Under Alisoun’s guidance, Sir David stumbled into his chamber. Alisoun quailed at the thought of putting her safety and the security of George’s Cross in this man’s hands. In this man’s filthy hands.
He’ll look better when he’s had a bath, she argued back at herself, and snapped her fingers at the maids. They sprang into action, stripping him of his clothing and tossing it in a basket to be boiled.
“Maybe the poor will take this,” one maid said, holding the soiled rags David called his hose between two fingers.
“The poor won’t want any of it,” Edlyn retorted.
Edlyn’s voice roused Alisoun. “Go on, dear,” she said. “I don’t think it proper for a maiden who is yet unmarried to bathe the guests.”
“Will you be bathing him?” Sir Walter demanded from the doorway.
Surprised, all the women turned to look at him, then at Alisoun.
“As I always do,” she answered.
He placed his fists on his hips. “Are you not a maiden?”
So angry she could barely speak, she said, “I am a widow.” By good Saint Ethelred, the man had lost his mind. When had he come to believe he had the right to question her activities? When had he lost so much respect for her that he believed he could insult her without consequence?
Oh, she knew the answer.
When she had confessed she’d risked everything to do what she thought was right. He didn’t comprehend that she cared nothing about his disapproval or his opinion. She paid his wages; what she expected from him was his unconditional loyalty. He hadn’t given it, yet still she recalled his earlier support and found herself unable to order he find another post.
Mechanically, she reviewed the arrangements for their guest. She spoke to Edlyn about the special evening meal, then sent her on her way. A fire burned in the fireplace. She pressed on the mattress. The bedding smelled clean and dry. Lifting the pitchers which sat on a table beside the bed, she found them empty and frowned. In their excitement over serving the legendary mercenary, the maids had failed to finish preparing the chamber.
At the tub, one of them squealed, and Alisoun glanced impatiently toward the little group around David. So frivolous! Did they think, just because he was a legend, he would be the answer to a maiden’s prayer? She glanced at the furious Sir Walter. Is that what he thought, too? Is that why he stood off to the side, watching, bristled up like a mastiff?
The group parted briefly, and Alisoun caught a glimpse of David, naked and dripping. He was certainly not a maiden’s dream. A cook’s dream, because he was so skinny. Or a washerwoman’s dream. She’d never seen a man so caked with dirt. It would take hard scrubbing to remove all the grime, but regardless of Sir Walter’s opinion, she knew her duty and always did it. Rolling up her sleeves, she picked up the apron the maids had laid out to cover her. If she could have, she would have left him to the maids, but she dared not retreat now or Sir Walter would consider it a victory.
Her level voice cut the chatter. “Where is the wine and water, should our guest have a thirst in the night?”
Heath clapped her hand over her mouth.
She’d been Alisoun’s personal maid before; she had been promoted to chief maid when Philippa had come, and when distracted, she occasionally failed in her duties. “Are there other chores left undone?” Alisoun asked.
The group around David melted away. Heath ran from one place to another, assessing each maid’s performance. They all remained within the chamber, hoping, Alisoun supposed, to sneak glances at the legend in their midst. She didn’t care about that. She feared only that their hospitality might be lacking, not that it would be done too well.
At her approach, David sank into the water as if it might melt him. From the look of him, he hadn’t the experience to know otherwise.
Soaping the washing cloth, Alisoun tried to ease David’s uneasiness with polite chatter. “Is the chamber to your liking?”
He leaned forward and let her rub his shoulders. “It’s lovely,” he said politely. “Is it yours?”
Briefly, she considered digging her fingernails into his skin. She had hoped he wouldn’t behave like an ass and make offensive comments that insinuated she would warm his bed. So many knights and lords did when she bathed them, assuming that she must hunger for what she did not know and smugly sure they could satisfy that hunger. For them, a few cool words worked much like icicles dropped into the bath water, and she never had the problem again—at least from the same man.
Today she didn’t feel so tactful. She, too, was exhausted from travel and this duty seemed onerous beyond belief. Running the washcloth up over David’s head, she let strong lye soap drip into his eyes. Jumping to his feet, he yelled, and tried to rub it out. Heath ran forward with a basin of clean water and helped him splash water into his face. When he turned on Alisoun, red-eyed and snarling, she thought to apologize sweetly. Instead she found herself saying, “You’ll sleep in here alone, Sir David, unless you choose another partner. I’m sure one of the maids could be persuaded to join you, out of curiosity if nothing else. Now, if you’ll sit again, we’ll finish with—”
He grabbed her hand in a firm grip, and she wondered if he would soak her. Her training told her she deserved it for allowing her temper to get the better of her, but Sir Walter’s growl angered her even more. She didn’t need protecting from David; she could handle him.
