by Tamara Leigh
When the voices receded and rain fell with more enthusiasm, he accepted they could go no farther and searched for shelter among the caves pockmarking the cliff. Most were too shallow to offer much protection, but two were deep enough to shield them from the icy rain.
Durand chose the one whose opening was so low they had to enter hunched over and drew The Vestal Widow into the dim space. Ten feet in, they were able to straighten, and he released the lady to feel his way to the farthest corner that was wide enough to swing a sword if necessary.
He unsheathed his blade, lowered against the chalk wall, and inwardly groaned at taking weight off his injured leg.
“I can see naught,” the lady whispered, the gray light behind her lower body revealing she remained where he had left her.
“Come, Lady.”
Beata squinted at where she more imagined than saw Durand. She hardly knew him, but what she did know was that his anger at being bound aboard ship had swelled—so much that since putting the Wulfrith dagger to him, she had sensed his ire hovering about her throat. She would fare better to keep her distance.
“Sit, Lady!” he growled.
She startled and gasped, “I am afeared of you!” And not only did she hate herself for pleading that did not fit Conrad’s wife and widow, she hurt over memories of when her husband had advised her against allowing crippling words to pass her lips.
Four and ten she had been the night her groom had gained their nuptial bed. Miraculously, her tearfully blurted declaration caused the aged warrior to draw back. But whereas Conrad had meant to loose lust on her, Durand Marshal might loose something more dangerous.
She heard him breathe deep as if to calm himself, then he said, “After what you have wrought, fear is the least owed you.”
That should have quieted her, but she ached for him to understand she was without choice and know how deeply she felt the loss of those enlisted to deliver her to England. “I regret running with Sir Norris. Pray, believe me, I would not have—”
“You think regret is of comfort to the dead?”
She drew a quavering breath. “I am sorry for their terrible end, and that I could offer little more than prayer for their souls.”
Silence, then he said, “I am to believe that as desperate as you were to escape me, you stopped to pray for them?”
She took a step forward. “When I left you, I meant to distance myself, but I realized I could not without being certain you were well. Thus, after keeping my word to the captain to pray for his men, I intended to return. And I would have had I not happened on the lady.” She lowered her lids, and when she lifted them, found her eyes had adjusted enough to make him out where he sat against the rock wall. “I hurt for her and all the others—”
“All the others? Know you who all they are?”
She swallowed hard. “Except for Sir Norris, who is likely beneath the sea, I but know the others as the ship’s crew.”
“Not only except for Sir Norris!”
Realizing he could not see her confusion, she said, “Certes, I did not know the lady. I was unaware there were other nobles aboard—”
“There were no other nobles on our ship.”
“You make no sense.”
“But I do—providing you think beyond your narrow existence.”
Beata would have taken offense were she not so unsettled by the puzzle cast before her. Groping at the pieces, she shivered harder as the wind stole into the cave and swept beneath her hem and up her legs.
“Our ship was not the only one claimed by the sea on the night past, Lady,” Durand fit a piece.
“You are saying—”
“As I should not have to. Aye, the reason for so much wreckage and so many bodies—among them nobles—is that two ships broke on the rocks. And possibly each other.”
It made sense, but as Durand had accused, she had not looked far enough beyond herself. “Dear Lord.”
“Do not stop there, Lady. Tell, who besides the noblewoman, whose mantle warms you, do you think was aboard that other ship?”
She clasped herself close. “How can I know?”
“Think!”
It was difficult. Because the cold muddled her? Or did Sir Durand merely taunt her?
He made a sound of disgust. “You know the ship waiting to return you to England was not alone in hoping to cross the channel on the day past.”
She did, but could it be? The wreck of a second ship was tragedy enough, but if it was the baron’s…
“Aye, though I found no evidence to prove it was his, had its captain believed it safe to sail, Baron Wulfrith would have given chase.”
Her knees quaked. She barely knew the warrior, but the possibility he was dead hurt as much as—nay, more than—the loss of Sir Norris. The baron had fewer years about him and was a husband and the father of young children.
“Why, Lady?” the queen’s man demanded. “What about you is of such import so many have died?”
A question only her father could answer. And in light of the dead, a pitifully poor answer it would be.
“What about you?” he persisted.
She lowered her chin. “I cannot say.”
She heard the rustle of his damp garments and boots over the chalk floor, stopped breathing when his shadowed figure halted before her. “I shall say it, then. As the queen suspected, Conrad Fauvel’s widow is an heiress, aye?”
Though that suspicion was more the reason Eleanor had forced Beata to accept Durand’s escort than concern over her subject’s well-being, and it had angered that the queen sought to do unto another what she refused to have done unto her—bestowing power and wealth on a favorite through marriage to an heiress—Beata was almost numb over the offense.
Durand gripped her arms. “Are you?”
She should continue to deny it as her sire would have her do—laugh and feign astonishment—but her flight with Sir Norris during the attack outside the inn evidenced her deception. Still, she could straddle the line between truth and falsehood with what was true in this moment—rather, what she believed was true.
