Kate made a tiny impatient sound. Her eyes opened. Questions filled her gaze.
Only then did Rafe understand himself. Other women he took, using them as he would, but not Kate, never Kate. By his will and her words, she was fated to be his wife, the woman who would share his bed for all the days of his life. He needed to know she desired him and that he alone would be her passion.
“You have told me I mustn’t kiss you, my lady. If a kiss is what you want, then it must be you who kisses me,” he whispered. With each word, his lips brushed hers, the sensation a most delicious torment. It was true. Not to kiss her was to die, but it was the sweetest sort of death he’d ever imagined.
Kate hesitated, a tiny furrow marking her smooth brow. Then, just when he feared she would retreat, she touched her mouth to his. Rafe groaned against her lips, so wondrous was the sensation. His. She was his, and she wanted him.
Her mouth moved on his just a little, then again. Rafe shivered at her innocent attempt to stir his desire. Oh God, to think that he and no other man would teach her the joy that could be had between them.
That thought was his undoing. Need exploded in him. His arms tightened about her until she was crushed against him. His mouth took hers, demanding, nay, pleading that she yield to him. She gasped against his onslaught then met his need with her own. His mouth left hers to kiss a path along the slender line of her jaw. Kate’s breath came in tiny pants. He pressed a kiss against her ear. She gasped at the caress then arched against him.
A tremor racked Rafe as the mound of her womanhood came to rest against his aching shaft. Putting a hand at the small of her back to hold her against him, he moved his mouth along her neck, kissing his way down toward her collarbone. Each caress wrung a shiver from her, and each of her shivers drove his own desire all the higher. Again she arched against him as she sought to make herself one with him.
“Kate,” he murmured against her skin. “Love me, Kate.”
“Lady Katherine! Katherine de Fraisney! Where are you?” Josce’s bellow echoed across the woodland to drive a stake through Rafe’s desire.
Kate gave a sharp cry and sprang back from him as if pricked. Panting and trembling, she stared at him. Her eyes were as wide as a startled doe’s. Rafe groaned in disappointment. Worse, her absence from his arms left him feeling a strange emptiness, as if a great part of him had gone missing.
“Lady Katherine!” called Amicia de la Beres. “Can you shout to us, so we know where to find you?”
Kate shot a panicked look in the direction of the cries then caught at her loosened hair as if her mere touch might disguise it. “Dear Lord, but I shouldn’t have--we mustn’t,” she stuttered, then caught hold of her panic.
An instant later she drew herself up to her tallest and crossed her arms before her, once again every inch the proper woman he’d taken into the window embrasure. Rafe’s heart twisted as he watched her shed her desire for him as if it was an unneeded cloak. Soon, he promised himself, soon she’d wear both desire and him as he pleased.
Lifting her head, she turned in the direction of her rescuers. “I’m here!” she cried out, then once more looked at him. “You must go, but before you do, I cannot help but say it. What you’ve done--”. She stopped, a start of guilt shooting through her gaze. “Nay, what we’ve done,” she amended herself, pleasing Rafe that when she owned her part of their shared passion, “it’s wrong, and we daren’t ever do it again.”
“Wrong?” Rafe protested, caught off guard by her accusation. “How can it be wrong for a--”. He caught himself just before he spilled the rest of what he meant to say: for a husband to desire his wife. That knot in Rafe’s heart tightened. Kate wasn’t his wife, not yet. Nay, she wasn’t, but she would be as soon as he took her for his own.
The thought cut Rafe to the bone. Only then did he recognize the opportunity he’d just lost. Jesus God, what a fool he was! For the last quarter-hour, he’d been alone with Kate. Why hadn’t he simply taken her on his horse and left with her?
Understanding followed on the edges of his retreating lust. Kidnapping the Daubney heiress was what a Godsol bent on revenge would do. But he wasn’t just a Godsol. He was Rafe, who wanted Kate, let her family name be damned. He wanted her as a wife, his loving wife, not as a prisoner to whom property was attached. Aye, and now that he’d had another taste of a willing Kate in his arms, he’d better find a way to take her soon. If not, he swore he’d die for the wanting of her.