“This is my chamber?” David demanded.
She stood absolutely still. “I have said so.”
“I sleep here…alone?”
“Aye.”
Her soapy hand slipped from his grasp, and he made no move to recapture it. “You have chambers for everyone?”
“For my guests.” She began to realize the reason for David’s amazement. “It wouldn’t be appropriate for you to sleep on the floor of the great hall with the servants. Sir Walter has a private chamber in the gatehouse where he can be at the ready in case of attack, but I thought that you should be within the keep.”
“Since I’m to guard you.”
She felt foolish now. “Aye. I need you to guard me and mine.”
Sir Walter stepped forward. “I can do it.”
Her hand trembled with frustration, but she answered as she always did. “I need you to preserve the whole castle and the village. There isn’t enough time for the special care I have come to require.”
She expected David to say something, to step between them somehow, but he didn’t. Instead, he sat in the water and looked up at them both as if expecting entertainment. She could have slapped him.
Sir Walter turned away with a grunt.
David didn’t try to take the cloth from her, but leaned forward to let her finish his back. A scar snaked out of his scalp and down his back, and when she washed his neck, she discovered the lobe of one ear was missing. She tried to be gentle with it, but he said, “Go ahead and scrub. It doesn’t hurt.”
Boldly, she inquired, “How did you lose it?”
The work within the room slowed as all the women strained to hear the tale.
“I made a mistake,” he said.
“Did the other knight—” Alisoun paused, not knowing how to continue.
“His widow has since remarried.”
His flat reply answered more than one question. He didn’t brag about his triumphs, but she wanted to know. Not for the same reason as the maids, who simply worshipped without thought, but because she wanted verification of his prowess.
Then he leaned back to give her access to his chest, and she saw further testament to the suffering he’d endured, both in battle and in his struggle to survive the drought. The wiry muscles across his shoulders lifted the skin in impressive ripples, but she traced the line of his prominent collarbone as she scrubbed. His arms clearly showed the effect of swinging sword and shield. The veins on the back of his big hands rose in massive blue lines, and he’d lost the little finger on his left hand.
Lifting his wrist, she asked, “Sword?”
“Battle ax.”
“Did his widow remarry, also?”
Sounding disgusted, he said, “Nay! It was only a melée.”
She looked again at the blank place where his finger should be. “You lost it in a play battle?”
“Not play,” he answered patiently. “Practice. We hold melées for practice, and to entertain the court.” He held up his hand and grinned at it affectionately. “If Sir Richard hadn’t pulled back on his swing, I’d have lost the whole hand.” Tucking it back in the water, he added, “I was a fledging then, and lucky.”
“Lucky.”
She looked, and she didn’t think he was lucky. A variety of weapons had gashed lines of flesh from his upper chest, leaving a gnarled pattern of black hair and white scars traced over his impressive pectorals. But immediately below, his ribs were delineated with dreadful clarity.
Perhaps he could eat the whole goose by himself.
She couldn’t wash the parts of him still in the water, and she wanted to, badly. Not because she was curious. She wasn’t, although the dirt and soap floating in the water might have frustrated a nosy woman. She’d seen, and washed, many men, and a legend such as Sir David would be no different. But obviously, the man was not enamored of bathing, and she didn’t know when she might persuade him to partake again. “Stand up,” she commanded.
He didn’t answer, but slipped one leg out of the tub and shifted as if the tub were too small.
Well, it was too small for a man of his size and…“Fine,” she said, and washed his foot. Calluses deformed his toes and snagged the weave of the cloth, but he flexed and grimaced in reflexive action when she stroked the bottom of his foot. Purple scarring rippled the skin from ankle to knee.
“Fire?” she asked.
“Boiling tar poured from the curtain wall during a siege,” he answered.
“Did you take the castle?”
He watched as she lifted his leg and washed beneath. “In sooth.”
The muscles of his well-formed calf joined a bony knee, and his thigh was thin—too thin for a man of his size.
Holding out her hand, palm up, she silently demanded the other foot. He looked at her hand. She insisted with a wiggle of the fingers, and he deliberately drew his foot from the water and laid it in her hand.
