One glance at her creamy flesh, her pert, rose-tipped breasts and womanly form, and his body had hardened in preparation for bedding her. Not that he’d arrived at her door with that intent, but years of it meaning exactly that had trained his body to ready itself…and to do it quickly, for there was no telling how much time he would have to enjoy the lady involved.
Now, she sat on a stool near the fire, unmoving but enticing him again with the curves of her body that pressed against the soft folds of her robe and shift. The Saxon garb she usually wore hid most of her figure from his sight, so seeing her without the layers and veiling tempted him more than even that first night and his first sight of her in the bed.
Soren wanted no witnesses to his bath, so he pushed the door open wider and nodded his head to them. Although the older one looked as though she would argue, wisely she kept her words to herself. The younger one had no such sense.
‘Lady Sybilla?’ she asked. ‘Should we go?’
‘Aye, go,’ he ordered, though he did not shout it as he wanted to.
For some reason, there was a feeling of calm in this chamber, even from the lady, and he did not wish to disturb it. ’Twas almost like he’d entered a refuge of some kind, a safe and restful place. Not what he would ever think a bedchamber to be and it did not make sense to him, but he accepted it and gave them another nod. He closed the door to find her standing.
‘Do you wish me to leave?’ she asked. ‘I suspect you want the privacy this chamber offers and will give you that.’ She took a step, an unsteady one, towards him and the door.
‘Nay,’ he said, imagining what the men in the corridor would see and think as the lady proceeded down past them. He shook his head before remembering that she could not see him. ‘Nay, there is no need.’
The lady stepped back and sat down once more, turning her back to him and giving the illusion of choosing not to look. Soren walked to the tub and dipped his fingers in the water. Warm, but not hot. He noticed the buckets along the wall and poured them in. Now steam rose from the surface and he smiled. It would feel wonderful to soak in this.
Unable to break his habit, he walked into the darker shadows in the corner of the room and peeled off all the layers of clothing he wore. With the worst of his injuries hidden by the darkness, Soren stepped into the tub and sank below the water’s surface. He might have moaned and was not certain he had until her soft laughter echoed across the chamber to him.
Soft yet nervous laughter.
‘I confess—a hot bath is a weakness of mine, lady.’
Had he said too much? He did not expect to converse with her, but to ignore her completely while using her chamber and while she sat but yards away seemed ridiculous. Soren had always like being clean and baths with the help of a willing woman usually led to other pleasures, but since his injury a hot bath helped to ease the tightness in the skin now stretched tautly to cover the gaping wound he had suffered.
He opened his eye and watched as she lifted the brush she held and ran it through the length of her hair. Soren shifted in the water as his cock hardened and rose. He’d seen it loosened and lying around her shoulders in the bed and he’d seen it braided and arranged. Now, clean and shiny from the brush strokes, he fought the urge to go and tangle his hands in it. When he moved too fast, trying to look away and focus on his…feet, the water sloshed over the side and on to the floor.
Then it was his curse that echoed across the room. Soren settled back in the water and cursed again, this time under his breath. He noticed she’d stopped in the middle of a movement and sat with her arms raised.
Mayhap this was not the good idea it seemed to be when he planned it? The boy must have mixed up the message he’d sent to Sybilla to inform her. What had Raed told her? Soren reached over the side and dipped his hand into the bowl of soft soap. Scooping some into his palm, first he lathered his hair and then spread more over his arms and chest, massaging the scars and rough patches of skin until they softened and eased.
‘What did the boy tell you earlier?’ he asked as he reached for more.
At first she paused, then she stood and took a few steps in the direction of the tub…and him. Her eyes were open, the swelling that had closed them gone now, but she remained sightless. The lady held her hands out before her, trying to feel her way across the chamber. Uncertainty covered her face and soon she stopped and remained still.
‘He truly is not at fault, Lord Soren.’ She clutched her hands together now, her hair swinging about her body and reaching all the way to her hips. ‘Pray thee do not beat him for this.’
She thought he would punish the boy over this? He felt the anger rising, but tamped it down. By judging him in this manner, she did nothing that others, even his own men, did not do. Still…though he’d raged at the boy, he’d not touched him in anger even once. And in spite of that raging and in spite of the fact that Soren was convinced the boy had seen him clearly at the stream, Raed never seemed afraid of him. The boy never ran from him or failed to meet his gaze when speaking. Yet the lady thought he would suffer for this misstep.
‘What did the boy tell you?’ Now he truly was curious about the message carried here.
‘He said you were sending a bath here.’
‘And?’
She shook her head. ‘That was all he said.’
Soren was beginning to see what had happened. ‘And you thought the bath was meant for you?’
‘Aye,’ she said. Did she realise she blushed now? A becoming bit of pink crept into her cheeks, erasing the pallor of this last week and replacing it with something more attractive.
‘I do not mind sharing my bath with you, lady,’ he said, purposely misunderstanding her.
