by Dee Brice
By Adrian’s reckoning, Arnaud died the day his twin stood in his place to marry Diane de Bourgh. What now? He swore to himself. Arnaud—now Adrian, as Earl of Belleange—needed the woman’s dowry to rebuild his home in stone. To repair his people’s cottages, to train, arm and mount men-at-arms and defend English soil from the Scots. To wage whatever wars his king deemed necessary.
Burying his face in his hands, he wanted to cry—not for his brother who had likely died happy in his drunken stupor—but for all the things Adrian could no longer afford to do.
And how, then, could his support his brother’s women? Their children? His own niece and nephews?
* * * * *
Belleange
The Great Hall
Seeing Adrian standing in front of the enormous stone fireplace, Diane hesitated for a moment. He seemed lost in thought, so focused that even the servants setting up trestle tables for the evening meal did not distract him. From the corner of her eye she saw Walker dismiss the workers before striding to Adrian’s side.
She stayed near a column between the tall oak entry doors, a step above the rush-strewn main floor. Unable to hear the men’s voices, she watched their expressions and body language in a futile effort to learn of Arnaud’s fate. Had he returned from Ireland before falling ill? Was Adrian taking a break from his brother’s sickbed? He looked tired, worried and worn—but how could he seem otherwise? Even without the twin connection, his brother’s illness must concern him in ways she, an only child in her real life, could only imagine.
Adrian bowed his head. Walker gripped Adrian’s arm, then thumped his back once. Walker motioned her to Adrian’s side, then paced away. Reaching Adrian, uncertain what to say, she took his hand. It felt warm and shook a little. He startled and looked at her, his eyes bruised as if he hadn’t slept at all in the days since they parted. Saying nothing, he drew her against him—almost as if they shared the loss of a loved one.
If he needed to pretend he was giving comfort rather than receiving it, she’d pretend as well. Wrapping her arms around his broad back, she gave him a firm hug.
“Is he…is your brother gone?” Dear God, of all the times for a ridiculous euphemism!
Holding her at arm’s length, he nodded. “Dead, yes. Drowned. His body lost at sea.” His voice gave away nothing of his grief. It showed only in his eyes, in the new-formed heavy creases bracketing his mouth, in the subtle sag of his wide shoulders.
“I…I am truly sorry for your loss, my lord—Adrian.”
He nodded, gave an apologetic half-shrug. “You will hear things about him.”
She looked at his hands on her arms. A prayer that he would mistake her response as objecting to his touch went unanswered.
“You have already heard.” His hands fell to his sides. Bitter amusement lifted one side of his mouth. “I did not always approve of what he did, but he was…”
“Your brother. You loved him.” Patting his shoulder, she added, “If you want to talk about him, I’ll listen.”
“Thank you, milady, but not now. Grant me a few days and we shall discuss what…er…our situation…”
Good grief! She hadn’t had so much as a thought about what Arnaud’s death might mean to her. Now she realized a sleepless night lay ahead—even many more, depending on how long Adrian mourned while not discussing anything with her.
Walker approached then took her arm in a firm grip. What did he think she’d do? Ten days since Adrian had left them, her butt still ached and her thighs felt bowed from being in the saddle. She could no more run away than she could ease Adrian’s grief.
But the devil duke could. If he would just let go of her arm.
“I shall escort Countess de Vesay to her rooms then rejoin you here.” With that Walker marched her up the twisty stone stairs. Losing sight of Adrian made her feel at sea—not the image she wanted swimming in her mind when her husband had drowned.
* * * * *
A widow yet never a wife. Wedded but not bedded.
What if she never returned to her own time? Would she never again know the joy of sexual satiation? Of loving and being loved in return? Which she had never known although eager to learn about the pain and joy such emotions brought to others.