He’d lost a toe on this foot, and the flesh stretched thin to cover the bone.
Before she could ask, he said, “Same siege as the boiling tar. I was running across the drawbridge and the portcullis came down on my foot. Praise God it didn’t land on my head.”
“Aye. God is good to you.” Surprised, she realized she meant it. David had come to the very gates of death and somehow escaped every time.
He raised his voice so all within the chamber could hear. “That’s all being a legend is. Living long enough to brag about your own exploits.”
“Might it also be the willingness to be first across the drawbridge?” she asked.
“First one across gets best pickings.”
First one across usually gets killed, she thought, but she didn’t say that. That was obvious to everyone within the room. Instead she moved to finish the job of washing him so he could eat.
This time he made a funny little grunt when she scrubbed his thighs. She raised an eyebrow at him, but he tucked his lips tightly together and shook his head.
After rinsing out the cloth in clean water, she soaped it up again. “Stand up. I can’t wash you if you won’t stand up.”
He just sat there, gripping the sides of the tub stubbornly, as if the dirt in the tub had affixed him from the rear down.
Then Sir Walter mocked from his corner. “Perhaps more than his fingers and toes have been cut off.”
Every eye focused on David. Would he be angry? Would he climb from the tub and tear Sir Walter’s gizzard from his bowels? Instead, a slow smile formed on David’s face. His lips parted. His chest rose and fell in deep inhalations, and smoky satisfaction practically oozed from him. Like one of the monsters living deep in the mountain lake, he rose out of the water and revealed himself in all his glory.
Laughing out loud, David rolled over in his bed and pounded the feather pillow exuberantly. Never in his life would he forget the look that had transformed Sir Walter’s sarcastic face. Even now, he could relive the gratification of seeing the old scoundrel’s expression right before he scurried out in abject humiliation. Nay, Sir Walter would never challenge him in such a manner again.
Alisoun…David rolled onto his back, wrapped his hands behind his head, and stared at the canopy above him as the misty morning light grew stronger. Alisoun was another story. He didn’t know what she thought.
It was that washing that had done it. Alisoun had used a rough cloth, and she’d scrubbed until his skin felt raw, but he’d noticed only the touch of her hands as they grazed him again and again. He hadn’t stood up when she commanded him to, for he didn’t want to embarrass her by an untimely display.
But when Sir Walter had goaded him and he had finally stood, she didn’t seem embarrassed. He didn’t know what he’d expected of her. Exclamations of rapture? A beaming smile? A quick grope? He’d gotten none of it, of course. She’d stood without a quiver, a simper or a frown. If she’d been impressed, she hadn’t indicated it.
And she should have been impressed. Hell, he’d been impressed, and he’d wielded that weapon all his life.
“Did you sleep well?”
He jumped, flinging the blankets up in surprise. He’d been thinking about her, and here she was, with her arms full of folded material and a pleasant smile on her face.
Again, he looked at her. Perhaps it was an exaggeration to call it a pleasant smile. It was more of a lift of the lips, performed because she’d been taught it was the proper thing to do. But he liked it. He liked her, the way she looked this morning, dressed for work in a faded blue cotte and a sky blue wimple wrapped over her hair and under her chin. A big iron ring of keys hung from her belt, marking her as the chatelaine of George’s Cross and a power to be reckoned with.
Rolling onto his stomach, he propped his chin onto his hands and grinned. “Well, it felt odd to have clean sheets, a clean body, and a room to myself, but I suspect I could easily get used to it.”
“Aye, it is pleasant to have a clean body.” She stacked the material on the bench by the fire hearth. With peculiar emphasis, she said, “It is more pleasant for the people around you, also. The sun is rising. It’s time for you to take on your duties.”
His grin sagged. “My duties?”
“You’ll want to consult with Sir Walter today, and I’ve told him you’re to have the freedom to wander where you will and speak to whom you please.”
“That’s generous of you, my lady.”
Ignoring both the words and the sardonic tone, she shook out a tunic of red linen and a surcoat of berry blue wool. “I thought these would fit you and be appropriate for your coloring.”
Dumbfounded, he repeated, “For my coloring?”
“A man as large as yourself with brown eyes, brown hair, and brown skin must take care not to appear to be a tree trunk.”
He viewed the colorful array of cloth in her hands with misgiving. “Mayhap being a tree trunk is an advantage when danger stalks.”
