She tilted his head back against her shoulder and covered his mouth with her own. Her teeth nibbled at him; her tongue licked him. He was wrapped in the heat of her passion, so close to surrender. When she tried to open his mouth, he gripped the last of his willpower and held her away.
“You don’t really want this,” he said hoarsely.
He saw fury come over her face an instant before she pushed to her feet. His head fell back against the tub, and he was suddenly alone and cold, his erection painfully hard.
“Why do you keep trying to tell me what I want?” she demanded, her hands on her hips. “I can make my own decisions.”
“You’re angry and frightened because of what happened with Townsend,” he said. “This is the only way you think you can regain your authority.”
She flung her arms in the air. “I don’t know what you’re talking about!” She stalked around the screen.
He heard her flounce back onto the bed. He sat frozen, calling on all the restraint he’d been forced to develop over the years.
Rejecting Margery’s advances was insane. How was this going to work in his favor? He might drive her away permanently.
Yet…it felt like the right decision. He reached down for the bucket beside the tub, stood up, and poured it over his head. With a shudder, he let the now-cold water do its work.
Margery sat stiffly on the edge of the bed, crossed her arms over her chest, and fumed. How dare Gareth tell her what she wanted, what she needed! Every man she’d ever met had tried to influence her choices. Now she was the one in charge of her life—and he wouldn’t let her do what she wanted.
“Margery?” he called.
She frowned. “What?”
“I have no garments here.”
Her eyes widened as he came around the screen, wearing just a cloth about his hips, his skin damp, his blond hair tousled.
“I am sure no one will see me if I run down the corridor,” he said.
“You’re leaving?” Margery tried to sound confident, but only succeeded in sounding fearful.
Suddenly the thought of being alone this night brought on a wave of unfamiliar terror. What was wrong with her? In an instant, she’d gone from desire to fright. Sir Wallace had surely searched the grounds and the castle; no one could get to her. In an hour or so, dawn would lighten the sky and she’d be safe for another day.
Gareth set his pile of dirty garments on a chair, then stood beside her bed. “I promise you that from now on I will be ever vigilant. This will never happen to you again.”
Childish words spilled out of her. “I just…cannot be here alone tonight. Please—”
He sat down beside her and the mattress made her lean toward him.
“Your ladies could come sleep near you,” he said. “I shall post guards right outside your door.”
“No guards! I cannot show that I am afraid. And how could I explain all this to Anne and Cicely? Please, just…stay with me.” She breathed her last words in a soft voice as she gazed into his eyes.
“Margery—”
“Please, Gareth.” She leaned against him and rested her head on his shoulder. His skin was so warm, and smelled like soap. She heard his quick intake of breath. Now he would take her in his arms; now he would give her memories she’d grow old cherishing.
But he held her away. “I’ll stay. Let me tuck you into bed, and I’ll make a pallet before the fire.”
She wanted to groan aloud. What did she have to do, force him back onto her bed and climb atop him?
“Margery.” He said her name regretfully as he rubbed her arms. “You are not thinking clearly tonight. You have been frightened, and I’m here, and I’m…not so bad to look at. That is the only reason you are acting in this unusual manner.”
She took a sharp breath. “What? You think I cannot control myself because of your looks? Do you think—oh! You are so arrogant.” She grabbed a pillow and hit him with it.
Gareth ducked away and laughed. She came up on her knees to hit him again, then watched as he caught his towel before it fell. She had a sudden wild impulse to grab the towel away and see what he did. But he moved out of her reach.
“Do you have a spare blanket?” he asked.
She folded her arms beneath her chest and did her best to look mutinous. “In the trunk at the foot of my bed.”
She watched him make his pallet. Beneath his skin, so many muscles rippled. When the thin cloth stretched taut over his buttocks, she slid into bed and pulled the blankets over her head with a muffled groan.
An hour later, Gareth stood over Margery and watched as she slept. He had wiped most of the mud off his leather jerkin, and now wore it like armor between the two of them.
Her face was calm, no longer fearful. Although his body still protested, he was glad he had not bedded her. In the morning she would have regretted her impulsiveness. He needed her to choose him, not run in fear from her feelings.
But there would be no peaceful dreams for him tonight, or visions, either, he was certain. He knew exactly what he wanted, and it was she, regardless of the secrets between them. He had even begun to think only of letting himself take her, pleasure her. At the thought of his vengeful plans, he felt uneasy.
He banished such thoughts. They would be wed; they would have passionate nights, and probably many children to keep her busy. He would never starve again, or be forced to sleep in rat-infested inns.
He tried to picture her brothers, to imagine basking in their anger while he enjoyed the contentment of vengeance. Yet Margery’s smiling face had begun to replace such thoughts. Would she be smiling if she discovered the truth?
A sennight passed, and during the days, Gareth watched Margery keep herself busy with the harvest and the coming preparations for winter planting. Each evening he would come to her bedchamber to guard her. He knew she was still afraid to be alone, because she never asked him to leave.
Most nights she was asleep when he arrived. Then he would watch her, memorizing how she moved, the expressions on her face, the way her hair cascaded like a dark waterfall over the edge of the bed. He would imagine sliding under the cool sheets, lifting her nightclothes, and pulling her naked body against him.