Standing less than arm’s length away yet well beyond his reach, his Kate shot him another flustered glance. “You know it’s wrong. How you can drive all sense from my brain is beyond me, but now that I know you do it, it won’t happen again.” Her words had the sound of a vow in them, but the desire that yet stained her fair cheeks made them a lie. “Now go. If my sire rides with them, he’ll kill you should he find you here, and that I could not bear.”
Rafe almost smiled. She couldn’t bear the thought of his death. That went far to ease her accusation that there was something wrong about their mutual desire.
“Then I’ll leave you, my lady, but only most reluctantly,” he replied.
Making his way to his horse on legs that still felt like thread after their kiss, he swung up into his saddle. Kate followed to stand at his mount’s shoulder and look up at him. At the back of Rafe’s brain lodged the image of a willing, loving Kate in his bed. That’s what he wanted.
Kate’s expression sobered until it was shy and somewhat pained. “I pray you don’t think ill of me. I tell you truly, I’ve never before behaved this way with anyone. I don’t know why it is that you...”. Her voice trailed off into silence as she gave an almost embarrassed shrug.
Happiness spiked in Rafe. There was no doubting the honesty of her words. Did she realize that in telling him this she also told him that the affection she believed she had for Sir Warin was no affection at all? Against that, how could she still want him for her champion on the morrow?
The need to beg her to refuse de Dapifer and name him in the steward’s stead filled Rafe. He swallowed the words. He wasn’t supposed to know about her plans with her father’s man, nor was there any way to broach the subject without revealing that he’d spied on her.
“My lady, when I think of you, it is only with the highest regard,” Rafe said at last. It was true. How else did a man think of a cherished wife?
Pleasure warmed Kate’s face and glowed softly in her smile. “I thank you for that,” she said quietly, then shook free of what troubled her to regain a more normal mien. “Since it seems I’ll not be there to watch it, I’ll wish that you take this day’s prize.”
Inspiration struck like lightning. Leaning down, Rafe took her hand and raised her fingers to his lips. “If I fail you this day then I vow I’ll take the morrow’s prize in your honor,” he promised her.
Pretty color again washed over Kate’s face. The need to sweep her up into his arms and ride from here with her tugged at Rafe. His hand on hers tightened.
“Call to us again, Lady Katherine,” Josce shouted, now no more than three hundred yards distant, “so we can find you.”
With a gasp Kate tore free of his grasp and pivoted in the direction of her rescuers. When she turned back to him naught but worry for him marked her face. “Go,” she urged, her brow creased as she stepped back from his horse. “Now, before they see you.”
With a nod, Rafe set his heels to his mount and started away from Josce’s call. It wasn’t until he was well out of Kate’s sight that he touched a hand to his breast. Coiled beneath his leather vest was one of Kate’s ribbons, the one from her open plait. He’d found it dangling from a broken hornbeam branch on his way down the hill. He’d taken it as his own mostly because he knew she meant to give Sir Warin its mate. The thought that Bagot’s steward might have more of Kate than he did was intolerable.
Not that anyone would know either he or Sir Warin had Kate’s ribbon. Rafe dared not wear his where others might see, especially not his brother. Will woul
d never understand why Rafe hadn’t taken Kate at the same time he took the ribbon. As for the steward, Rafe didn’t think Sir Warin bold enough to wear his where Lord Bagot could witness it. At the very least Kate’s sire would be enraged that his steward had formed a relationship with his daughter; at the worst, Sir Warin would lose his position, if not his life, for his pursuit of Kate.
Kicking his horse into a trot, Rafe rode in a great circle around Kate’s position on his way to rejoin the hunt. As he went his thoughts turned to the morrow’s joust. Yesterday winning that competition meant only lining his slim purse; his goal now was to take the prize in Kate’s honor. Once he had done that, she’d know he was the better man and her heart would be his. All that remained then would be to marry her.
Confidence welled in Rafe. Nor would it be a forced wedding. After all, by her own words Rafe was the husband God intended for Kate Daubney.
“There, my lady,” Albreda said, settling Kate’s golden circlet on her veil to hold it in place. “You’ll be the loveliest of all the gentlewomen this day, you will.”