“I thought of that.” With a snap, she shook out a black cloak trimmed in green. “I doubt that you’ll be in danger in broad daylight, and in the early morning and late at night, this cloak will keep you warm and protect you from being seen unnecessarily. Get out of bed. I want to cut your hair.”
She’d left her scissors on the table last night when she’d left the room, but she obviously hadn’t forgotten them. Why was she so insistent on removing his mane? Like bathing, was this some kind of ritual required when one entered the home of Lady Alisoun?
“Let me get dressed first.” The door stood open behind her, but she was alone, and for the first time he wondered why. The lady of the house should never have been reduced to carrying his clothing, but mayhap the chief maid had been correct when she giggled and told him that their mistress found him attractive—when clean.
Naked as a newborn, he put his feet on the step stool beside the tall bed, then stepped onto the floor, keeping his gaze fixed on Alisoun for reaction. “Did you bring hose?”
Lifting two black wool tubes, she showed them to him. “Don your braies,” she commanded. “Then sit on the bench. You’ll not want your clean tunic cluttered with hair clippings.”
He did as she told him, watching her carefully for signs of interest or intrigue. There were none. She laid out a towel on the table beside the bench, tested the scissors, then stood and waited, hands folded before her, for him to seat himself.
It occurred to him she was a restful woman. That lack of expression which so frustrated him made her an easy companion. It also made him want to prod her to get a reaction. He sat, and as she wrapped a cloth around his shoulders, he said, “I was wondering…why did you leave last night?”
He saw her hand appear from behind him, pick up an ivory comb, then retreat. The comb bit into the hair at his forehead, then slid over the top. A tangle caught it, and it stopped with a jerk at his neckline. “Ow!” He clapped his hand over hers as she tugged to separate the strands. “Ow, ow! Stop that!”
A warm chuckle floated over him, pleasing his ears, and he tried to twist around, to view this miracle of emotion from the lady. That only made the comb bite deeper, and she pushed him back into place. “Do you always whine? If so, I wouldn’t want to have been anywhere near when you were actually wounded.”
“That’s different. This pain is unnecessary.” Feeling as if he’d been chided, he folded his arms over his chest and glared at nothing while the comb tugged and maneuvered. Then he realized she’d changed the subject. She’d established herself in control and silenced him all at once. “You vixen,” he murmured.
The comb paused in its work. “What?”
He straightened his spine and wished his shoulders had the breadth they’d once had. Too many months of near-starvation had reduced his bulk and made him less awesome than he’d been in his prime. But, he reminded himself, last night she’d still left after he’d stood in the tub. “I did ask why you failed to finish bathing me, didn’t I?”
Her hand appeared again, picked up the fine steel scissors, and disappeared behind him. In his ear, he heard the “snick” sound as she tested them, then their cold metal rested against his neck.
She was good, he admitted. Very, very good. Only the most consummate diplomat managed to convey a threat while saying nothing. But, he wondered, why did she feel the need to threaten him? He’d done nothing more than ask a simple question.
She seemed to realize it, for she said, “I do apologize for abandoning you, but on my first night home, I had many duties which required my attention—not the least of which was soothing Sir Walter after your impressive display.”
He pounced on that. “So you did think it an impressive display?”
The scissors sliced through his hair with that peculiar, irritating sound, and a shiver ran up his spine as wisps of brown swirled down toward his feet. “Every woman in the castle thought it an impressive display, and if they didn’t see it themselves, they heard an expanded version.”
“But you were impressed?”
She blew the hair away from his ear, and he shivered for a reason other than fear. “Very impressed.” She clipped off the words as sharply as the scissors clipped off his hair.
Satisfied, he said, “Don’t cut it too close.”
“Don’t you trust me?”
Funny, when he wasn’t distracted by looking at her, he deciphered her moods a little more easily. Her voice betrayed her more than she would like, and her hands lost their graceful movement when he aggravated her. “Don’t you trust me?”
The comb and scissors paused. “What do you mean?”
“You haven’t yet told me what is threatening you. That’s what I’m here for, isn’t it? To protect you against some menace.”
The comb and scissors moved along. She answered reluctantly, “Someone has conceived a dislike for me.”
“Enough of a dislike to shoot arrows at you?”
“Apparently.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know.”
He decided that was a lie. “Who?”
“I don’t know.”
