Garland of Straw (Roundheads & Cavaliers Book 2)

by Stella Riley

  ‘That’s generous of you.’ He was already sitting down to pull off his boots. ‘Get into bed and remove your shift. I don’t mind in which order.’

  ‘Do you really think this will help?’

  ‘You mean - won’t I hate myself in the morning? I’ve no idea – nor do I much care. Get into bed and lose the damned shift.’

  It was the tone five hundred troopers obeyed without question and, shaking from head to foot, Venetia shot between the sheets and wriggled out of her shift. It was going to be awful. If he hadn’t been so angry … if she’d thought he might actually listen … she might have tried telling him why it was going to be awful. Then again, perhaps not. It was too humiliating. And, in just a little while, he’d know anyway – if, thanks to Ellis, he didn’t already.

  Even knowing that argument or resistance would only make matters worse, she could not help saying, ‘You once told me that you d-didn’t approve of rape.’

  ‘I don’t.’ His breeches followed his boots and, for a moment, he stood looking at her, his breathing harsh and ragged. ‘But this isn’t rape. It’s the long-delayed consummation of our marriage and it needn’t be unnecessarily unpleasant unless you choose to make it so.’ He paused and then said abrasively, ‘Well? How do I compare with Ellis?’

  Venetia started, shut her eyes tight and turned scarlet with embarrassment. Without realising it, she had been staring as he stood before her, naked as God had made him; and God had clearly done an excellent job. She gripped the sheet up to her chin … and felt her breath leak away as the mattress dipped beneath his weight.

  Clamping her teeth together, she braced herself for the inevitable assault.

  It did not come. Seconds ticked by … and still nothing. Finally, unable to bear the suspense, she opened her eyes on an impenetrable grey gaze and said jerkily, ‘Can’t you … can’t you just get on with it?’

  ‘Did you expect a three-minute wonder?’ asked Gabriel acidly. ‘I’m sorry to disappoint you but there’s been nothing so far to make me that eager. However … I suppose we can try to change that.’

  He twitched the sheet from her grasp and let it drop over her hips. Venetia shut her eyes again, shivering with apprehension. She could feel him looking. She didn’t need to watch him doing it.

  Neither speaking nor touching her, Gabriel conducted a leisurely appraisal. The silver-gilt hair was spilling over the pillow, her breath came in odd little flutters and he could see the pulse beating somewhat frantically at the base of her throat. Her breasts, though not large, were fuller than he had expected, and an almost fragile-looking rib-cage tapered to a narrow waist. Her skin looked like silk. All this, since he hadn’t touched a woman in eight months, ought to have been enough to arouse his interest. The reason it didn’t was that she was lying there with her eyes tightly shut, her jaw clenched and every muscle in her body rigid with tension.

  Almost experimentally, he reached out a hand to trace the contour of her waist … and wasn’t at all surprised when she nearly jumped out of her skin.

  He said irritably, ‘For Christ’s sake, Venetia! I don’t expect or even much care whether or not you enjoy this – but I’d as soon not hurt you. However, if you’re going to lie there like a sacrificial virgin on a slab, you’ll make it unavoidable.’

  Her eyes opened briefly and he glimpsed something that looked very like despair.

  She whispered, ‘I’m sorry. It’s just … just …’

  He frowned. ‘What?’

  But she merely shook her head and said, ‘Please … can’t we just get it over with?’

  Not unnaturally, this unfortunately phrased request was open to severe misinterpretation.

  It didn’t occur to Gabriel that the misery he’d seen in her face had nothing at all to do with Ellis in the way he imagined, but everything to do with Ellis in a way he didn’t suspect. Consequently, he said unkindly, ‘By all means. If you keep your eyes shut and I stop talking, you can pretend I’m Ellis, can’t you?’ And he swept his palm up to enclose her breast.

  Venetia, who had been about to mutter that that wouldn’t help, gasped. The heat of his hand flowed through her skin and when his fingers slid tauntingly around her nipple a piercing shaft of sensation shot downwards through her body. Her eyes flew wide and she looked at him in confusion.

