“Why are they so far from home?”
“Perhaps we can discover that while we all eat. Here comes Meg with the additional food I requested.”
“It is needed.” Catryn blushed as she watched Meg set out the food. “I was rather hungry.” She ignored his grin as she moved toward the table.
Once the food was served and everyone had a plateful before them, Catryn asked, “Where are you traveling to, Mrs. Pryce?”
“To Portsmouth,” she replied, “and please, call me Mervyn, m’lady.”
“Thank you, and you must call me Catryn.” She could tell by the looks on both women’s faces that they might have trouble doing so comfortably. “Are you taking a journey?”
“Nay, we are collecting my husband.” Mervyn sighed. “He was taken up by the military press gangs when he was on a journey to gain something for His Grace. It was months before we knew what had happened to him and more months before His Grace could get the authorities to get him free of service and returned. I fear he was wounded or injured in some way. His letter to us when he knew he was being sent home was not all that clear. They had sent him to India. My Llywd, who rarely went beyond the Elderwood lands.” She shook her head. “I am not sure what will happen to us now.”
“You will return to Elderwood, will you not?” said Orion.
“But to what kind of life? My Llywd may be seriously wounded or sickly. His Grace . . .”
“Will find something that he can do to earn his keep and find pride in the doing of it.”
“Are you certain of that?”
“I am. He chose your Llywd to work for him. As what, may I ask?”
“Oh.” Mervyn’s smile was a little shaky. “My Llywd is an educated man and His Grace chose him to help with the books and, on occasion, in seeing to some of the books from the other properties; or even finding the best price for our wool or horses. The pressers must not have believed him when he told them he was the Duke of Elderwood’s man of business.”
Mrs. Pugh grunted in a soft sound of disgust. “They did not care. They saw a big, strapping man and wanted him to fill their ranks. He would not take the shilling so they just took him. It is near to a miracle that His Grace found him as quickly as he did.”
“It did not feel so quick, but aye”—Mervyn nodded—“I understand how easily we could have lost Llywd forever.”
“Modred will find work for him,” Orion said again and looked right at Mrs. Pugh. “It is not easy for my cousin to find ones he can work with or be around for any length of time.” When the older woman frowned and then nodded in understanding, he looked at Mervyn. “No matter how serious a wound your husband has suffered, Modred will not cast him aside. He is much too valuable to him, for his work and for the fact that my cousin can actually work with him. And Modred is also a very loyal man to those who have served him well.”
The rest of the meal went quickly, conversation moving to more traditional topics such as the weather. Catryn watched the boys play and inwardly sighed, missing her own son. She was apart from him for a good reason, however. Until the threat Morris presented was ended, in whatever way necessary, Alwyn would always be at risk and she would not tolerate that.
“I think they suspect that we are more than traveling companions,” said Catryn as she readied herself for bed and peeked around the privacy screen to look at Orion.
She was pleased that he had offered his bedchamber to the women and children but still felt a little awkward over how that must look to Meg and the family now using his bedchamber. Although she had decided she could risk her reputation, she was uneasy about doing so in such a blatant way. There was no doubt in her mind that neither Meg nor the other women believed he would spend the night in the parlor.
“I would say that suspect is the wrong word,” he said. “’Tis more like a certainty.”
She blushed and ducked back behind the screen. “Whenever that realization struck them, it did not appear to change how they treated us.”
“Of course not. They are not of society and have a much more practical nature. What you and I do, as adults, a man and a young widow, is not something they consider their concern. Then, too, one of them is a Pugh and I suspect she is well versed on my clan, both the Vaughn side and the Wherlocke one.”
“By well versed you mean that she knows there are a lot of rogues within your family?” she asked as she hurried across the cold floor and slid into bed at his side.
Orion bit back a smile when she curled up by his side and he wrapped his arms around her. She wore her maidenly night shift, her hair properly braided. Despite that appearance of utter innocence, she did not hesitate to join him in the bed or curl up in his arms. Her small hand stroked his chest with obvious pleasure. He knew that when he started to make love to her, all that maidenly sweetness would disappear and she would become a fiery wanton in his arms. It was an odd mixture that he suspected could fascinate him for a long time.
“She has undoubtedly heard a few tales. We breed mostly boys, and that means there are always a goodly number of single young men doing what single young men are apt to do.”
“Ah yes, the type of things that so many like to tsk-tsk over even while they gather up and retell every tale they can and do so avidly.”
His eyes widened when she slid her hand down over his stomach and curled her soft fingers around his erection. There was a hint of tension in her body and he knew she was awaiting rejection, so he did his best to remain still and as calm as he could be with those long, delicate fingers shyly stroking him. The tentative way she explored him so intimately told him that she had never done such a thing before and that only made his desire burn hotter.
Catryn heard Orion make a soft murmuring sound of pleasure as she stroked him. It was enough to banish all her hesitancy. This part of a man had fascinated her since her wedding night. She had never seen a grown man naked until Orion, who plainly had only pretended modesty due to his scars, and she had never touched her husband in such a way during those silent, uncomfortable couplings in the dark. Until Orion she had never thought it something that could bring her any pleasure, either, and had decided its only use was to allow a man to relieve himself and to breed children.