Another lie. But what she’d told him was almost as interesting as what she didn’t tell him, and why she’d told him even more interesting than that. When he wanted information from Alisoun, it seemed, he would have to introduce a subject she wanted to avoid, like her response to his body, then allow her to speak on an alternate subject, like this harassment against her. “Why don’t you go to the king and press charges against this lord who so plagues you?”
She combed his bangs into his face. They were long, past his nose, and they tickled. He blew at them, and she scolded, “Stop that. I need to cut these, too.” She stepped over the bench and stood in front of him.
Breasts! She had breasts that pressed against the thin blue material. The straight drop of the cotte she wore hid the rest of her shape from him, but her breasts begged him to kiss them. He could almost hear them calling his name, and he wanted to press his ears close to better heed them. Perhaps they were smothered under there. Perhaps they wanted him to free them. Perhaps…perhaps he’d better subdue another impressive display. Hoarsely, he prompted, “The king?”
“King Henry already tries to exert more authority over me than law or tradition allows him. I will not involve him in a matter which would leave me indebted to him.”
She answered steadily, as if she wasn’t aware that her breasts thrust themselves into his face. Maybe breasts were unruly, like penises, and she had no control over their behavior. But he knew what his penis was doing—didn’t she know about those impertinent breasts?
“I do comprehend your concern about King Henry, but if you had a man to take care of you—” A wad of hair landed in his open mouth.
She stood back, withdrawing those breasts from his reach, and watched as he spit and sputtered, then sneezed. When he finished, she said, “I don’t need a man.”
“How would you know?” He pushed back the half-trimmed curtain of hair from his face to watch her. “Your maids call you the oldest virgin widow in England.”
Typically, she showed no reaction. “I meant I don’t need a husband to protect me. It was easier to hire you.”
She didn’t deny her maidenhood, he noted. “I meant you would do well to take a man into your bed and find out what you’re missing.”
“And I suppose you have a candidate in mind.”
Smiling his guaranteed maiden-melting smile, he twisted the remaining long strand of hair. “Why not me?”
“Because you’re a poor, landowning baron. What could you bring me?”
“Pleasure.”
She took a startled breath at his bluntness, then reality came to her rescue. “And a babe in nine months. Then we’d have to negotiate a marriage settlement, and you could bring me nothing to match what I have here.”
“More important from my point of view—what could you bring me?” He had the satisfaction of seeing her chin drop. “In sooth, you’re wealthy beyond my wildest dreams, and that’s an advantage to me.” He sighed gustily. “The churchmen say that money doesn’t buy happiness, but I want a chance to prove it.”
“So you admit it. You want me only for my wealth, just like a thousand other knights.”
He could have danced with triumph. She hadn’t dismissed him with a laugh. His little trout was rising to the bait. “Not at all. Your lands are magnificent, but you’re also quite attractive.” She opened her mouth to retort, and he added, “When you keep quiet. That just doesn’t seem to happen often.”
She snapped her mouth shut.
“I’m a gentle man. I’ve proved myself the better of every warrior in England.” Painfully, he corrected himself. “The better of all but one warrior in England. But I have no need to prove myself stronger than a woman. I don’t hit them. I never hit my wife, and if ever a woman…well, you can ask any of my people. I don’t hit those weaker regardless of the provocation, nor does my dignity suffer when a woman lashes me with her tongue.” Placing his hand flat on the table, he leaned toward her. “With me, my lady, you can be right all the time, and I won’t mind.”
“I am right all the time,” she said, but her voice faltered.
“You see?” He took the scissors from her hand. “A man could easily murder a woman like you. For your sake, you’d best marry one who answers your sarcasm with wit rather than blows.” He chopped the last of his hair off.
“Nay!” She sprang forward. “Oh, nay, now look what you’ve done.”
“What?”
“You’ve cut it crooked.” She combed, parted, separated, then shook her head. “Now I’ll have to do the front again until it’s even. The castle folk will think I’ve lost my touch.”
“You can’t do everything yourself. You can’t be chatelaine, chief knight, and barber all in one. That’s too much of a burden for any one person to bear. Believe me, I know.” He tapped his chest. “I’ve been trying to do it alone, too. Together we would halve the duties.”
“And double the cares.”
The new cut her scissors made probably failed to even up the line, but he consoled himself the hair would grow back. “The king wants you married, and married you’ll be. You asked for advantage. Well, shouldn’t your husband be a man over whom you have an advantage?”
