She ignored the herbs hanging from the ceiling and went to examine the rows of bottles, jars, and pots. A small cloudy jar that sat alone on the corner of a high shelf caught her eye. It looked as if it was kept apart so it would not be mistaken for another.
She found a small stool underneath the table and stood on it to take a closer look. From the light dust, she could see the bottle was not quite in the circle where it had been.
She lifted it off the shelf and put her nose to it—the same strong, tangy smell. Carefully, she put it back in its place.
What could it be? Perhaps it was something for Eleanor, though it hardly seemed like an ingredient for a love potion.
She jumped as the door to the spicery swung open. “There you are.” Jamie gave her a devilish grin as he kicked the door closed behind him. “I brought the clotted cream.”
He set the bowl on the long table and sniffed as his gaze drifted around the small room.
“Are the smells not wonderful in here?” she said.
“I do like a touch of spice with my clotted cream,” Jamie said with a glint in his eyes.
He dipped his finger in the bowl and brought a large dollop of clotted cream to her lips. She licked it off his finger and closed her eyes with pleasure as the rich flavor filled her mouth. When he took her in his arms and kissed her, the taste of him mixed with the sweet taste of cream. Heady smells filled her nose as he laid her back on the table.
She decided she could tell him later about Margery, the unlocked door, the mysterious potion…
Chapter Twenty-three
Christmas Court was nearly at an end. After so many days of drinking and feasting, the crowd was boisterous. Linnet could barely hear the music of harp, flute, and tabor above the hum of conversation in the Great Hall.
Linnet caught sight of Martin talking with some other squires and touched his arm to pull him aside.
When he turned, his eyes went wide.
“L-L-L-Lady Linnet.” After a delay, he swept her a formal bow, bumping a man behind him in the process. The man swore at him, but Martin did not appear to notice.
Linnet sighed inwardly. Surely, the lad should have grown accustomed to her by now.
“Have you seen Sir James?” she asked as she peered through the crowd.
“H-he took Thunder out for a gallop.”
Someone moved, and a glint of silver near the floor caught her eye. She stood stock-still, unable to breathe. In the gap between men’s leggings and the skirts of gowns, the silver-clawed bottom of a cane shone bright against a black square of the tiled floor. Her vision narrowed like a tunnel to fix on it through the crowd.
Linnet swayed on her feet, hit by a wave of dizziness as the memories burst into her head. She and Francois holding hands as they hid under the bed. The men arguing. All she could see were the men’s feet… and that distinctive silver lion’s paw on the base of the cane.
Where are his grandchildren? Where are they?
The raspy voice had been angry, insistent. With each word, the silver-clawed paw thumped on the floorboards. The memory of the sound made her stomach tighten and her palms go damp.
“M’lady, are you well?” Someone had taken hold of her arm and was speaking to her. She shook the hand off her.
Slowly, she lifted her gaze from the silver base of the cane to take in the man who held it—the man she had been seeking for so many years. She saw a flash of green brocade, but then the crowd moved and her view was blocked.
“Leave me,” she said, shaking off the hand that had fastened onto her arm again.
With her heart thundering in her ears, she began walking toward her enemy. Mychell had lied to her, given her the wrong name. The man with the cane was not dead. He was right here at Windsor. Mychell must also have lied when he claimed the man was just an intermediary, a lackey like himself.
The fiend’s back was to her. She took in the fine brocade stretched over a broad back gone to fat, and the elaborate liripipe hat with a long tail drawn forward over his shoulder.
He was talking with Gloucester and Eleanor… and Pomeroy. But she barely took note of the others; even Pomeroy did not matter. She had made a vow that day as she hid under the bed. At long last, she had found her enemy. Ten years she had waited. And now he was hers.
Her heart pounded in her ears, blocking all other sounds, as she started toward him through the crowd. A glimmer of reason broke through her trance: Not here. Not here in the hall before all these people.
But she needed to see his face. Making a wide circle, she worked her way around the room until she stood behind a pillar opposite him. She closed her eyes and leaned her head against the pillar while she gathered herself. Despite all her efforts to find him, her enemy had hidden from her at every turn. Now, finally, she would know who he was.
Would she recognize him? Would he be an old friend of her grandfather’s, as the others had been?
The advantage was hers now. She must not forewarn him that she knew who he was. And that she intended to destroy him.
She drew in a deep breath and walked around the pillar.
The group had shifted so that Pomeroy once again blocked her view. All she could see of the man was dark hair and a fat cheek, pink with good health. In her memory, his voice was an old man’s. But here the villain was, in the prime of life, with years before him to enjoy the fruits of his unearned prosperity.
All thought of carefully choosing her timing, of working by stealth, went out of her head when the man threw back his head and his hearty laugh rang out above the noise of the crowd. How dare he enjoy his life after destroying her grandfather? How dare he, after leaving her and Francois to face the world alone and penniless?
She remembered the fear of getting caught stealing and losing a hand. She remembered hunger clawing at her belly when they did not manage to steal enough. She remembered the English soldiers cornering her and Francois in their empty house in Falaise. She remembered the lechery in the soldiers’ eyes that she did not fully understand and yet made her ill with fright.