The way Orion intimately touched her brought her a wondrous pleasure and she had suddenly wondered if she could give him the same. He had certainly hardened quickly when she had touched him. What surprised her was how her own desire grew stronger as she stroked him. She soon wanted to be in his arms, to feel the heat of their flesh blend. As she shifted to move up his body, she impulsively kissed him. He groaned and threaded his fingers in her hair, gently holding her in place. Catryn daringly ran her tongue along his length. Orion’s reaction to that intimate caress was all the encouragement she needed to continue.
It was not until she took him into her mouth that her play was abruptly interrupted. Orion caught her up under her arms and dragged her up the length of his body. She opened her mouth to ask if she had erred only to have her question smothered by her night shift as he pulled it off over her head. And then she was on her back and he began to intimately caress her as he kissed with a hunger that had her heart pounding with anticipation. Since he was not acting as if she had shocked or offended him, she wrapped her body around his and let him lead the dance that always left her so well pleasured she could barely think.
Orion finally regained his senses enough to breathe more evenly and start thinking again. He quickly made certain that he had remembered to fall a little to the side when he had collapsed from the strength of his release so that he did not crush Catryn beneath him. Then he smiled. She was splayed out beneath him as if she had been knocked unconscious, the only sign of life being the way she was still panting. As he watched her breathing grow more even, it was a relief to realize that he had not shocked or frightened her with his sudden, fierce need to be inside her. When she slowly opened her eyes, he kissed her.
“Well”—she cleared a lingering huskiness from her voice—“t
hat was very energetic of us.”
He laughed. “True. I fear your ardent attentions to my eager body made my need for you grow rather fierce.”
“Ah, so I did not do anything wrong.” She blushed as she realized she may have just initiated a discussion of intimacies that she was not sure she was ready for.
Brushing a kiss over her blush-warmed cheek, he said, “No, you did nothing wrong.” He nipped her earlobe. “A little more practice, a few careful instructions, and you will succeed in leaving me too sated to move for days.”
She felt the warmth of his breath warm the side of her neck as he laughed, and swatted him on the arm in retribution. “Rogue. I do not think you should be saying such improper things to me.”
“Cat, we are naked together in a bed. I believe that gives us leave to speak of almost anything.”
“Ah. There is that.”
He was still chuckling when he got out of bed, washed up, and then came back with a damp cloth to clean her off as well. It was a very gentlemanly thing for him to do, but Catryn had to fight the urge to hide beneath the covers. When he got back into the bed, she was still a little tense with embarrassment, but relaxed when he pulled her into his arms. It felt too good to be there with him, skin to skin, to let something like acute modesty ruin it.
“Such a modest lass,” he murmured and kissed the top of her head, then laughed when she gave the hair on his chest a punitive tug. “I find it sweet.”
“Sweet?” She frowned. “I am naked in a bed with a lover. I am not sure I wish to be thought of as sweet.”
“And what would you like to be thought of as?”
“Wild? Seductive? Intriguing?” She smiled when he laughed again.
“You are all of that with a touch of sweetness.”
For a few minutes she simply enjoyed being held in his arms. If anyone had ever told her that she would enjoy being naked with a man, she would have laughed heartily. Curiosity would have made her willing to take a good look at a naked man, but she could never have imagined how good it would feel to be skin to skin with one. Then again, she had never imagined she would find herself with a lover like Orion. He was a man who could tempt the most saintly of women into behaving badly.
That made her think of just how many women he had tempted and how few he had refused when they had invited him into their beds. It was not a pleasant thought. She could not help but fear what comparisons he might have made and how she might have suffered in those comparisons.
Shaking that thought aside, for it was far too depressing to dwell on, she then wondered how and when their affair would end. As a married woman and then as a widow, she had become privy to a lot of gossip about men, husbands, and lovers, and even some men to whom women claimed they would give a fortune to have as a lover. Some women suffered for taking a lover, while others appeared to be forgiven for having a whole string of them.
She had also learned that the end of an affair could be painful and very messy. She would not allow her time with Orion to end that way, she vowed. Catryn thought on how, right after she had given Henry a son, several women had advised her on the matter of conducting an affair properly, as if they had no doubt that she would soon enter into one. Discretion, she had been told, was a must. She grimaced, knowing she had already failed miserably in that. The other rules had been much simpler. Do not cling to the man. Do not expect love and devotion and never, never demand it nor give it. Do not expect the affair to last.
It had all sounded so very sordid and even sad, yet here she was with a lover. Catryn decided she would do her best to follow all those rules but knew she would never be able to control her own heart. All she could do was try very hard not to make a complete fool of herself.
Chapter Fourteen
Catryn woke and looked at the man she was curled around. He looked so handsome even in sleep that she could easily have found that annoying. No one should look that good while sleeping. She grinned at such nonsense and idly wondered what would be the best way to wake him up.