  ‘A normal reaction, at last,’ remarked Gabriel acidly. ‘Thank God.’

  And to himself, Two of them, actually. And about bloody time.

  He’d relied on prolonged abstinence to cause his body to overtake his brain. Unfortunately, he’d begun to realise that anger wasn’t any sort of aphrodisiac … and, until her breast filled his hand, he’d begun to doubt his ability to finish what he’d started. This, given Venetia’s predilection for confiding in sodding Ellis, simply wasn’t an option – so it was a relief to find his loins finally co-operating.

  He wondered what she’d do if he kissed her and so, pulling her inexorably against his body, he brought his mouth down hard on hers.

  Flesh met flesh. Venetia stopped breathing for an instant, her hands pressed flat against the solid warmth of his chest. His kiss, a little rough and undeniably demanding but somehow wickedly enticing, elicited an immediate response. Her mouth opened under his and he took instant advantage of it, probing her tongue with his own until an unexpected and wholly unfamiliar sensation of heat unfolded inside her and she didn’t know whether to struggle or melt. Without being aware of it, her arms closed about him and her fingers sought out the muscles of his shoulders and back before entangling themselves in the thick, dark hair. She thought hazily, This is … different. How is that possible?

  Rapidly and none too gently charting every curve, Gabriel let his hands travel over her body. He released her mouth for a moment in order to look into her face and then, satisfied by what he saw there, continued his exploration. He traced the line of waist, hip and thigh … and then slid his fingers between her legs. Venetia made a tiny, involuntary sound in the back of her throat and tensed against him, tilting her head back to reveal eyes full of shock. Somewhere in the recesses of his mind, Gabriel wondered about that … but, before he could consider asking, shock faded into hazy pleasure.

  He possessed her mouth again and then murmured sardonically, ‘Not that it makes any difference … but I take it you’re not saying no?’ And, without waiting for an answer, settled over her and entered her body with one long, smooth thrust.

  For an infinitesimal second, Venetia’s nails dug into his back … and then she realised something surprising. It didn’t hurt. It felt … he felt good. Better than good, as he started to move inside her. It felt astonishing. His teeth grazed her lower lip and his thumb brushed her breast. Her gasp became a moan and then the ghost of a whimper.

  Like that, do you? thought Gabriel distantly. Still want me to get on with it? The exquisite sensation of her tight, sleek heat around him said that this wouldn’t be a problem. Then let’s see, shall we?

  His thrusts increased in pace and depth. Venetia arched her back and clung to him as a new sensation started to grow inside her. Something hot and melting that seemed to make her want more and more and more. It was absorbing, frightening, urgent … and suddenly, without warning, over.

  Over?

  Breathing rather hard, Gabriel rolled off her and lay on his back for a moment, before swinging his legs to the floor and reaching for his clothes. With a cold, unpleasant smile, he said, ‘I hope that was brief and painless enough for you. Goodnight.’

  Gradually, the new, lovely and promising sensations in her body dwindled. She was sorry to see them go … but counted it a miracle that she had felt them at all.

  *

  Venetia awoke early in the morning to a curious sense of well-being which intensified as memory came flooding back. It hadn’t been a disaster. She hadn’t been a disaster. It hadn’t even been uncomfortable. It had been … unexpected.

  She stirred lazily, smiling to herself and then opened her eyes to find Gabriel standing over h
er – fully-dressed and with an expression bleak enough to make hell freeze.

  Most of her warm contentment drained away and she sat up quickly, clutching the sheet to her chest. She had been foolish to think last night might have changed the way he felt. Why should it? He believed she’d slept with Ellis – so, all things considered, he probably thought her little better than a whore.

  As usual, what Gabriel thought was not immediately apparent and he seemed in no hurry to speak. But finally he said curtly, ‘As you know, I have to go back to the Army. With the harvest due – and a bad one at that –I’d naturally have preferred to leave you here to look after things. But since I’ve a particular aversion to having Ellis keep my bed warm for me, I can’t do it. No.’ This as Venetia would have spoken. ‘Don’t interrupt. I intend, as before, to take you with me. But this time there will be no carriage, no maid and no Phoebe. We are going to ride fast, just you and I. And you may take only what can be carried on a pack-horse. I trust I make myself clear?’