Her eyes were round as she observed her handiwork. She combed again, then put her hand over his bangs to hold them down, and leaned close to his face. The scissors touched him again, but her constant handling had warmed them. “When a woman is married, she is her husband’s chattel. She can do nothing without his permission.” She cut again, then stepped back and looked. A catlike smile curved her lips, then disappeared when she saw how steadily he watched her. “All advantage is lost with the signing of the marriage contract.”
“You do yourself an injustice. I give you fair notice, Lady Alisoun, that I intend to demonstrate the advantage you will have, and keep, over me.” He laughed out loud. “Come here.”
“What?” She actually took a cautious step back, and that for her was a rampant manifestation of wariness.
“I need help donning my clothes and hauberk, and I have no squire.”
“I’ll assign you one.”
He inclined his head. “I would be most grateful.”
She hovered for another moment, then came forward to stand beside him. “In the meantime, I will assist you.”
By the saints, she was a brave woman!
A stupid woman, but a brave one.
“If your knife is honed, I will shave you before I dress you,” she said.
He remembered the implicit threat of her scissors. And she wanted to put a knife at his throat! His eyes narrowed. “Nay. I thank you.”
She blessed him briefly with a smile, and he realized how skillfully she put him in his place. But other, greater nobles had tried to keep him in his place. Other, greater circumstances had oppressed him, and he had emerged tough, resilient, superior. His difficult life had taught him much and given him the advantage over this well-bred lady. He had only to remember that.
While he removed the cloth from around his shoulders and wiped off his neck, she laid his tunic and surcoat on the table. As briskly as if he were a dallying child, she ordered, “Raise your arms.”
He obeyed, flexing his muscles as he stretched. “Do you think I’m too thin?”
“Aye.” Jerking the tunic impatiently over him, she tugged it down to his waist to cover him. “But if you keep eating like you did last night, you’ll regain your bulk soon enough.” She surveyed him, and he clearly saw a gleam of satisfaction. “Then you’ll win your title back. Then you’ll be the greatest mercenary in England again.”
Ripping open his gut would have been more merciful. Since his arrival, he’d pushed his defeat to the back of his mind, ignoring the memories of his defeat. Now she spoke of it casually, as if he would unquestionably regain the title he had held so long. He knew differently. He knew his expertise had been declining even before he’d won Mary and her lands for himself, and in the years since then he’d been more of a farmer and shepherd than warrior. Only his guile and experience in battle had kept him from immediate and humiliating defeat in front of the king.
Was that the price of winning her? Did he have to become the legendary mercenary David again? Because that was impossible. He knew it was impossible.
“What?” she said, as if hearing his thoughts.
She didn’t seem to realize how much her shining confidence hurt him. There wasn’t a shred of guile on her face. Of course, there wasn’t really a shred of emotion either.
He looked deeper. She did have faith in him. He’d better wed her as soon as possible. Before she found out the truth about him—or his damnable honor made him tell her.
“Where is your hauberk?” she asked.
His chain-mail shirt, his pride and joy, had gone to her armorer the night before to be oiled and repaired, but she didn’t know that. She just wanted to avoid touching him. “I think I need the surcoat today. No reasonable man would brave this storm to shoot at me.”
She lifted her head and heard what he heard. The gray morning light had dissolved into a firm, steady rain. He credited her sense of duty rather than her vindictiveness when she said, “That’s true. You’ll have to move quickly on your rounds today.”
Standing, he pulled on his hose and tied the garters of his left leg. Then he noticed she was watching instead of helping, and he realized his foolishness. While he tied the front strap of his right leg, he said, “Here. The old wound on my hip restricts my movement, and I can’t twist around to tie it.” He didn’t have a wound on his hip, but she didn’t know that. Not unless she’d gotten a better look last night than he thought.
Apparently she hadn’t. She sank to her knees beside him and groped for the other strap. By the time she found it, tucked inside the back of his braies, and tied it, he had to close his eyes and grit his teeth to keep the groan of lust within him. He’d asked her to help him as a kind of jest, to see if she would perform the duties of a wife without quibble, and now he paid for his presumption with an agonized pleasure.
“There you are, Sir David,” she said. “Will there be anything else?”
The tone of her voice made his eyes snap open, and he looked down at her. It wasn’t that she sounded insolent, or openly laughed at him, but he’d been observing her for days now, and he recognized her amusement.
As she knelt before him, the temptation to show her what else he would have her do was great, but it was too soon for that. Instead, he let her stand, and she had already turned away when he said, “There is one other thing.”