The man had turned her into a wanton, she decided as she rested her cheek against his chest and began to trail her fingers down to his taut stomach. Before this, if anyone had suggested that she would enjoy being naked with a man, including her husband, she would have been shocked right down to her slippers and then had a hearty laugh.
Henry was the very last person she wished to think about while lying in bed with Orion, but memories of the nights spent with her husband were suddenly crowding into her mind. Darkness, very little touching, and only the parts necessary for breeding bared when it was time for the joining. It had been a chore, not a pleasure or even a true bonding between a man and his wife. Worse, too many of those times were now memories seen through a thick fog. It was as if she had dreamed those times Henry had come to her bed, but Alwyn was proof that he had.
Uneasy now, she struggled to bring those memories more clearly to mind, but that proved impossible. She could always recall that she had gone to bed, even how she often fretted over the possibility that Henry would join her, and then nothing until she woke in the morning with an ache between her thighs. The puzzle was about why she had not fully woken up when her husband had climbed on top of her. It could not be usual for a woman to sleep through such an activity. She had not slept through far less intrusive things, such as the maid coming into the room to light the morning fire.
“Ouch.”
Catryn looked up to find Orion frowning at her. Then she looked down at where her hand rested on his stomach. She was no longer lightly stroking that smooth, warm skin. Her hand was partly clenched, her nails prodding his flesh. She blushed and tried desperately to relax her hand, but the thought of how Henry had crept into her bed at night would not be shaken from her mind and kept her tense. There was something wrong with what she was recalling, but she could not think what it could be, and that only added to her rapidly growing unease.
Orion reached down and took her hand in his. “I was enjoying your caress and about to request that you take it lower. Pleased I did not.” He kissed her palm when she gave a shaky laugh. “What troubles you?”
She flopped onto her back and stared up at the ceiling. “I suddenly thought of Henry.”
“Obviously not in a pleasant way.” Orion nearly winced and then told himself not to be a fool as it was obvious that her memories of her late husband were neither fond nor welcome.
“No. I rarely think of Henry in a pleasant way. He was not a husband one recalls fondly. He inspired no fondness when he was alive, either. No, I just remembered how I never spent time abed with him like this, never saw him unclothed save once when he was shirtless only, and never touched him like this. Nor he me. Then I recalled that I can barely remember the beddings.”
She blushed even as she scowled, uneasy about speaking of such personal matters yet feeling compelled to do so. “It is as if it all happened in a dream. I would go to bed a little concerned that Henry would come to visit, which was never a pleasant matter, and then wake up in the morning knowing that he had, but not truly knowing what had happened and when. It was as if I had dreamed the whole thing, yet I know I did not because of that pain.” She looked at him. “Surely a woman cannot sleep right through such an event?”
“I would not have thought so and, thank God, I have never had any proof of it.” Orion was pleased to see her smile but he did not like the implications of what she was saying, yet could think of no reason for a man to drug his wife just to bed her. “Were you a nervous bride, afraid of the bedding? One who would shake or cry?” It was hard to think of the passionate woman at his side as a terrified bride, but he had not known her then, could not know how she may have changed since her wedding day.
“Every bride is nervous on her wedding night, but I was prepared. Even when it proved to all be such a severe disappointment, I was accepting of that, too. I wished to be a good wife and I wanted children. It was never a pleasant duty, however, so I am puzzled by how little I remember of it. One always r
ecalls unpleasant things clearly, as if the mind wishes for you not to forget and thus fall into the same trap again and again. And one always recalls what it is that causes pain.”
“Did you have anything to eat or drink before you settled down to sleep?”
“Of course.” She pointed to the small tankard of cider on the small table by the bed. “I always have a nice drink of some hot tea or spiced wine or cider as I read a little before sleeping. It helps me to push aside all those little irritations of the day that can keep one awake for hours.”
“It sounds to me as if your husband may have put something into your nightly drink.”
The moment Orion spoke that suspicion aloud, Catryn knew it for the truth. There had been a time or two in her life, such as when she had been sunk deeply in grief over the loss of her mother, when she had been given something to help her sleep. She had strongly disliked it and never taken it again, hating the way it pulled one into sleep against one’s will and left a person groggy, one’s thoughts all in disorder, in the morning.
Catryn was embarrassed that she had not recognized that she had been suffering the same sensations. Now that she examined her fog-shrouded memories carefully, she knew it was exactly the feeling she had had in her marriage bed, right up until the moment she had gotten with child. The dark-of-night beddings had ceased then, too, and she had no trouble recalling everything that had happened during the nights following that moment. Never again had she awoken sore and her mind cloudy, with no more than a few scraps of memory to explain why she was experiencing that discomfort.
“That bastard,” she hissed, clenching her hands into fists and wishing Henry was there so that she could beat him senseless as he so richly deserved. “But why do that? I did not refuse him or scream or weep.”
“I have no answer for that and, since the fool is dead, I fear the reason is lost.” He leaned over to brush his lips over hers. “Do you think we can kick the late, unlamented Henry out of our bed now?”
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