face—her pert nose, the warm flush along her cheekbones, the delicate bow of her softly parted lips, and the limpid eyes she opened wide to him when he remained unmoving.
"Let it be again as it was on that first night," Graeye implored, suddenly fearful of his rejection.
Suddenly, she was in his arms, his mouth merciless, his hands urgent upon her body. Though she heard the warning voices, heard their faint cries when she touched: her tongue to his, she could not turn back. This was what she wanted.
"Would you have me stop?" he rasped against her mouth.
She shook her head, the single word she spoke lost amid the kiss that brought their mouths together again. Drawing a hand over the stubble shadowing his jaw, she pushed her fingers into his thick hair to hold more tightly to him.
He accepted what she offered—and demanded more. Hungrily, his mouth plied hers with fervent kisses, drinking from her as a man who had not quenched his thirst in a very long time. Without breaking the contact he pulled her against the wall of the stall and locked her between his thighs. Groping for the laces of her bliaut, he loosed them, then slid his hands inside only to encounter the chemise. Rumbling an invective into her mouth, he began to drag her skirts up.
A sound somewhere in the stables broke through Graeye's hazy consciousness. "Gilbert," she gasped, "we should return to the donjon. Someone might come upon us."
Breathing heavily, he lifted his head. "None would dare interrupt," he said, and closed his hand over her warm thigh.
Nay, but they might see their lovemaking, she thought. "I ... " she began, then trailed off at the thought of losing Gilbert to reasoning. Shaking her head, she slid her hands up his chest and around his neck.
Though he did not think he could wait, Gilbert saw the distress in her eyes the moment before she shuttered it with a coaxing smile. He reluctantly stepped away from her, and held out his hand. "Come," he said, "we will find privacy abovestairs."
Abovestairs? Graeye looked up and only then realized that a loft lay overhead. It would not offer the solitude of her chamber, but it was preferable to the stall. Smiling, she placed her hand in his and allowed him to lead her up the stairs.
In a corner radiant with sunlight, Gilbert gently laid her down on the hay. Having regained a measure of control over his desire, he leaned over her and leisurely savored her brilliant hair where it was spread out beneath her.
"Never have I wanted a woman more than I want you, Graeye," he said gruffly as he brushed the hair back from her brow.
She could find no words to answer him. That he still wanted her was enough. H
er heart pounding wildly, she slid her hands up over his chest, her restless fingers probing the powerful undulations she found there.
Pushing up her skirts, Gilbert pressed a knee between her willing thighs. When she parted, drawing her knees up to accommodate him, he groaned aloud. Sweeping aside her undergarments, he ran his hands over her belly, then up her sides. Tiny moans of pleasure broke from her throat when he caressed the sensitive nubs of her heavy breasts.
Arching over her, he took her cries into his mouth. Had she not been so small and he so large, it would have been a difficult task given the protrusion of her belly, but there was just enough space that she would feel no discomfort.
His mouth maintaining its possession of hers, he pressed his hips to her center of heat. When she arched upward, moving against his straining manhood, he thought he might go mad with wanting her. With the last of his restraint slipping away, he slid a hand between her quivering limbs to find her moisture.
At his touch Graeye tossed her head back and arched higher, thinking to assuage the deep ache she had first experienced all those months past. But still he held himself from her.
As he loosened his breeches, Gilbert watched the play of rapture over her flushed face. He was surprised that he had once entertained thoughts of her being a fairy, for now he saw that she was wholly a woman. Freed from his breeches, he pressed his length to her, but did not enter. In a moment, he promised himself. He did not want it to be over too soon.
"Gilbert!" His name broke from her lips as her flesh met his. Her breathing shallow and rapid, she opened her eyes and looked questioningly at him. "Do not cease now," she beseeched.
Reveling in the sweet huskiness of the voice he had been deprived of during their first joining, Gilbert tried to make sense of the words she spoke. Cease? Not even if she begged otherwise could he do that.
"Please, Gilbert," she pleaded as she reached urgent hands to his hips.
The control he sought still eluding him, he lowered his head and pressed his lips to her belly, then moved them up her body and captured her mouth again.
Graeye rubbed her torso against his, her breath coming in short gasps between the impassioned strokes of his mouth. Tilting her head back, she offered him her throat. She clasped him tighter as he laid his lips to it— kissing, sucking, and nipping her heated flesh.
When she was thrashing beneath him, her hands sliding between them to seek his manhood, Gilbert knew he could hold out no longer. Raising himself up, he easily found her moisture. His breathing ragged, his teeth clenched against the yearning to plunge himself fully into her warmth, he slowly fit himself inside her.
Though she welcomed him, her discomfort was evident in the stiffening of her spine. He held himself unmoving, allowing her to become used to bim, moisture beading on his brow with the effort to refrain from taking her too quickly.
Slowly, she relaxed, her hands sliding down his back to grip his buttocks.
Gilbert needed no more encouragement. Still, he had enough wits about him to proceed slowly. Though she had already given him her virginity, she was nearly as untried as an innocent, and this time he was determined she would reach the same pinnacle he aspired to.
Exercising control over his baser needs, he withdrew partway before sinking more deeply into her. He paused again, his eyes searching her face.
She met his stare. "Show me," she whispered, then turning her head, gently sank her teeth into his shoulder.
He surged fully into her, his thrusts quickening as she responded with tentative movements that strove to match the rhythm of his. Though he was fast losing all sense of reality, still uppermost in his mind was the need to see her satisfied before he found fulfillment himself. But when he heard Graeye's moan of pleasure, the sweet sound drove him further from his objective.