Seated on her cot, Kate lifted her precious hand mirror. No larger than her palm, the bit of silvered metal set in a horn frame had been a gift from Lady Adele upon their parting. Starting with the mirror aimed at her middle, Kate maneuvered it to slowly reveal herself from waist to shoulders.
Because no man had yet tendered an offer for her hand, Lord Bagot dictated that his daughter wear a new overgown today, the one he’d purchased for Kate’s upcoming and as yet unscheduled second wedding ceremony. The garment was styled in the height of fashion, with a raised waistline and sleeves so long their hems brushed the ground. Made of silk dyed a pretty shade of blue, she wore it over her pale yellow undergown.
Now the mirror reflected Kate from shoulders to chin. One of her ribbons had gone missing after yesterday’s riding accident, even though she, Ami and Sir Josce had searched the whole hillside for it. Because Kate needed the remaining ribbon to give to Warin this morning, she’d refused to let Albreda use it in her hair today. At the moment it was hidden inside the narrow sleeve of her undergown—this, even though she very much doubted she’d have a chance to meet with Warin before the joust started.
With no other hair ornaments to use Albreda had braided Kate’s hair into a single plait, then wound this into a great knot. The hairstyle drew the beholder’s eye to the thick golden necklet set with amber that Lord Bagot had given his daughter to wear.
At last Kate gazed upon her face, framed by the sweep of her fine white veil. She smiled, pleased. All in all, she thought herself an elegant affair. In fact, she looked every inch a woman who had two champions, each trying to take the day in her honor.
From the recesses of her memory came Lady Adele’s voice warning that a true lady only ever had one hero at her beck and call. Adele claimed that only an ill-mannered woman gave tokens to more than one man. Doing so, she warned, could lead to more fighting between the champions than against their opponents.
That gave Kate pause. God knew that there was plenty of animosity between the two men who loved her. Then again, she hadn’t actually given Rafe a token. And she had promised Warin that he would be her champion. Kate made a face at herself in the mirror. She wasn’t certain it was Warin she wanted as a hero.
Once again that whirlpool of emotions set to turning in Kate. All on its own, the need to be near Rafe woke. Before she caught herself, the corners of her mouth had lifted against a sudden, startling and wonderful pressure in her heart.
What was wrong with her? Kate forced her mouth to flatten. She shouldn’t be encouraging these sorts of thoughts. It was a lady’s God-given duty to keep the relationship between herself and her courtly lover chaste, and Kate had badly failed in her duty. Rafe had been honorable enough to heed Kate’s anemic rebuke yesterday and refuse to kiss her, but what had she done? Why, she'd kissed him!
There could be no more of that. But how was she supposed to stop herself from touching Rafe when even the memory of his kiss could set her heart to pounding? Lord, but just the trace of his bare fingers up her naked arm had left her lost in the most glorious rush of heat. Who would have guessed a man’s touch could be so pleasing?
Not all men’s touches. Kate shuddered at the thought of Sir Gilbert forcing his mouth onto hers.
In disgust’s wake, wicked curiosity arose. Rafe was a man she barely knew and hadn’t yet come to love, at least Kate didn’t think she had. If his kiss was so marvelous, shouldn’t Warin’s kiss be even better? After all, Warin was the man she’d loved for all of last month.
“What do you think?” Albreda demanded, interrupting Kate’s inappropriate musings.
“I think I’ll do well enough, Albreda,” Kate replied, banishing as best she could the remains of her sinful thoughts as she busied herself returning her mirror to her jewel chest.
“Now, my lady, don’t you fret,” Albreda replied, mistaking her mistress’s lusts for disappointment. “Some fine knight will make an offer for your hand soon enough.”
Kate hoped not. Placing her tiny chest beneath her cot again, she straightened. As she brushed her veil back into place Albreda leaned forward to put her head near Kate’s. The maid shot a swift glance at the blanket that divided the tent in twain.
“If I were a bolder woman,” the servant whispered, “I’d be telling your lord father that’s he’s too impatient. These things take time.”
“Do they?” Kate asked, turning so swiftly toward Albreda that the servant shied back from her. Oh, how she prayed it would take weeks, months, even years before she had to marry again. “Are you certain?”