  She swallowed and kept her head very high.

  ‘Perfectly.’

  ‘Good. Then I suggest you get up and make ready while I speak to Sophy. I want to leave within the next two hours.’

  ~ ~ ~

  THREE

  It was an arduous, unpleasant ride and it ended up taking longer than Gabriel had expected – partly because with Lambert in hot pursuit of Hamilton, it was necessary to follow the trail of messages which Wat had left at every halt and partly because Venetia was with him.

  Not that she ever complained. In fact, Gabriel got the distinct impression that she’d have bled to death sooner than do so. But when he could see her growing gradually white with fatigue, he told himself that it was only sensible to pause for refreshment or stop for the night rather earlier than he’d planned. After all, it would cost an even bigger delay if she collapsed in the saddle.

  They crossed the Pennines by way of Leeds, Huddersfield and Oldham to Manchester, where they shared a mediocre and largely silent meal at a noisy and not especially comfortable tavern. Gabriel retreated behind a mask of granite-like courtesy and said nothing of the fact that he’d hoped to be in Warrington by now. Venetia pushed her food around her plate, tried not to show that her back was aching and wondered why all her usual confidence had deserted her. Then they bade each other a formal goodnight and retired, in equal confusion, to their separate chambers.

  Exhausted but unable to sleep, Venetia’s mind ricocheted between wanting to kill Ellis and searching for a way to undo his mischief. Both seemed equally impossible. The only crumb of hope she could find was that, in bringing her with him, Gabriel had given her a slender chance of making things right … if, that was, he ever showed signs of being willing to listen.

  Since communication between them had been reduced once more to its most basic level, Gabriel did not know that Venetia was far from averse to making this journey with him. He only knew that, in dragging her off to bed, he had somehow made matters worse rather than better. And as yet, he was too wrapped up in his own feelings to even begin wondering what hers might be.

  The moment in which he had found and identified Ellis’s glove was trapped in his mind like a fly in amber. Savage disillusion and a sense of betrayal had sliced through him, bringing something akin to physical pain and then sheer, blinding rage. And rage, of course, had been responsible for everything which had followed.

  In all his life, Gabriel could not remember ever totally losing his temper. But when he had walked into the parlour and heard Venetia admit that Ellis had been her lover, he had lost it with a vengeance. Caution, common-sense and even the most rudimentary self-control had flown, leaving only a white-hot need to cure a few of his ills by teaching his exquisite, lying wife a sharp lesson.

  Well, he’d done that all right. He’d let his tongue run riot and forced her into bed. Thus far, it had been ugly, shameful and potentially dangerous; all the things he’d thought he wanted. Only then, just when he’d given up expecting it, she’d melted into his arms as if being there obliterated everything else; and even when he’d taken her with less consideration than he’d ever shown any woman before, she had still responded to him as though …

  He reached abruptly for the bottle and poured himself another drink. It did no good to remember how she’d reacted. It particularly did no good to re-live the moment this morning when she’d drifted into wakefulness, sleepily smiling; smiling as though he’d given her something – when he knew perfectly well he hadn’t. He’d made the whole episode about possession rather than love-making and had done no more than was strictly necessary in order not to hurt her. Then, for the first time he could remember, he’d taken his own pleasure as fast as possible without any care for hers. And yet still she’d looked up at him and smiled.

  He set the memory aside and told himself he wouldn’t think of it again. He would remember, instead, that she wasn’t to be trusted – and was probably as accomplished an actress as she was a liar. Either that or she didn’t much care which man was in her bed. But no. He frowned down into the amber liquid. He could not believe – did not want to believe - it was that. Also, for a moment or two at the beginning, he had glimpsed something in her face that seemed wrong but that he couldn’t identify. So if she’d been acting, it had been a truly remarkable performance; that, or he was more gullible than he’d thought.

  All this, however, was almost beside the point. The important thing now was to put it to the back of his mind and recover his self-possession. But that was easier said than done when the scent of her hair lingered in every breath he took and the softness of her skin was indelibly printed on his fingers.