Sharing a bath could be a pleasurable few hours while sharing bath water was usually a necessity. Filling a bath tub of this size took considerable work and would not be for only one person in most situations. It would be set up in the kitchen area near the hearth so the water did not need to be carried far from the fire. Having one here today was a luxury, an indulgence, one not to be repeated often.
‘Share your bath? Surely not,’ she said, a bit too breathlessly for his own comfort.
An innocent who had no idea of the possibilities in pleasure between a man and a woman. Well, he did and his body did, too, reacting to the thoughts racing through his mind now that involved this tub, hot water, soap and the woman standing before him. So much for his finding a refuge of peace and quiet. He needed to change the direction of this conversation and his thoughts before all his control was lost and he was pulling her into the tub or tumbling her onto the bed and taking the wife he was still not certain he wanted.
Soren understood that what had happened to her, with her, that first day and night, had given him a reprieve of a sort. Time to sort things out once the haze of his rage eased and time to avoid mistakes that would haunt him for the rest of his life.
One such mistake was taking her as wife.
He’d done it in the heat of battle, in spite of his words to Stephen to the contrary. Now, he knew that consummating their vows would have bound her to him, leaving no way out. Once he’d made that decision, though, the thoughts of her and the images that seemed to occupy his mind were all of the passionate kind. As she’d begun to heal a bit and come around, evidenced by her plucky resistance to his demands for the location of the manor rolls, Soren found her occupying his thoughts much more than he wanted to admit. Now she stood before him, dressed in only the thinnest of bedrobes, blushing and breathing in a manner that spoke of arousal…or at least interest.
‘So what did you think this bath meant, if not to share it with me? Did you think I was being kind, then?’
Would he never learn, or rather unlearn, his damned attraction to women? When would he realise that this was going in a dangerous direction? But years of flirting with and enjoying the company of women, beautiful and plain, high-born and common, had taught him habits that were nigh impossible to forget. And even the recent sc
orn and fearful reactions of women to his new appearance had apparently not burned it out of him either. She stammered at first, then shook her head as though refusing to answer, but she closed her eyes, tilted her head up as though offering a prayer of some kind and then spoke.
‘We…I…I thought you meant to claim your marital rights,’ she proclaimed, looking none too happy over the possibility of it.
This explained much. Soren’s men had been staring at him all afternoon in a strange way. Smiling at him, too, in an unexplained manner and for no reason. But now he understood what they thought, what they all thought, thanks to one untrained boy’s misspoken message—they believed he was here to bed her. Part of him wanted to laugh over this and part wanted to get out of the tub, peel off her robe and claim those marital rights.
He could almost hear Lord Gautier laughing at him in that moment. And as he searched for the right way to handle this, he knew that mayhap he was not as far gone as he and many others had thought him to be. A bit of the man he used to be crept into his soul.
‘And is that what you want me to do, Lady Sybilla?’
Chapter Ten
Why had she foolishly admitted the truth to him?
She should have remained quiet and not spoken and not engaged him in this conversation that was now mired down in a dangerous place. If he’d only wanted a bath, that was all right with her, but talking about sharing a bath had caused such strange feelings to rush through her body. Then one word led to another, a question to an answer and so on until now she’d unwisely shown him that she had thought he was here to share her bed!
Sybilla reached up and pushed her hair away from her face. Loosened from its braid and freshly washed, it was an unruly mass that surrounded her shoulders and face with a mass of curls. She realised that no man had looked on her hair this way. Why was she thinking such frivolous things when he waited for an answer from her?
He’d stopped washing, for she could hear no sound of water splashing or movements in the tub. Did he stare at her now? She swallowed once and then again, but her throat grew tight in nervousness. What did he look like naked if he looked so formidable across a field of battle?
She shivered at the very thought of such a thing. He cleared his throat, reminding her that he was awaiting her response. Sybilla squared her shoulders and shook her head.
‘Nay.’
She heard him move then, the water sloshing and splashing as he must be standing and stepping out of the tub. Sybilla wrapped her arms around her and tried not to shake too much. His steps moved closer until she could feel the heat of his body near hers. But he’d given her an opportunity to speak her mind, so she decided to be bold, much bolder than she felt.
‘I had planned to ask your leave to go to my cousin’s convent.’
‘When were you planning to ask that, lady?’ he asked, his voice coming from just above her and to her right. She turned to face him and lifted her face.
‘The day you attacked. I was going to relinquish my claim to these lands and retire to my cousin’s convent in order to save my people from harm.’ She shrugged. ‘You gave me no opportunity to do so.’
The silence, broken only by his breathing, made her uneasy. Sybilla took a breath and released it, trying to calm the racing of her heart. Did he truly stand so close with nothing between them? She could smell the scent of the soap he’d used when she inhaled and could imagine him smoothing it over his skin. She shivered again.
‘So, you wish to become a nun, then?’ he asked, his voice almost a whisper, teasing her ear with his breath.
Oh, dear Lord in heaven, he was that close!
She desperately wanted to move away, but dared not. Was he giving her the chance now that he’d not done before? Would he let her go?