Lifting her face, feeling Durand’s breath on her brow, catching the glitter of his eyes, she said, “I know not.”
A growl rumbled from him. “The answer, Lady, is aye or nay.”
“Or mayhap.”
As if she were the foulest of beings, he released her and pivoted.
She had no intention of following him, but then came the roll of thunder and a crack of lightning that splashed blue light across the cave’s walls—and scattered the leaves in that corner of her mind.
Having glimpsed the queen’s man lowering to the right before the cave returned to darkness, she stretched out a hand and moved toward him. When her fingers met the wall against which he sat, she pressed her palm to its smooth, damp surface and turned her back to it.
As she began to slide down it, he said, “The other side of me, Lady.”
She nearly asked the reason, but she realized here was the warrior. If any pursued them as far as the cave, he did not wish her between him and his opponent. He might not care to protect her, but he would do it for his queen.
If only he would do it for you, bemoaned a voice that did not belong in her head. Closing the door on it, she stepped forward. As she started around Durand, lightning once more lit the walls. She hated it, but it prevented her from stepping on the knight’s injured leg and saw her seated beside him sooner—too near, her hip and arm brushing his.
He stiffened, and she expected him to shift away, but he left it to her to correct. She wanted to, but not as much as she longed for assurance of his presence when the storm once more made itself heard, felt, and seen and the rain gave rise to mist that billowed into the cave.
She tucked her chin into the neck of her mantle. “Forgive me, but for as long as I can remember, I have been afraid of thunderstorms.”
“More than you are of me?” he said, not with threat but with what seemed accusation—as if her declaration was meant t
o lead him astray.
“Strange that, but aye. The wrath outside worries me more than that within.”
As if to prove it, she jerked as the thunder of moments earlier birthed pulsing light of such duration that when she snapped her chin around, her gaze met his. And held long enough for her to note his concern.
In the ensuing darkness, she wrapped her arms around herself to keep from convulsing over imaginings that, as a child, had tormented her when ill weather threatened to blow away the rotting leaves and reveal what lay beneath.
Following marriage to Conrad, she had liked thunderstorms no better, but with each passing year, the dark corner had become more distant and blurred until only encounters with men like Sir Oliver drew her near enough to glimpse the leaves. Why did the storm so affect her now? Because she had returned to England where that childhood dream was dreamt?
“Lady?” The knight’s hand touched her arm.
Struggling to keep from clapping her own over it to hold him to her, she gasped, “I wish you did not hate me so, but I understand and am all the more grateful you saved my life. ’Tis honorable.”
Stranger yet, a moment later she was pressed to his side, the arm she had brushed against turned around her back and waist, her cheek on his collarbone, her head beneath his chin.
“Durand?”
“Silence, Lady Beata!” His breath wove through her tumbled hair and warmed her scalp. “Just…be silent.”
She swallowed further words, mostly out of surprise at once more hearing her name pass his lips and the thought she would like to hear him speak it with more familiarity—absent her title.
“Let us rest while the storm is upon us,” he said. “We are a long way from where we need to be.”
Where was that? she wanted to ask, but she was too grateful for someone to hold to in a storm—even one who disliked her—to risk losing the comfort.
Compressing her lips so they would not betray her, keeping her eyes open lest she too soon drifted away from one more considerate than he had cause to be, she told herself to remember how it felt to be held by an honorable man.
CHAPTER TEN
She is responsible, Durand reminded himself, having become increasingly aware of the woman he had been compelled to draw close an hour past. She must answer for the dead, especially if the second ship was Wulfrith’s. And yet—
Yet? he demanded of the fool.
If what she told was true, she but remained loyal to her father as a daughter—
If! And what of loyalty to one’s sovereign? The lady is a deceiver!
As once he had been. To that the Wulfriths could attest.
Aye, though perhaps no longer Baron Wulfrith. Because of her.
He lowered his gaze to The Vestal Widow. Though she slept, she continued to hold to him. As he tried to part the shadows across her face, he recalled how she had pleaded for him as he fought the ship’s crew, declaring death need not be the end of their confrontation. He would have been tossed into the sea had she not promised a greater reward. And when he sought to convince her of the danger of setting sail, she had acquiesced. It was Sir Norris who would not be moved.
True, she had left him on the beach, but her claim she meant to return to him after praying for the dead was supported by footprints body to body and that she had possessed only his dagger, likely taken for protection.
Certes, she vexed, but she was not as senseless or self-centered as he wished to believe.
Aye, wished. His best defense against women who tempted him to abandon faith and honor to answer base needs was to exaggerate their ills, as it was also a defense against exposing a heart twice denied—first Lady Beatrix Wulfrith, then the healer, Helene. Or nearly so the latter, a half-noble whom Wulfrith’s youngest brother, Abel, had taken to wife.
Durand had not felt as much for her, but he might have had he not learned from Lady Beatrix the folly of feeling much for a woman who felt little for him. Thus, he had pulled back from that disastrous edge when the kiss pressed on Helene had not moved her heart toward his. And he had further redeemed himself by aiding Abel Wulfrith and her in overcoming the obstacles keeping them apart.