  He fell asleep wondering why nothing seemed to go quite right; why, instead of exorcising his growing attraction to Venetia, he had managed instead to weave a web for himself. And by the time they halted the following night, after another crippling day’s ride and still seemingly some distance behind Lambert, he was acutely aware of two damnably incompatible facts. The first was how badly he wanted her – and the second was that it would be a cold day in hell before he laid a hand on her again; because whichever way one looked at it, only a complete idiot would risk becoming emotionally involved with a woman he couldn’t trust.

  The end of the third day brought them wearily to Uttoxeter and journey’s end. By the time she had ridden through the scattered, grinning ranks of the Colonel’s regiment and been deposited like superfluous baggage at a small inn bustling with officers, Venetia cared for nothing except her chances of persuading someone to bring up sufficient hot water for a bath. Gabriel, meanwhile, went immediately in search of the Major-General to report his return and apologise for having arrived twenty-four hours late – only to find, as Major Maxwell put it, that he’d missed all the fun. The Duke of Hamilton had surrendered to them earlier that day and was even now in dignified custody.

  Gabriel nodded. ‘So I’ve heard – along with the fact that Callander continues to elude you.’

  ‘And Langdale,’ said Eden.

  ‘Yes. But Sir Marmaduke has my very good wishes for a fair wind to France. Callander doesn’t. In short, since he’s largely responsible for Hamilton’s current predicament, he ought to have the decency to be here sharing it with him. But life, as they say, is rarely fair.’

  The crisp voice held a note of unusual bitterness and Eden took a long, thoughtful look at his Colonel. He said, ‘If you don’t mind me saying so, you look exhausted. Have you managed to find yourself some quarters?’

  The lean mouth curled slightly.

  ‘After a fashion. I’ve thrown out Ned Moulton and Lieutenant Billings. It’s one of the privileges of rank.’

  Eden grinned. ‘Obviously. But when did you get too grand to fit into one room?’

  ‘When I decided to bring my wife with me,’ came the cool reply. And then, before the Major had recovered his breath, ‘You won’t know it yet, but Lambert is taking the bulk of the Army to join up with Cromwell for a march into Scotland. I, on the other ha
nd, have been ordered to take two troops and escort Hamilton and a handful of others to London. If you want to attend your sister’s wedding, you can come with me. If not, I’ll take Captain Massey. It’s entirely up to you. And now I’d like to get some idea of the number of prisoners who are being assigned to my chaperonage.’

  Not being sure how best to answer this, Eden confined himself to guiding Colonel Brandon to the house where, with the exception of his Grace of Hamilton, the London-bound captives were lodged. There were five of them. Four were minor Scottish nobility; the other was the fellow who Gabriel had last seen disappearing into the dusk of Preston with an empty pistol.

  Across the heads of the gloomy disdainful Scots, two pairs of grey eyes – one as light and clear as spring water and the other dark as threatening storm-clouds – met and locked. Then, without a hint of recognition, the Cavalier said, ‘If you’re staying, I hope you’ve brought some dice.’

  ‘Unfortunately, not,’ replied Gabriel evenly. ‘But I daresay Major Maxwell can oblige you.’

  While Eden was good-humouredly searching his pockets under the Royalist’s suddenly acute stare, Colonel Brandon faced the officer outside the door and said briskly, ‘Who’s the Englishman?’

  ‘We’re not sure, sir. He says his name’s Ambrose and that he’s just a common soldier serving as a Colonel under Sir Marmaduke Langdale. But there’s some as think he’s a rich Midland lord who’s broke his parole.’

  ‘Is that why he’s being sent to London?’

  ‘Not altogether, sir. There’s also a suspicion that he’s the one as planned the scurvy trick what took Pontefract.’

  ‘I see,’ said Gabriel. And thought irritably, Christ! Out of the whole Royalist army, why did it have to be him? Then, as Eden materialised at his elbow, he said, ‘Let’s go. I’ve seen all I need to. And now I suppose it behoves me to find Wat and send him to guard Venetia’s door from the nasty, drunken soldiers. Do you know where he is?’