by Nicole Locke
Not his.
On a low groan of pain, he released his strangling hold to rest his hands against her thighs, to pull his nipping teeth away from the succulent tender flesh of her neck.
Pinned against the wall and resting on his knee, she was weightless in his arms—but she felt like everything.
Slowly raising her head, pressing her hands against his shoulders to pull herself up, she eyed him. ‘You stopped.’
He almost hadn’t. When at any moment Ian or the extra guards at the door could have stormed in, he had been half a heartbeat from ripping away any restraint.
She laid her hand on his cheek, the concern and desire in her expression undoing him all over again. He was never like this. Always a brute of a man, he was a beast with her.
‘Did I hurt you?’ he asked.
She brushed her thumb across his cheek. ‘Not enough.’
He tilted her head to the side and cursed as he eyed her neck.
‘Can you see them?’ she said.
Her eyes were wide, excited. His own must be horrified. ‘You’re marked. I’ve put you in danger.’
‘Do it again,’ she said. ‘Then we’ll argue on why you were gone and how you should have told me where.’
Slumberous large eyes, swollen lips... Too swollen. Had he hurt her there, too? He had just wanted... And she...she wasn’t concerned at all. As if—
‘Did I do this before?’ he said.
Her hand fluttered to her neck. ‘For days I covered them. He didn’t see them. They were good. You don’t understand... I know it doesn’t make any sense or reason—and not to me either—but they reminded me of you. I liked it that you—’
‘I can’t do this. He’s here.’
His blood was ice and fire. His body was forged steel; his thoughts were scrambling like tumbling dry leaves. He needed to step away completely, not to be in this room. But he couldn’t stay away—couldn’t release his fingers from the folds of her gown. He was physically incapable of it. Words. He needed to say them—to tell her what he should have before.
‘There’s more at risk. I have... I have a family,’ he said.
She jerked in his arms. ‘You what?’
He held her tightly, until he realised she truly was fighting him, and then he slid her down to the ground.
‘You have a family?’ she said.
Of course he had a family. Everyone had a—
What a fool. It had never dawned on him to form that sentence any differently because the thought of himself with a wife and children was so beyond his reach as to be not even a dream.
‘No, not like that. My mother and sister are alive, and Ian knows where they are.’
‘You’re not making sense...’
He brushed a hand against her neck. ‘You’re bruised.’
She put her hand against his, held it to her, and he took some heart from that.
‘What do your family have to do with Ian?’
‘He was travelling through my village when he saw me. My brothers... It was just me, my sister and my mother that day. He offered coin. You were right—he did threaten them.’
‘Are they well?’ She gripped his hand.
‘As long as I do what he wants.’
A look of disbelief raced over her expressive face, and she suddenly looked to the left. He took a few steps back.
‘Where have you been?’ she said. ‘What did he make you do?’
Nothing of his past—all about his present. Not an odd question, but not the one he’d expected.
‘I truly can’t tell you. This is not something I can defend myself against.’
‘You must. Or perhaps... Maybe...’
‘What is it?’
She swallowed. ‘Maybe what he’s making you do is what he wants from me?’
Never. If Ian sent her on a task...if Ian had her play some part in his games...he’d find some way to escape with her—some means to get to his sister and mother in time or warn them of—
But wasn’t that what Ian was doing simply by having her here? He was a fool!
‘I don’t know what he wants from me. Why am I here.’ She opened her mouth, closed it. ‘I tried to lie with him. In the beginning, when he took me from Roul. But he walked away.’
The thought of Ian combing his fingers through her soft curls blinded him with rage, but he had to keep his temper. In Warstone games, those who kept their heads stayed alive.
‘He calls you his mistress, but he’s never taken one before. I think it’s for appearances—for something that I don’t know of yet. I know he’s been sending correspondence to his parents.’
‘That woman at Roul’s...was she to deliver a message?’
She was part of it. Even though she’d only accidentally stumbled across Ian’s game of legends and treasures. ‘It’s not safe for you to know this!’ he said.
‘You believe he would usually have killed me?’
He nodded.
‘Something isn’t right. Ian wants to dine in the Great Hall tonight and he has been acting...gleefully, for him. He’s frightening. And now you’re telling me you have a family you’re trying to protect...’ She waved at him. ‘And you’re acting...unhinged.’
He couldn’t think! Some of it had to do with Ian, but mostly it was to do with her. To hold her, kiss her, lie with her had been everything. To give her up immediately afterwards...his body, his heart, had rebelled.
Torn in two—that was what he was. Torn between his duty to his mother and sister and the vows he’d made to Lord Warstone. Not that they were worth as much as other vows, but he intended to uphold them.
Compare that with Margery, who needed...wanted him. He’d made a vow to her as well. He’d make a vow of his very soul if he was allowed to have one anymore. If he had a soul, it was hers.
But then that vow went both ways, didn’t it? If he was going to be good to her, in body and soul, he needed to say goodbye. To keep her safe, he couldn’t have her.
‘We can’t do this,’ he said.