Now here he was with The Vestal Widow, defending behavior earlier found indefensible, feeling the fit of her, and when lightning lit the cave, liking how well he wore her.
I have been long without a woman, he tried to excuse his softening toward one who should move neither mind nor body. Though at court, opportunities aplenty presented to be intimate with the fairer sex, it was years since—
He dragged his thoughts from Wulfrith’s oldest sister back to this lady to whom he should not be attracted—she whose speech, mannerisms, and appearance were almost indelicate. And even if what drew him to a woman was so altered, there was the barrier of pursuing one he could not have. Were Conrad Fauvel’s widow a great heiress, her wealth would not be wasted on a mere knight.
A distant crack of thunder made the lady startle. “Tell not,” she breathed.
Did she dream?
“’Tis a secret.” This time her words had voice, but she sounded more like a girl than a woman.
“Lady?”
Her fingers on his chest convulsed. “Ours alone.”
Durand set a hand over hers. Feeling its tremble, he called again, “Lady?”
“Unto death.” She whimpered, then hissed, “Shh!”
“Beata?” He grimaced over the ease with which he named her.
“Tell not!” she rasped and began to weep.
He knew better than to respond to a woman’s tears, that having been the beginning of his downfall, but when her shoulders jerked and hand scrabbled at his mantle, he lifted her face. “Awaken, Beata!”
She stilled and rain-soaked light leapt into her eyes. “Durand?”
“It is I. You dream of dark things.”
“Do I?”
He did not answer, and moments later she whispered, “Aye, the leaves.”
“Leaves?”
“They rot away. I cannot allow that.”
Clearly, she was not fully in this moment. “It is but a dream, Lady.”
“Would that it were, but I do not think so.”
“It is. This is real. Us. Here. Now.”
Her chest expanded as she drew a deep breath, then she came up on her knees, slid her arms around his neck, and said near his mouth. “I would stay with you. Let us not go back.”
“Beata—”
“Aye, Beata.” Those words causing her lips to brush his, he wondered if he was the one dreaming and why he wanted the unseemly lady to fulfill the promise of a kiss.
She fulfilled it—tentatively and awkwardly giving proof of the name by which she was better known. And he responded, giving lie to the name the queen bestowed upon him. He drew her nearer, opened his mouth on hers, and tried what no man had tried. Just as he had done with—
He pulled his head back so sharply it struck the wall. Narrowing his eyes at the shadowed woman he had pulled onto his lap, he heard her soft panting and sensed her uncertainty.
This was a place ventured before. And he had been ruined for it. As then, now there was grieving over the dead. As then, now one he did not want tempted him. As then, now he had tasted what was freely given.
But not as then, he would not claim innocence that ought to be gifted to a husband, no matter that the lady invited his attention. When she was better of mind, she would be grateful.
Though he wanted to thrust her away, one other thing learned from the ruination of a lady was that it was cruel to be callous, even if only to discourage feelings he did not return. That he had done with Lady Gaenor who had looked at him with her heart in her eyes.
He did not believe this woman was enamored of him as the eldest of Wulfrith’s sisters had been, but lest she moved in that direction, he must set her aright. For both their sakes.
“That should not have happened,” he said and eased her off him.
He sensed her confusion, then its resolution. “Certes, it s
hould not have.” She scooted farther away as if she did not trust the one who had ended what she had begun.
Might she now accuse him of ravishment?
That riled him until hard-learned lessons forced him to take responsibility for his part that was possibly greater than that of one who lacked experience with the carnal. The first seed of intimacy had been cast by him when he drew her near to offer comfort, not unlike when he had soothed a grieving Lady Gaenor over the belief her sister had died.
“Pray, forgive one who knows it is ungodly to take advantage of a woman,” he said. “I but meant to awaken you from a disturbing dream.”
Her breath caught, but as if to cover something she had not meant to expose, she issued a sound between a laugh and a snort. “You need not be so honorable, Sir Durand. I was hardly myself, but not so unaware I do not recall I set myself at you.”
She could not have surprised more.
“And now, methinks, we know the truth of the names by which we are called,” she continued. “The Vestal Widow yet virtuous, though less than before this day. The gallant monk…”
She could surprise more, bold when coy was the way of most ladies. But then, she had chosen the lesser of evils to distract him from the greater, had she not? Strange that the dream she believed not a dream more disturbed her than discussing the intimacy they should not have shared.
She sighed. “As my experience is limited, I cannot know how much of a monk you are, but never have I been kissed and touched like that.”
Further surprise. He had been certain her mouth was untried, but considering her penchant for flirtation, Sir Oliver was not the first to attempt to alter the name given her.
“The gallant monk has not always been that, aye?” she said.
Farther from gallant and monk than he would have her know.
“Regardless, I thank you, Sir Durand. Though my conduct is sometimes deemed unseemly, ere this day I could not be accused of behaving with wanton disregard for my reputation. And I can conceive of no means of explaining it away without sounding false.”
He could, having grown accustomed to women who found him all the more desirable for his lack of interest.