All of it happened as a consequence of this man’s acts against them. Red rage grew in her until her body pulsed with it. She could not bear that he should walk this earth another day, another moment.
As she moved toward him, she felt for the thin blade she kept strapped to the inside of her forearm. She gave her arm a snap, and the blade slid loose from its sheath and fell into her cupped hand. As she folded her fingers over the hilt, she imagined sticking it into the middle of her enemy’s chest.
She needed no plan. His time had come.
Justice was hers.
“Quickly. She is there,” Martin said.
Jamie followed his squire’s gaze and saw Linnet. She was moving through the milling guests like a hunter stalking forward, her eyes on her prey.
“You were right to fetch me,” Jamie said without taking his eyes off Linnet. God’s beard, what was she doing?
Jamie eased his way around an elderly couple, then quickened his pace. But a massive woman in red velvet stepped in front of him, and he lost sight of Linnet behind the woman’s expansive headdress. He stepped to the side and looked over the heads of the noisy crowd, tension thrumming through him. Where in the hell was she?
A moment later, he saw her emerge from behind a pillar. Her eyes were fixed dead ahead, and she took no notice of the people who attempted to speak to her as she brushed past them. Jamie had seen that same fierce expression on the faces of warriors charging into battle.
But who or what was she charging toward? As he plunged through the crowd again, he followed the direction of her gaze… to Pomeroy. Damnation, he didn’t know Pomeroy was here. Good God, she was headed straight for him. What in the name of all the bloody saints did she plan to do?
Jamie pushed his way through the guests as quickly as he could without knocking anyone to the floor. When she was but five feet from Pomeroy, Jamie stepped in front of her. She gasped and looked up at him, her eyes wide and unblinking, as
if he’d wakened her from a dream. Taking her firmly by the arm, Jamie wheeled her around and marched her toward the door.
“God’s blood, Linnet,” he hissed in her ear. “I told you I would take care of Pomeroy.”
When he finally got her out of the crowded hall, he kept going. He intended to take care of Pomeroy once and for all this time. But he would deal with Linnet first.
He marched her all the way up the stairs to her chamber, shoved her inside, and slammed the door behind them.
“I swear, you will be the death of me,” he shouted at her. “What were you about to do to Pomeroy? You had murder in your eyes.”
“Nothing,” she said in a voice that still sounded dazed. “I was not going to touch Pomeroy, I swear it.”
He took hold of her shoulders and gave her a shake. “I told you I would take care of him.”
She was shaking so violently that he ground his teeth to make himself stop yelling at her.
“It was not Pomeroy,” she said.
“For God’s sake, do not lie to me. I saw you.”
“But I—”
“You broke your promise to me!” He slammed his fist on the table beside them, making the jars on it rattle. “In the name of all that is holy, why can you not see how dangerous this is? What will I have to do to keep you out of trouble? Chain you to the floor? Leave a guard of twenty to watch you?”
“I felt as if I were possessed,” she said, sounding more bewildered than contrite. “I knew ’twas not the place nor—”
“Not the place? For God’s sake, you were about to attack him in front of three hundred people. And that is not the worst of it. The Duke of Gloucester was standing next to Pomeroy. If you brandished a blade near Gloucester, I’d never get you out of the Tower.”
“Who was the third man talking with them?”
Was she finally beginning to see the gravity of what she had done? “God’s wounds, Linnet, that was the mayor of London. You could hardly have chosen a worse group to assault if you tried.”
“The mayor?” She blinked several times, as if trying to absorb this news. “But you told me he was a good and honorable man. Are you quite certain of his character?”
“What does it matter what sort of man the mayor is?”
When he rubbed his forehead against the blazing headache she was giving him, she stepped closer and put the flat of her hands on his chest. His skin sizzled beneath her touch.
Hurt and love and anger surged through him in a ball of emotion too strong to contain. He slammed the bar across the door. This time, he did not care who might have seen them enter her bedchamber. Let them all know he was here in her bed.
He gripped her face in his hands and covered her mouth, letting her feel his anger. His shaft throbbed with need. He wanted to claim her, subdue her, finally make her his.
For she was not his. Not yet. Despite her promises, her pledges. She had not truly given herself to him.
Why could she not love him enough?
He would take her now, because he could. Because he wanted her. He clenched the silky strands of her hair in his fingers and kissed her until she sagged against him. When he pulled away, her lips were swollen, and her skin was pink where his whiskers had rubbed against it.
She looked so fragile in his arms. But Linnet was no delicate flower. She tore through life, leaving a burned trail behind. He both loved and hated her fiery nature, her strength, her unwillingness to follow the rules of her class and her sex and do as she ought.
He wanted to bend her to his will. Possess her.
When he lifted her, she wrapped her legs like a vise around him. Their mouths were locked as he slammed her back against the door. She made little cries against his mouth as he covered her breasts with his hands and squeezed the nipples through the cloth. When she tore her mouth away, he sucked on the skin of her neck, leaving his mark. The smell of her hair in his face made him mindless with desire. He wrenched her skirts up and ran his hands up her bare thighs. Gripping her rounded buttocks, he held her tight against him. Despite the layers of cloth between them, he could feel her heat.