‘He doesn’t want you to guard me?’
‘No, I’ll still guard him.’ And her. He’d watch over her somehow.
‘What will he have you do? Are you going away again?’
‘I’ll be here. I’m not one of Ian’s typical guards or hired mercenaries. I’m paid far more than them. But I was...bought.’
‘Bought?’
‘I have told you I have a mother, a sister. I also have two brothers. My family are all large. My brothers are gone from home. Their size got them noticed, and they’ve made their own way. I was the last one living at home when Ian of Warstone noticed me, offered to train me and take me under his employ. I said no.’
‘Because he’s a Warstone?’
‘Because I was helping my mother. Unlike my brothers, I never wanted to leave my childhood village. I liked it there, very much. The fields, the fact everyone knows who you are...’
‘So he threatened your sister and mother.’
‘He knows I don’t want to be here. Coin alone wouldn’t purchase me. He didn’t threaten to harm them or ruin them.’
‘He threatened to kill them?’
‘At first I declined. I was all my mother had, and she needed me for farming. He offered coin...and then a threat. He took me because I had no choice. It was their lives or mine.’
He gave her time to understand, and when she nodded he thought she did. Her eyes were no longer warm, or concerned, they were...they were still her.
‘You send your coin back to help them?’
‘I do—but my life is not my own. Please believe me, if it was—’
She held up her hand. ‘I believe you more than you can know.’
It was she who took steps away from him, holding her arms around her waist. And this time she shook her head as if the c
onversation she was having with herself was one she didn’t want to hear.
‘You kissed me,’ she said.
‘I’ve... I’ve never broken from him until you. You need to know what I’ve done. What needs to be done now—’
‘And then you kissed me again. You burst into this chamber after not saying goodbye...for this?’
‘I had to.’
‘You had to? For your own selfish reasons, you are here now. You could have told me this before. You risked him seeing us like this, you kissed me so that I have to lie to the Warstone, risking my life to do so, to tell me that we...we can’t be together?’
What could he say? Words that might make it sound less harsh...but she spoke the truth.
‘Margery, please—’
‘No. This was... You guarded me before, as well as any of these cold stone walls, but no more. I won’t have it. It should be different now that we have shared...now that I have waited. I hoped we were different. I hoped you were different. I wouldn’t have—’ She pulled herself up. ‘I would have protected myself from you. Get out. Go. You tell me there’s no future? Then there’s none.’
He took a step towards her, saw the shadows on her neck from a kiss that would permanently mark his heart. Keep her safe, when he had harmed her?
‘Christ, I’ve hurt you.’
‘Your kiss didn’t hurt me—your words just now did.’
He had hurt her—he saw it, and there was no comfort for that pain. None whatsoever. He was a fool, and for once—for just this one time—he needed to do the right thing.
So he left.
Chapter Thirteen
‘You look beautiful, my dear,’ Ian said smoothly as he scratched a quill across the parchment on his desk. ‘I do wish you’d tell me how you injured yourself.’
She waved her hands and fingers around her neck. ‘I bruise so easily. If I stopped to remember how I got them, I wouldn’t get anything done. I’ve even got one on my leg. I wonder if I bumped into something...’
He looked at her leg, but then bent his head and continued to scribble. Did he guess she had hit herself in different spots, to mask the bruises Evrart had put on her neck? She’d been able to think of no alternative. She didn’t want any harm to come to him, though it didn’t mean Ian wouldn’t harm her.
Evrart had left the room, and she’d barely righted herself before Ian strode back. He’d taken no notice of her and, since she preferred this room to the others, she’d curled herself up on a bench to stare out of the window while Ian had gone about changing his clothes and sitting at his writing table.
How long had it been since Evrart had held her only to say goodbye? It had felt like forever in that kiss—as if he’d missed her and wanted her. As if she was worth the risk. Instead, he’d told her of his family and said they had no future.
She did understand—fully, completely—about protecting a family. She protected her own. She also understood about protecting herself. That she’d been doing all her life. Her decisions over Josse and Roul had put her soul at risk, but she had gone against her own self-preservation instincts for her family.
It seemed Evrart had done the same. He worked for Ian—a man he despised, who threatened him—and he didn’t defend himself because he protected his family against the Warstone.
But she had gone further than Evrart. With Evrart, she hadn’t defended or protected herself. She had pulled him towards her, held him. She had kissed him and hadn’t hidden. She had been alone with him in this room and had felt no fear, only need and want. She had felt...love. She had thought Evrart felt the same.
A future with him would be difficult, given their loyalty to their families and the threats against them, but she had included him. Had thrown away her instinct to protect herself to be with him. Something she hadn’t thought she was capable of except with her family.
She’d thought he saw her. Evrart couldn’t see the colour of her eyes or her hair, like everyone else. What did he see, then, when he looked at her? Did it matter when she could feel the cavern of her own heart cracking wider?
He didn’t want her—wasn’t willing to risk being with her.