His hands spanned her waist. Her firm flesh warmed his hands immediately, and he pulled her close. Women, for him, were normally bits of pleasure, but the top of Alisoun’s head reached almost to his nose and she spanned almost his whole length. He wanted to revel in her obvious surprise at his maneuver, but his training warned him he had best follow up his advantage at once.
Wrapping one arm around her back, he tipped her off balance. “Alisoun?”
Totally unprepared, she looked up, and he kissed her.
Her cool, dry lips impressed him with their curiosity. Whether or not she admitted it, Alisoun wanted experience, but she positively hadn’t had it yet.
He broke off the kiss. “Hasn’t anyone ever kissed you?”
“Not memorably.”
He digested that, then said, “A challenge.” He bent over her again. “The legendary mercenary David always accepts a challenge.”
Apparently she had second thoughts about her cooperation, for she turned her head away. He didn’t care. Her cheek attracted him, as did her forehead and her lashes. Dark lashes, he noticed, and again he wondered if her hair was truly red. Everything about her tasted good, a little like heather. She still withheld her lips, but she wasn’t clawing at his face or kneeing him in the groin, so he knew he didn’t personally repulse her, and he could bank on that interest to give him a chance. He touched her lips with his tongue, then withdrew it. Her body tensed against his, and he felt her quick intake of breath.
“Don’t be such a coward,” he whispered.
Speechless, she glared at him.
“But you’re not a coward. You just want to know. I don’t tell. I won’t tell. Use me.” He smiled at her. “I won’t charge for this service.”
Somehow, reminding her that she was in charge freed her from that lingering stiffness. She didn’t smile back—she hadn’t lost that much propriety—but her lids fluttered, then closed, and she relaxed against him.
Her show of trust almost sent him groping for the bed, but she probably thought he was like this with every woman. Probably she underestimated her own potency, and the power of his knowing she would be his wife. Probably she hadn’t even accepted his candidacy, but this cinched her fate. Aye, he wanted her lands, but he wanted her.
“Sir David?”
He caught her with her mouth open. His lips molded hers, his tongue thrust inside before she could change her mind. He tasted her shock, and realized she couldn’t have changed her mind. She hadn’t known what to expect. He wanted to breathe with her lungs, wanted to moan with her voice, but more than that, he wanted to connect with that kiss. That kiss sent her body arcing against his, brought him protectively over her. It was the best kiss of his life. It was…she fought him in a spasm, and he let her up for air.
Then he edged his knee between her legs and pressed her against it with his hand on her bottom. “Now you kiss me.”
“What?” Her eyes opened, and she looked at him sleepily.
Immediately he imagined how she would appear after a night in his bed, and he rubbed his knee up and down, up and down. “Kiss me.”
She understood without further elocution, and wet her lips with distracting resolve.
He was going to die of pleasure, and she hadn’t even touched him yet.
Her breath reached him first. He inhaled the scent of mint, felt the first tingle of fever. Then her lips, then her teeth, then…oh, blessed day, her tongue met his. For one lucid moment, he remembered the tale his great-grandmother used to tell him. Then the hard slam of desire swept everything before it. He was lost in it, drowning in it, clutching at it, at her.
Probably only one sound could have brought him to the surface.
A giggle. A girl’s high-pitched giggle.
He lifted his head, took a breath, opened his eyes, and found himself staring into Alisoun’s bewildered gaze. The giggle from the great hall had been abruptly cut off. None of the serving folk or men-at-arms who broke their fasts peered into his chamber, but the damage had been done. Or was it a rescue? Had they been moving toward a cataclysm with no guidance and no forethought? Before he could gather his thoughts, Alisoun’s calm facade fell into place. “My thanks, Sir David. It’s good to know I have hired a man experienced in every field.”
Irritated, he could only stare as she freed herself from his grip. How did she do that? How could she be trembling in his arms one moment, and indifferent the next? He wanted to grab her and shake her until the mask she wore fell away. Instead he watched as she glided away from him with her usual poise. He almost turned away from the sight of her. He almost missed it, but as she walked past the door, she staggered and caught at the frame.
She glanced back at him in embarrassment.
He pretended he hadn’t seen it. But he now knew his plan. From now on, he would woo her and win her with kindness and patience. He would oil his tongue and court her, and before she knew it, she would be in the thrall of that fashionable romantic rot.
Perhaps he would have to shave, after all.