Some evenings she was still awake, her eyes watching him intently as he closed the door and went to make his pallet. It was as if now that he’d rejected her, she would not approach him.
Night after night, the tension between them increased. If she just pressed herself against him, he would part her legs and take her wherever she stood. Instead he lay on his lonely pallet, listening to her breathe, his desire and his groin keeping him awake.
When he was in danger of forgetting his purpose, he prowled the room and made himself remember what she and her family had done to him. But those feelings were burning out beneath the lust that lay banked, waiting, inside him.
Chapter 20
One day a messenger arrived, and that night Margery waited for Gareth in her room, so excited she didn’t even get ready for bed. She was no longer afraid to be alone, but she let him continue his vigil.
She was sitting cross-legged in bed, staring into a candle’s flame, when he opened the door and slipped in. He never knocked, for that might awaken someone. Instead, it was always a sudden, delicious surprise when she saw him. The pleasure that moved through her kept her warm—as did the secret that she wanted to tell him.
Gareth leaned back against the door and looked at her quizzically.
She grinned.
He walked to the trunk for his blanket, eyeing her. She crawled to the end of the bed, then flung herself into his arms, making him stagger back a step. She stared up into his intent face, and her smile died as he looked at her mouth. A shudder of pleasure, of excitement moved through her. In anticipation, she slid her hands up the back of his neck into his hair.
Yet he calmly lifted her hands away from him, and went to sit by the hearth. He didn’t seem to see the room, or her, but something far away in his thoughts.
&
nbsp; Gritting her teeth, Margery followed him and sat in the chair beside him. She tried to imagine another man, her husband, here in this room with her, but she couldn’t. There were only images of Gareth—kneeling to make her a fire, changing his clothes behind her screen, standing beside her bed. She would have such wonderful memories to carry through her life, when her duties kept her alone. Yet she needed one final memory from him.
“Margery?” He suddenly got to his feet and came to her.
This was it. Her breathing was shallow; her heart began a wild pounding. Please, let him touch me, let him take me to bed. He leaned over her, blocking out the rest of the room, until her world was just the two of them. He lifted a hand and reached toward her.
“Margery, don’t move. Your necklace has—”
As his fingers neared her chest, she couldn’t help but jerk. The necklace fell in a heavy loop down her body, and beads scattered everywhere.
“—broken,” Gareth finished, smiling.
She wanted to groan. He knew just what he was doing, what he did to her. She gave a reluctant laugh, and they both got down on their knees. In the dim firelight they searched for the beads. When their fingers brushed and connected near one, Margery lingered.
“Ah, ah, ah; this one’s mine,” she said, snatching it from his palm.
“Then this one’s mine.”
His fingers slid beneath her shin and she giggled. Soon they were each scrambling for the most beads they could carry. She only knew the warm breathlessness of their bodies straining, brushing. She picked up his foot to find a bead; he reached over her back for another one.
Finally they knelt facing each other, two piles of beads before them. Margery felt her breath catch as she looked up at him, and watched his gaze drop almost lazily down to her breasts. She froze, waiting, hoping, but he merely gathered up all the beads, placed the pile on her bed table, then stood looking down at her.
“Did the messenger today carry good news?” he asked.
She smiled. “My brothers will be here tomorrow.” For just a moment before he turned away, she could swear that his face darkened with anger. She had to be imagining it.
“I haven’t seen them in so many months. And they said Peter has already gone on to London. This is wonderful news! I’ve even planned a hunt in their honor.”
Gareth leaned his shoulder against the windowsill and looked out over the dark countryside. Meeting her brothers again had always seemed like a distant nightmare, far in the future, where he’d demand satisfaction and vengefully pummel them into unconsciousness.
But tomorrow they would come, and everything Gareth had worked toward with Margery would be in jeopardy. Bolton and Welles would take one look at him—a man who brutalized people at tournaments, who was followed by a murderous curse and strange visions—and cast him out of their sister’s life.
But Margery was no longer a child, he thought, watching as she slipped behind the screen. She was a grown woman, with strong opinions and needs. And right now she needed him. He was her personal guard, the man she wanted in her bed before she married. He could not imagine her meekly agreeing with whatever her brothers said. She’d been a grief-stricken young girl when she’d last behaved like that.
He turned around as Margery reappeared, wearing her nightdress. Her long hair covered much of her body, but the gown was so fine that when she walked he could see the curve of her hip and the pale shadow of her nipples.
She glanced at him, then stared, her face serious. He didn’t know what expression he betrayed; he was beyond caring. He watched her climb into the four-poster bed and she eyed him almost warily as she pulled up the blankets and coverlet.
He should take Margery tonight. He walked slowly toward the bed, and her eyes grew wider and wider as she looked up at him. He saw the excitement, the knowledge in her gaze. She wanted him.
If he did take her, then when her brothers arrived, Gareth would have an even stronger hold over her. His seed would already be in her belly. Nothing could stop him from claiming his right to marry her.