Right now, she was fiercely grateful for the prick of pain under her jawline—a reminder to her this man had held her fiercely. Held her. Maybe she could pretend a while longer that he meant to keep her.
‘Your lip is swollen,’ Ian said.
She jumped.
‘Everything is well?’ he asked.
Not with the lumps of fear rolling through her stomach, Evrart’s crushing kiss... ‘When I harmed my leg, my hand flew up and hit my face.’
‘Clumsy.’ Ian blew across the parchment and set it aside.
‘I have always been clumsy.’
And even more so now, with these words. Who hit themselves in the face? Did he believe her? It was difficult to tell, since he wasn’t raising his head. There wouldn’t be a chance she’d believe it.
He looked busy with his task. ‘Are you hungry?’ Ian pulled another parchment in front of him.
She welcomed the change of subject. ‘I am looking forward to dining in the hall.’
He raised a brow. ‘You do not like living in my quarters?’
A mistake! ‘Everyone would love to live in your quarters.’
What to say next? That she had overstayed her welcome? That she’d soon go mad if she looked at the same cracks in the stone? It was lavish confinement. If she complained, she had no doubt her comfort would be taken away.
As if Ian knew her thoughts, he smirked. ‘You are clever. Too bad you weren’t clever enough to avoid me in that corridor.’
‘I avoided you when I ran the other way and hid in the kitchens...when I told no one. And I’ve told no one since.’
He tapped the quill and began to write again. ‘Didn’t you tell me you knew nothing to tell?’
What was wrong with her? She’d blame this on Evrart too. Her heart hurt! Her words were being skewed. It wouldn’t matter if Evrart had put a stop to any life they might have with each other. Ian could end her life now.
‘What happened to that woman in the corridor?’ she asked.
‘What woman?’
Why had she asked? If she said too much she’d reveal what she knew. ‘The one you were with in the corridor when you spotted me.’
‘Oh, she is dead.’
She was going to be sick! But why it surprised her she didn’t know, since she’d already guessed.
‘Once you had spotted her, I couldn’t use her to deliver my message because she might have talked of you.’
He said everything so coldly. Easily. And he had killed that woman because she had gone down to the kitchens to eat. The thought...
She didn’t want to think.
Had her brothers received her note saying that she was in danger? She hoped they hadn’t. She now truly understood that they couldn’t help her, but she consoled herself that at least they’d know where she was, that she was thinking of them...
‘You’re wondering when I’ll let you go?’ He blew on the new ink and then took both parchments to lock them inside the small chest on the table.
‘I’m always wondering what you’ll do to me.’
He stood, inspected his hands, and straightened his tunic. ‘I know, with certainty, that you’re not always thinking of me.’
She hoped he meant when she was sleeping. He couldn’t mean when she was with Evrart. He couldn’t know of that.
‘What will you do with me?’
‘You keep asking me that question. For now, I can let you know you’re doing as I hoped.’
‘Questioning you?’
He smiled. ‘Are you getting comfortable with me that you should use such a tone? Interesting...’
What was happening to her? As a child, she had defended herself—as an adult she sought the
protection of her family. Because she loved him, she’d included Evrart under that protection.
Now she wasn’t even trying to protect herself. With her casual words, she had willingly handed Ian of Warstone the blade to slice her throat.
Bracing herself for a verbal or physical attack, she watched Ian stride towards her. But he held up his hand for her to rest her own upon. Like royalty. It was a farce!
‘For now,’ he said with utter calm, ‘I am escorting you to dinner.’
She couldn’t.
‘Come, now. I have such few opportunities to do a kindness and not have any consequences. This is one of them.’
Ian eyed her hand and the arm he held out. She laid her hand on his arm, and he patted it as if he was some source of comfort, when he was the cause of pain.
‘You’re here because I want to see if I can’t do some good for someone who has given me loyalty. I have to admit I thought you might be useful in other ways, but I’m running out of time and there’s still so much to do. Most of it is ready...yes, most... But...’
Ian had to suspect something, but his step was steady, his hand still and his breath even. Margery was loath to accept his support, but she did. Out to the corridor and towards the stairs, down one after the other... All she needed to do was not trip and fall—
‘You’ve gone quiet.’
Because she only had more questions, and she wasn’t certain she wanted answers—not from a man who spoke in incomplete riddles. Because this man frightened her, and she couldn’t get the hand on his arm to stop trembling.
She was all too certain now that he suspected Evrart, and yet...was he talking of Evrart and her? He had talked of her tone, but his voice...he almost seemed happy.
The hall was full, noisy...no more or less so than she’d seen over the years at different houses and on different occasions. She was a mistress, not a wife. She had been constantly subjected to sights not meant for any true maiden’s eyes.
There were some men piled in the corner with a few women between them. Margery glanced at them once and then glanced away. She’d seen it all before and didn’t need to see it again—didn’t need to think about the fact she was, at this moment, exactly like them. She was mistress to a married man. The fact he hadn’t actually lain with her was of no consequence. She had made her choice when she made the decision to leave with Josse of Tavel.