“Indeed, I am,” the maid replied, offering a confident smile. “Why years ago, your maternal grandsire kept Lord Bagot waiting nigh on two years before the marriage to your lady mother finally came to pass. Of course, that was partly because there were entanglements with another family that had to be broken. So too, did your lady mother need time to settle her affections,” she added.
The past clouded Albreda’s gaze for a moment, then she smiled. “I know it’s hard for a young thing like you to believe when you look upon him now, but your sire was quite the stallion then, roaring for his mare. He would have no other woman. Lord, but I thought he’d eat his heart out of his chest, so deeply did he long for his lady.”
Albreda paused, her lips lifting against some long almost forgotten scene. “She was a beauty, your lady mother. Although your coloring is your sire’s, you have the look of her, you do.”
That startled Kate, as did her sudden longing to hear more of her forgotten dam, especially about her mother’s connection to the Godsols. “You knew my dam well?”
“I did indeed, my lady. I was only one of Bagot’s seamstresses then, but--” Albreda fell silent as the drape separating father and daughter lifted. It was Peter, Lord Bagot’s manservant.
“Albreda, since you’re finished with Lady de Fraisney, Lord Bagot awaits you,” he said, a note of warning in his tone. His stern expression left no doubt he’d overheard the maid discussing his lord with that man’s daughter and sought to stop any further confidences.
Chastised, Albreda bowed her head. “I come,” she said, leaving her charge without a backward glance.
Stewing in frustrated curiosity, Kate slipped around the blanket to stand near the tent’s open flap. Once again the rising sun filled the tent’s interior, the long, lazy rays reaching all the way to the back wall. Today, the light teased metallic glints from her sire’s chain-mail hauberk and leggings where they lay draped across Lord Bagot’s armor chest. Since her father had no squire at the moment, Peter did the duty of checking the armor for loose and rusting links.
At the far end of Lord Bagot’s cot lay a basket of breads and cheeses, delivered not long ago from Haydon’s kitchen to break her sire’s fast. A square of greased fabric now covered the tent’s rush flooring. Near one corner stood a bucket filled with steaming water. Haydon’s tiny bathhouse was too small to accommodate the many knights who wa
nted to use it that morn. Thus some men opted to bathe in the river while others, like her sire, made do with a scrubbing and a rinse in the privacy of their own tent.
Lord Humphrey, dressed in naught but his skin, sat on his stool at the cloth’s center, face aimed toward the tent’s doorway. Any hope of meeting Warin died. It was as if her father knew his daughter planned to slip out from under his eye this morn and intended to prevent it.
Kate sighed, only to startle herself when she realized she was relieved. She didn’t want Warin to be her champion or have her ribbon. Her hand curled about her opposite wrist and the ribbon hidden in her sleeve. Why hadn’t she given this to Rafe yesterday?
Rushing now, Albreda grabbed the cloth from the lip of the bucket, wetted it then laded on soft soap from the wee cask of the stuff they’d brought from Bagot. Moving around her lord, the maid began to wash the nobleman’s back.
Without Albreda to block her view, Kate stared at her father. Resentment flared. By all rights she should have been the one bathing him; it was the duty of a man’s nearest female relative, whether wife, daughter or sister, to perform that service. Why, many a time in the past had she bathed Sir Guy de Fraisney, her father-by-marriage, with Lady Adele at her side. That her father didn’t require the same of her only proved how little he cared for her.
Across the tent from her Lord Humphrey’s eyes narrowed. His jaw tightened beneath his beard. “Haven’t you anything better to do than stare at me?” he demanded, his voice harsh.
Kate started in surprise, unaware that she was still looking at him. More resentment followed. What did he expect her to do for the two hours before the jousting began? Sit on her cot and twiddle her thumbs?
“Nay, my lord,” she said in truthful answer.
Irritation flashed through her sire’s eyes then he loosed a fiery sigh. “I suppose you don’t. Well the last thing I need is you underfoot when I must concentrate on what awaits me this day. Go on,” his wave shooed her toward the tent’s open flap. “Take yourself off to the hall and break your fast with the other ladies. Go, waste your time in whatever useless occupation idiot women like yourself use to fritter away their day.” There was nothing but sneering contempt in his voice.
The Warrior's Wife Page 11