Gasping, he leaned his forehead against the door and moved against her. Jesus and all the saints, she felt good.
But not as good as he would feel inside her.
“Jamie, please,” she said against his ear.
He claimed her mouth again as he frantically untied his braies. When her hands found bare skin under his tunic, the breath went out of him. Finally, he freed himself from his braies and leggings. He paused with the tip of his cock just inside her and closed his eyes, savoring the unbearable rush of desire that pounded in his ears and pulsed through every vein.
Then he plunged into her. And he was home again. All he wanted was to be here inside her right now. Again and again, he thrust deep inside her, as she clawed at his back and made those sounds in the back of her throat. As she screamed in his ear, he came in an explosion of lust and anger and so much desire that it staggered him.
Using the door as support, he slid to the floor with her before his knees gave way. Christ, what this woman did to him!
When he could move again, he lifted her off him and stood to tie his braies.
She stumbled to her feet and threw her arms around his waist. “Please, don’t be so angry with me. You don’t under—”
He pushed her away and forced himself to say it.
“You must choose. I will not have a wife who will take a blade to a man in the middle of Windsor Castle, in the presence of half the royal family.”
“But he—”
“I cannot chase down and kill every villain you provoke into threatening your life! And it will not be just your own life you put at risk, but our children’s as well.” He leaned close and shook his finger in her face. “I will not have it. I told you, I will not pledge myself to you unless you let the past lie.”
Tears streamed down her face, but he would not be moved. Not this time.
“You. Must. Choose,” he said, tapping his forefinger against her chest with each word. “Continue this battle or be my wife. For I swear to you, Linnet, you cannot do both.”
Chapter Twenty-four
Jamie found Sir Guy Pomeroy gambling in a small, well-appointed room in the Curfew Tower at the far corner of the palace grounds. A brazier glowed too hot on one side of the room. On the other, several noblemen sat at a table with their sleeves rolled up and cups before them. A young squire stood behind each man, ready to pour more wine or run an errand.
All the men looked up as Jamie entered, and several hailed him. One was Sir John, a big man from Northumberland who knew his father well and had fought with them in France.
“Do you wish to join the game, Jamie?” Sir John called out. “Sir Guy brought cards from France.”
The cards, which were not yet available in England, must have cost a small fortune. Each card was an elegant miniature painting with gold highlights.
“Just what we Englishmen need,” another man joked. “One more way to lose our coin.”
Jamie did not join in the laughter. “I believe I have all the vices I need.”
Something in his voice caused the room to go quiet.
Anger roiled through him as he met Pomeroy’s cold black eyes across the table. He was going to wipe that sneer off the pompous bastard’s face.
“Speaking of your vices, how is Linnet?” Pomeroy said. “I must say, her behavior in the hall today was bizarre even for her. But what can you expect of a woman raised by a merchant?”
Jamie drew his sword from its scabbard and slammed the flat of the blade in the middle of their game, scattering cards and sending coins rolling to the floor. Hands went to sword hilts all around the table, but Jamie kept his eyes on Pomeroy. Jamie had a well-earned reputation with a sword. With the point of his aimed at Pomeroy, it was unlikely anyone else would attempt to interfere.
Jamie put his other hand on the table and leaned across it. “I will give you the benefit of the doubt, Sir Guy, and
assume you did not receive my challenge.”
Pomeroy had the gall to say, “What challenge?”
This was a private dispute; Jamie made it public now only to force Pomeroy’s hand. If Pomeroy had the sense to remain quiet, Jamie would have refrained from saying anything more in front of the other men.
“What challenge?” he said, his eyes burning into Pomeroy’s. “The challenge I delivered to you a full two months past at Westminster. The challenge I repeated in messages delivered to you every week since.”
At this, the gazes of the other men shifted from Jamie to Pomeroy. A man might seek a peaceful resolution to a challenge, but he could not simply ignore it—at least he could not and retain the respect of his peers.
“Come, Rayburn, I thought you were jesting,” Pomeroy said. “I could not credit that you would risk your life over a woman so common.”
Pomeroy was a hairbreadth from having Jamie’s blade in his chest. ’Twas a shame it would be dishonorable to cut the godforsaken man down while he sat in a chair.
“I have waited nearly two months for you to name the time and place,” Jamie said, biting out the words. “I will have satisfaction this day. Two miles upriver there is a wide bend in the Thames. Meet me in the field on the south side in two hours, or I shall come find you and strike you dead for a coward.”
Pomeroy raised one black eyebrow. “I warned you before, she is not worth what this will cost you.”
Jamie lifted his sword and brought the sharp edge down with a crack, cutting a half dozen of the valuable cards with one stroke. He lifted the sword and leaned forward until the point touched Pomeroy’s tunic over his miserable heart.
“All you need to know,” Jamie said, “is that saving that lady a moment’s concern is worth more to me than your life.”
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