Those distressing thoughts took her attention to Adrian and Walker riding side by side in front of her. She had never met Adrian’s twin—uh, duh, dummy, he’s dead!—but she wondered about their closeness. Apart from what she’d seen of his suffering, Adrian acted more as if Walker were his brother. Maybe because they were close friends already and Adrian knew Walker would support him through this awful time of mourning. Without a body to bury, Adrian must be grieving even more. Perhaps wishing he had sailed in Arnaud’s place.
From what she’d learned about her husband’s death, sober Adrian would likely have returned safe and sound. No one would have to mourn anyone. Well…she might mourn her lost life, miss it even more than she already did. But whichever man had died or might have survived wouldn’t help her now, or get her home.
Nor would mourning ease the pain in her lower body, which being on horseback had renewed. Two days’ respite—that was all Adrian had allowed her. Two rather pleasant days, she admitted. She’d soaked in a large wooden tub in front of an enormous fireplace with cauldrons heating more water should she want it. She laughed to herself. She hadn’t spent the entire two days in the tub, of course. Closer to two hours, but emerging blissfully clean from her toes to her scalp, down to her waist-length hair—an unexpected growth that puzzled her but seemed to fit the time and place.
After returning to her own rooms—another surprise since she’d expected a small cubby at best—a young woman had combed her hair until it dried, then helped her to dress. First, a clean chainse with long, tight-fitting sleeves that felt so light she would gladly have gone about in what amounted to a floor-length nightgown. Yorkshire weather being cooler than the southwest she’d left, her maid Essie had convinced her to don a looser, elbow-length sleeved cotehardie. Of vibrant green cloth of gold, the color left her breathless and half convinced she was only dreaming the intense hue and glorious material. Then she remembered that crusaders had brought home damasks, cloths of gold in myriad colors, perfumes and unknown spices worth kings’ ransoms.
And if she had to, she would admit to enjoying the covetous glances the serving women had cast her. She had also enjoyed the admiring looks Walker and Adrian had given her. Walker’s she dismissed as those he gave any reasonably attractive female. Adrian’s she cherished as taking him away from whatever thoughts weighed so heavily on him that he seldom smiled.
His continuing somberness forced her to avoid asking about her own fate. Her questions piled up like gathering storm clouds. Would he send her back to her uncle? Use her dowry to fund her lifelong incarceration in a nunnery? Did Adrian have the right to do anything he wanted to with her?
Sighing, she dismissed those questions in favor of more immediate ones.
Once again wearing slops and long hose, again astride her gentle mare, she wondered where the men were leading her. Not, apparently, back to where she’d met them. Even she recognized they would travel that far only with well-stocked wagons to feed them, their armed escorts and, above all, their destriers.
What seemed like an eternity later, they arrived at a small, thatched cottage. Smoke wafted upward, dissipating on the faint breeze. Her companions reined in their horses, Walker’s expression bland, Adrian’s resigned. Since neither man looked disturbed by the smoke, Diane guessed the cottage wasn’t on fire. As Adrian dismounted, a tow-headed lad with bright, Caribbean-blue eyes came to take his horse’s reins. The new earl tousled the boy’s hair as he passed, his steps flagging as he approached the cottage. The door opened before he reached it and a woman with white-blonde hair stepped out, one hand on her enormous belly.
Merciful God, is she one of the Days?
Diane gasped, then called out, “Wait!” Surely even Arnaud couldn’t send a pregnant woman away—especial
ly one who looked as if she might have her baby on the cottage stoop. Adrian ignored her and escorted the woman back inside. Swearing under her breath, Diane pried herself free of the saddle then slid to the ground, tugging down her short, narrow tunic.
Before she reached the path leading to the cottage door, Walker blocked her. “Get out of my way,” she demanded, shoving at him when he wouldn’t let her step around him.
“Why? So you may see firsthand the squalor Marget lives in? Or do you wish to help her pack her meager belongings?”