‘No, not a nun,’ she stuttered. ‘But I could live a contemplative life there.’ Her claim was a bold one and one that would be refuted by almost any person who knew her.
Suddenly, he stood behind her, grasping her shoulders and drawing her back against him. His body was like a stone wall, all hard with no softness to be felt anywhere. Sybilla knew enough about how men and women joined in carnal knowledge to know what part of him pressed against her back now, but she tried not to think of that. Then he leaned down and whispered again.
‘Would you give up all that you have, Lady Sybilla? Would you be able to obey and live quietly?’
He moved one arm across her, holding her to him while he used the other to slip into her hair and move it to one side. His breath tickled her neck now and she tried to ease away. Instead it opened the whole of her neck to him. Exposed, held securely against him, she was vulnerable in a way she’d never felt before. She should be crying out in fear, but her body reacted most strangely—her breasts swelled under the weight of his arm, her skin tingled yet ached for something more and the place between her thighs grew moist and heated.
‘Would you give up everything?’
The touch of his tongue on her skin made her jump. Then he kissed the same spot. Over and over he placed his mouth on the sensitive place and kissed it. She could not help the gasp that escaped when his teeth nipped her skin, not enough to hurt but enough to send icy hot tremors through her whole body.
Enough to make her come to her senses!
‘And what, Lord Soren, do I give up?’ she asked, straightening her head and tugging free. ‘Lands and people that are no longer mine? A husband who came within seconds of killing me and now plans to use me only as a brood mare? A life lived blind, unable to see or do anything that gave me pleasure or satisfaction? What exactly do I stand to lose by entering the convent?’
Time spun out between them as she stood in the darkness that was now her world, awaiting his response. Sybilla half-expected him to strike her now for her insolence, just as her father would have if she’d spoken to him in this manner. The touch of his mouth to hers was not what she expected.
This time he did not hold her in place. He simply placed his lips on hers and kissed her. She gasped at the feel of it and then felt his tongue slipping inside her mouth. Stunned, shocked and completely inexperienced in such things, Sybilla did not know what to do. She’d been kissed before—her parents, family, even her father’s overlord—but never by someone in this intimate manner. When his tongue touched hers, swirling around it, and pressing more firmly against her mouth, Sybilla forgot about everything else.
He recognised his mistake as soon as he got close to her. Old habits died hard and his enjoyment of taking pleasure where he could came roaring back at him. This was his wife, after all—he could take her to bed and pleasure her and no one could naysay him. It was right…his right. But her words took him out of his need for pleasure and to the heart of the matter.
He had come here to kill her.
He had taken her lands and everything and everyone she held dear, to what extent she still did not know.
He had stolen her sight and whatever life she could have had.
Sybilla had spoken the truth of it all, yet her mouth beckoned to him anyway. The urge to touch those full lips and silence her with pleasure overwhelmed his control. He would show her what she would miss if he had their marriage annulled and let her go to the convent.
So, he stole but one kiss.
Only to show her the folly of her belief that she had nothing to lose. To demonstrate that she would miss something. Instead he taught himself a lesson, one that would be difficult to forget.
The woman he’d married might be blind and might be innocent, but he could feel her arousal, feel it against his mouth and taste it on her tongue. If he continued and deepened the kiss the way his body urged him to, her mouth would soften even more against his, her breasts would swell in his hands, the nipples would tighten into buds and he would suck…
Merde, he thought as he fought the passion that rose within him, he could have her beneath him in minutes, if not sooner, both of them panting and him kissing parts of her body she most likely had never considered having kis
sed… She would arch to his touch and call out his name…
Durward’s voice, his laughter as he attacked from behind, echoed in Soren’s head at that moment and he pulled back at almost the instant he was about to surrender to the need to have her. He stepped back, releasing her mouth.
Her expression showed her surprise and her confusion. Though her eyes could not see, she blinked as though waking from a slumber and frowned. Her mouth, the one that would tempt him again this night in his dreams, closed into a thin line. The flush of arousal still coloured her cheeks.
Soren pushed down the concern he felt growing even as the passion cooled. He ruthlessly ignored all the things he knew she needed to hear from him, from a man of his experience, from her husband, and walked away. Picking up the clean garments near the tub, he dressed hurriedly and turned to face the door.
He would not give in now to weakness when it was his inner strength that had kept him alive this long. He could not relent and let her in or even close to him. He had almost made his escape when her soft voice echoed across the chamber.
‘Do you give me leave to go to the convent?’
It would be the easier of the possible paths to take. It would be almost the kindest thing to do rather than condemning her to the life he’d planned for her. It would make complete sense, considering her condition and her inability to carry out the duties expected of the lord’s wife.
What had begun as teasing, as flirting, had turned deadly serious with only a kiss. Soren had plans, plans he’d paid for with his own flesh and blood, plans that he’d spent months making and refining and waiting to see come to fruition. Now, when everything was on the edge of success, could he step back and forget all he’d suffered because of a kiss? The heartless monster everyone thought he’d become battled with the better man he always wanted to be in that moment.
His Enemy's Daughter Page 8