He halted beside the bed, unlacing his tunic and shirt. She let the blankets slip down to her waist. She was breathing fast, and her eyes sparkled with that wildness that made him boil inside with need of her.
Unbidden, an image rose of her face if he claimed her as wife before her brothers. He tried to thrust the thought away, but it took hold and grew. She would be the one humiliated, not her brothers—because she would not have chosen him freely as husband.
He closed his eyes. Was this panic that he was feeling? He, who approached every battle with savage bloodlust? Her brothers loomed as vividly in his mind as cold-blooded monsters, yet they were only men. They’d been tamed by wives and children, whom they were anxious to get back to. They wouldn’t be visiting Margery for long. All Gareth had to do was make them extremely uncomfortable, and then wait until they left. This time around, he would be the one with all the power.
Margery leaned back on her hands, and her nightdress slid off one shoulder. He could see her fragile collarbone, where he wanted to place his lips. But not tonight.
He sighed, kissed the top of her head, and walked toward his pallet.
“Gareth?” Her voice was quiet.
He paused, but didn’t turn around.
“Why can’t we?”
Over his shoulder, he said, “Because you would look at your brothers tomorrow and regret it. I will not be your bad memory.”
“You are wrong,” she said with conviction.
He sighed. “I’ve been wrong before.” He stretched out on his hard pallet and flung his arm over his eyes.
In the great hall, Gareth sat beside Margery to break his fast. Though he was exhausted from little sleep, she could hardly keep still. Even at Mass she had constantly looked over her shoulder, as if her brothers would arrive at any moment. She was bursting with excitement, and he found himself more and more angry. Everything in both their lives came back to her brothers.
He left Margery to her preparations and went out to the tiltyard. Under Wallace’s tutelage, the solders and knights had become a fine fighting force. There were even a few whom Gareth thought he could take on and actually enjoy the fight.
But today he leaned against a rail and glowered at everyone.
Wallace eventually strolled over and leaned beside him. “It’s been a few days since you looked this mean.”
“I am not mean.”
“I’ll reserve opinion on that. ’Tis just that lately, you’ve been rather…jovial.”
“I am never jovial.”
Wallace sighed. “However you choose to call it, I thought you had been succeeding in your courtship of Mistress Margery.”
Gareth shrugged and frowned.
“Ah, you’ve had a problem.”
“Not until today.”
“What happened today?”
Gareth glanced at Wallace. “Her brothers will soon arrive.”
“Oh, I see.”
Gareth had a strong urge to punch that grin off Wallace’s face. But he contained himself.
“Do I need to reassure you?” Wallace asked. “You have won the lady’s affection. Surely her brothers cannot change that.”
For a moment, Gareth almost wanted to explain all of his past with Margery’s family. But he’d never had a friend who remained friendly once he learned the whole sordid truth. He had become too comfortable with the man, and that was dangerous.
Though Wallace seemed different from other men, Gareth still would not test him. “I can handle her brothers. I just wanted to warn you to steer clear of Bolton if you can.”
Wallace raised his eyebrows. “Just because I know him?”
“Why would you work as a captain of the guard if you’re inheriting a barony? He might also be suspicious that two men from his past are both here with his sister. I do not mean for you to hide, but if you can avoid him…” His voice trailed off.
“I understand,” Wallace said softly. “I shall do my best.
”
Before the midday meal, horns sounded a blast, and a dozen men on horseback came through the gatehouse. Gareth put down his blunt sword and walked to the edge of the tiltyard. He recognized the two men in the lead as Margery’s brothers, Viscount Reynold Welles, and James Markham, Earl of Bolton.
They both looked hale and fit, considering they’d just returned from defeating the pretender to the throne and his supporters. They were dark-haired like Margery, but Welles was a tall, broad mountain of a man next to Bolton’s thinner build. Welles wore plain, functional garments, while Bolton dressed as if he were going to court instead of traveling from battle.
They looked around the inner ward, where Gareth stood waiting, but they didn’t notice him. As the company dismounted, pages and squires ran to take their horses. The doors to the great hall opened, and Margery descended regally, followed by her ladies, wearing a smile that could have split her face. The last few steps, she gave a glad cry and ran to her brothers. They grabbed her up, passing her between them for hugs.
Gareth walked closer, needing to hear everything. His stomach roiled with anger and tension, and he was barely able to keep a fierce frown from his face.
Margery stood between her brothers, with their arms overlapping across her shoulders. “It is so good to see you both,” she said happily. “I worried every day that you were with the king.”
“The Irish didn’t mount much of a battle,” Bolton said with easy confidence. “We barely got dirty.”
Welles rolled his eyes. “It was not quite that easy.”
“Nevertheless, the pretender will be turning the roasting spits in the royal kitchens from now on.”
Everyone laughed, and Margery’s brothers turned to introduce her to the men they’d traveled with. More knights for her to consider for husband—more men Gareth would have to discredit. He was beginning to regret not bedding her last night.
Everyone trooped inside for dinner, so Gareth washed up and followed them. Margery had already seated her brothers at the head table, along with a few of their companions. Ladies Anne and Cicely were each seated between two men, and they looked flustered and happy.
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