Diane gaped at him, her eyes stinging with tears. He’d hurt her feelings. But she refused to let him see. Raising her chin to an imperious height, she said, “Not that it’s any of your business, but I’ve changed my mind about her leaving at all.”
“Why? Because she is pregnant?” He sneered, his dark gaze lit with an unholy fire. “Or mayhap because her son has Arnaud’s eyes? All his mistresses’ spawn have de Vesay eyes. All of them are also in varying stages of pregnancy.” Walker continued to stare at her.
All his spawn? How many children had her dead husband sired? She wanted to run as far and as fast as she could just to escape Walker’s intense scrutiny. Was Diane de Vesay so unfeeling that she didn’t care the women were with child? That they, if forced to leave now, could die giving birth and their newborns perish with them? With no mother to look after them, what would the older children do? How would they survive?
Her urge to cry strengthening—this time for the Days and their children—she looked at the ground. When she felt able to meet Walker’s assessing gaze again she said, “Do the other women all have real names, as well?”
Ah, that took him by surprise!
“Aye,” he finally admitted, looking even more displeased. Because she’d forced him to confess or because…
“You know them all by their true names, don’t you?” He glared but nodded. “And you’ve…taken your ease with them, as well. Haven’t you?” He headed back to his horse. She followed, almost running to keep up with him. “And because you know their real names, they mean something to you, don’t they? You don’t want them to leave any more than Adrian does, do you?”
“No!” he bellowed, vaulting into his saddle. A kick to his mount’s sides took him away. Her own mare trotted after his chestnut stallion like a boon companion who needed no urging to follow. Adrian’s horse did a little dance, but the boy spoke in a gentle voice, quieting the gelding.
Diane started after Walker and her horse. Realizing she would never catch up with them, she turned back toward the cottage just as Adrian emerged. His gaze flickered between her and his horse, his expression rueful as he assessed the situation.
“It appears we must ride double,” he said, mounting then reaching down for her.
Without thinking, she raised her arms and felt a powerful tug before he settled her astride in front of him. Her tunic rose to mid-thigh but, with no one to notice, she held her peace. His hard thighs cocooned her bottom, a far more comfortable saddle than the mare’s. Wanting to tell him she’d changed her mind about the women leaving, she looked up at him. But he was gazing at the cottage, his eyes a darker blue that seemed to hide his thoughts.
She felt him draw a deep breath as he finally looked down at her. “I told Monday—Marget—she may stay.” He turned his horse in the direction they’d come from, leaving her to assume the other women would stay, as well.
She supposed her other self would rant and make threats, but she was proud of him for taking a stand. That other woman deserved some kind of payback for Arnaud even considering throwing out women in their condition.
“Nothing to say, Diane? No shrewish condemnations? No—”
“Nothing of that nature, Adrian.” His using her name made her heart flutter. Resisting the impulse to pat her chest to calm her racing heartbeat, she said, “I hadn’t realized she was so close.” Oh dear! What if she had known the woman was pregnant and so far along? She kept her gaze focused on the gelding’s ears.
“She hardly showed when you insisted—” As if disliking the accusation in his voice and words, he gave a great sigh, then fell silent.
“May I ask a question?” Not waiting for permission, she rushed on. “Were they… Did they work at the castle? Were they maids or cooks or—”
“Four were my sisters’ companions. The others seamstresses. All are widows who chose to stay at Belleange when my sisters married and moved away.”
Since he didn’t look as if she should have known all that, she risked saying, “Because of your brother?”
“In part.” Amusement laced his voice. “More, I think, because the children are close and their mothers wanted them raised together.”
Too curious to stop questioning, she went on. “Did the children live in the castle?”
“Where else?”
Right under that other Diane’s nose. Perhaps in a better-defended portion of the castle than her own children, should she have any. Diane de Vesay might hate her for what she was about to do, but that woman seemed more and more heartless by the minute. And even though Diane de Bourgh would never know with any certainty what had happened after she returned to her own time, she had to do something now. Even if Arnaud’s mistresses were all sluts—which they weren’t—the children shouldn’t be punished.