He was losing control again, he acknowledged before the thought began its slide back into his subconscious. Aye, it was not as if he could not take his ease of her now and pleasure her later, he reasoned. It had just been so long.... Groaning aloud his pending satisfaction, he thrust faster, wresting the rhythm from Graeye as he pulled her buttocks up to meet him.
"Take me with you," he heard her pleading voice even as he approached the edge of oblivion that offered the possibility of freedom from the stranglehold this woman had upon his desires. As nothing else could have done, her voice pulled him back from the brink.
"Aye, love,".he. said, wondering at the ease with which the endearment fell from his lips before setting himself to her pleasure. Like no other woman before, though there had not been so many during these past years, she responded wonderfully to his every touch and caress.
Carefully, he nurtured the heightened stirrings of her body, pausing only when it became too agonizing to deny his own needs, then resuming once he regained control. Though her release was not long in coming, it seemed ages.
He felt her tightening, felt a sudden stillness within her the moment before she convulsed amid cries of pleasure. His breath coming in sharp rasps, he stared at her lovely face, imprinting the rapture he found there forever upon his mind.
Her body softened beneath his, her features relaxing. At that moment Gilbert unleashed the storm that had been raging inside him. One moment he was straining over her, seeking that same place she had found, and the next he was rolling away. Holding tight to her, he took her with him as he fell back upon the hay.
Feeling as if there were not a bone left in her body, Graeye lay pleasantly satiated against him, her head tucked beneath his chin. Though she had known there was something beyond what she had felt that first time with this man, it was more than she had ever imagined. He had taken her to that elusive place, and she had not found it wanting. It was some time before either spoke, but when Gilbert finally did, his voice was gruff, his words terse.
"Never again refer to yourself as 'whore,' " he said. "My men will respect you as if you were my wife. Do you understand?"
She nodded, for he spoke true. Although most believed she'd been Gilbert's leman since her arrival at Penforke, none had shown her anything but deference.
"Gilbert, will you ever find it in you to forgive me the wrongs my family has done yours?" she asked as she ran her fingers lightly over his chest.
Her unexpected question jolted him—and the pain behind her words. "I do not blame you," he said truthfully.
"Aye, you do," she countered. "Naught has changed. I am still a Charwyck, and you hate—"
"Nay, I have told you, I do not hate you, Graeye."
If only she could believe him. "Then you are a fool," she replied, tilting her head back to study his face.
"And not for the first time," he said, and smiled. The dimple that she had suspected would be there if ever he genuinely smiled appeared.
She was captivated, unable to squelch the impulse to touch it with the tip of her finger. He stiffened momentarily, then smiled wider.
Her hand resting alongside his jaw, she met his gaze and thought she saw there what was also in her heart. She was stunned. Was it possible he loved her, but could not bring himself to admit such a thing—as she could not? Nay, she concluded, it had to be something eke. Contentment, perhaps.
Chapter 20
Graeye awoke in Gilbert's bed the following morning. She knew it without opening her eyes. Would have known even had his body not been curled around hers, his arm encircling her thick waist. The long night of love they had shared could not be easily wiped from her mind. Too, it had only been a few hours since sleep had finally taken her.
She looked around the bright, sun-streaked room— evidence that late morning was upon them—and her gaze rested on a delicately worked wall hanging. She had noticed it yestereve, so out of place was it. Truly, it was the only thing in the lord's solar worth taking note of.
Not once since she had been at Penforke had she entered Gilbert's private chamber. Until yestereve she had not been fool enough to do so.
The only unexplored room, it had come as a surprise. Unlike
the rest of the donjon, it was sparsely outfitted, its furnishings shabby and aged. Mostly, though, it was a cold place, no warmth to be found anywhere except in that beautiful wall hanging, which depicted each of the four seasons.
As she would be sharing this room with Gilbert henceforth, would he mind if she made changes? she wondered. It was simply too dreary to contemplate spending much time in otherwise. His hand caressing her belly pulled her back to his presence.
" 'Tis good you are such a large man, Gilbert Balmaine," she murmured, thrilling at the sensations his fingers kindled over her taut skin. " Twould not be so easy for you to fit your arm round my waist were you not."
Deep, sleepy laughter rumbled in his chest as he nuzzled the back of her neck. " 'Tis better you are such a small woman."
Her brows knit as she remembered what Lucy, the healer, had said to her several weeks past. Though she had tried not to think too much about it, Lucy's words frightened her. "Lucy says my labor will be difficult," she said. "I am too narrow."
Gilbert grew still. It had not occurred to him the effects of birthing on one so small. Foolish! he chastised himself. Had not his own mother, a woman not much larger than Graeye, died after giving birth to Lizanne?
Squeezing his eyes closed, he hugged Graeye tighter. The thought that he might lose her tore at him in a way that defied close scrutiny. The only thing he knew for certain was he could not lose her. The light she had brought to his life still had many shadows to chase away.
The admission surprised him. It went beyond desire, beyond what he had felt for the woman he had once been betrothed to. And he had fancied himself in love with Atrice. What, then, did he feel for Graeye?
"Are you still awake?" she asked, easing onto her back.
He loosened his hold. "Aye," he said, pushing himself up on an elbow to look down at her. Reaching forward, he brushed the hair from her silvery eyes. "Do you not worry. Lucy is a skilled healer and has delivered many children. You will be fine."