“I think you should move them back. At-at least until their babes are born.”
His horse stopped. She hadn’t felt or seen him pull on the reins. But she knew from her own riding lessons that skilled riders could make their horses do pretty much anything with leg pressure or by shifting their weight.
When he said nothing, she turned her head and met his puzzled eyes. “What?” she said. “Don’t you think they’d be more comfortable in the keep? I bet it’s a whole lot cleaner than a dirt-floor cottage. Not to mention warmer.”
The breeze had strengthened and now held a hint of a coming storm. Shivering, she leaned against Adrian’s warm chest. He stiffened yet wrapped his arms around her as he urged his gelding to a brisk trot. She bounced against his thighs and felt his cock stiffen.
Damnation! Could he and Walker think of nothing but sex? With his penis rubbing against her crease, her nipples pearled and her juices dampened her folds. For that matter, could she? And how strange was it that she found them both so physically appealing? On the other hand, they were the only men who’d paid her any attention or even talked to her. Her real-life, nonexistent sex life shouldn’t make her desperate for a man’s attention. So why did she wish Adrian would cup her breasts, untie her slops and slide his cock deep inside her drenched folds?
Get a grip! she told herself, noticing scaffolding rising along half-finished stone walls. A little farther along the same wall workers pulled timbers from piles of rubble.
“You’ve had a fire,” she said, looking over her shoulder at Adrian. “Was anyone hurt?”
“No, praise God.”
She waited for him to tell her more. He said nothing but his frown prompted her to probe deeper. No matter how painful he might find her questions, she had a right to know about her new home. Until she found the way back to her old one, she was stuck here. Intrepid explorer that she was, if she hadn’t seen the construction she might have broken a leg trying to get over or around it. A heavy stone could have fallen, crushing her to death.
Shivers coursed up and down her body. Adrian drew her closer but held to his stubborn resistance to talk to her.
She continued to pester, saying, “How did the fire start? What rooms burned?”
“Does it matter? With Arnaud dead and your marriage unconsummated—” He drew a sharp breath, blew it out on a huff. Setting his lips in a firm line as if zipping them closed, he said nothing more.
His brief outburst gave her a clue, one she intended to pursue. “Arnaud started the fire. What? Did he toss his tunic over his bedside candle?” She’d read that some folks did just that, with the same horrible results.
Adrian’s scowl warned her to let it go.
She had kept her tone light as if making a joke. Adrian’s growl and jerk on the reins brought her sudden fear. “I was only j-joking.”
“Were you? Or did you know he hated you for forcing him to give up his Days? Know that he was drunk when he did, in fact, toss his tunic over the candle? How?” Grabbing her shoulders, he twisted her to face him. “How did you know, witch?”
His fingers digging into her upper arms brought tears to her eyes. Willing them gone, she managed to get out a protest. “I d-didn’t. I swear—”
He lifted her straight up, then let her go. As she tumbled to the ground, he spurred his horse to a gallop.
Collapsed in a heap, for several moments Diane stayed where she was, not even trying to move. If the fall had broken any bones, the pain would let her know soon enough. A sprain or two would hurt almost as much and make getting to the castle a Herculean effort. Assuming she could limp or crawl from where she lay, did she even want to go there? And if she did…
Dear God, she could only imagine what he would do to her. Beat her. Starve her. Burn or hang her as a witch.
Struggling to her feet, she looked around for a sturdy limb. She’d use it to steady herself on her way back. Use it to defend herself if the blackguard tried to touch her. Blackguard? Was she starting to think like a woman of this time? Heaven help her, she was!
Several hundred yards ahead she saw folks gathering stuff from the ground. With her rotten luck, most likely they were removing any limbs or rocks she could use as protection. Firming her lips against anticipated pain, she set off toward the castle. With every step she vowed to find a way out of this mess.
