by Mary Balogh
“I had powerful motivation,” he said.
She opened her eyes and gazed up at him. “You made it public, Alexander?” she said. “Everyone heard and saw?”
“Everyone,” he said. “Every man of Cwmbran.”
She closed her eyes once more. She did not have to have it explained further. She could picture it just as if she had been there. He would have taken them up the mountain to the meeting place. It would be fitting for it to happen there. He had used his authority to draw all the men up there and then he had told them the truth and administered punishment. But no—something better than that.
“It was a fair fight?” she asked without opening her eyes.
“A fair fight,” he said. “I avenged you with my fists. He made me look like this with his.”
It was primitive and bloodthirsty and unchristian to be pleased. But she was pleased.
“Thank you,” she whispered, and opened her eyes again.
He gazed down at her and took a step closer to the bed in order to touch the backs of his fingers to her cheek. She set her hand over his and turned her face toward it so that she could lay her lips against his palm. He did not move his hand.
“Thank you,” she said again, and she looked up into his blue eyes and smiled.
“You are still drugged?” he asked.
She nodded.
“There is no pain?”
She shook her head.
“Too drugged to know what is happening?” he asked.
No, not too drugged for that. She understood him immediately. And answered him without hesitation by looking into his eyes and shaking her head again.
He did not move for a moment but gazed searchingly into her eyes. Then he withdrew his hand from hers and crossed the room to the door. She heard the key turn in the lock. When he came back to the bed, he began to undress, his eyes on hers.
He was bruised, she saw. Bruised and beautiful. She had not seen him up on the mountain that first time. She had only felt him. Now her eyes devoured all his muscled, well-proportioned beauty. And she wanted him with a languorous, half-drugged desire. She wanted to be joined with him, one with him. She wanted to be healed by him. She wanted to heal him.
“Siân.” He drew back the bedclothes when he was naked and eased her shift and other garments gently down her body and off over her feet. “My beautiful Siân.”
“Beautiful Alexander.” She smiled and reached up her arms for him.
He did not come on top of her. He set one knee between hers and eased her legs wide with both of his so that he could kneel between her thighs.
“Don’t move,” he said. “I’ll do everything that needs to be done. Lie still.”
And yet he said it not so that he might thrust into her and take his own pleasure as quickly as possible, she discovered over the next half hour or so. He gave her pleasure, slow pleasure that her body could absorb without the frenzied need to writhe and lift to him.
His hands caressed her breasts, tightening them with sweet sensation, bringing her nipples to aching peaks. His head, bent over her, reached down for them. His mouth suckled them and eased them while his tongue lightly caressed the sore nipples and sent throbbing need down through her womb to settle between her thighs.
She spread her arms wide across the bed and gripped its sides. It struck her for a moment that she was spread-eagled as she had been last night, but the other way up and voluntarily this time. There were no bonds at her wrists and ankles to hold her in position. And today her body was being caressed, loved instead of whipped.
“Take away the memories and the ugliness,” she whispered to him.
He lifted his head from her breast and looked down at her, along one of her arms, and down to one spread leg. And she could see in his eyes that he understood.
He nodded and smiled down at her. “Yes,” he said. “No ugliness today, Siân. And no force and no violence. Only love.”
Her eyes yearned up into his. Love? Yes, it was love. He had called her his love up on the mountain and she had believed him. She believed the word he used now. It was an impossibility, what was between them. But it was real and beautiful nevertheless and in the here and now it was exquisitely right.
“Yes,” she said. “Love me, Alexander.”
And so he loved her, first with his hand, so that she almost swooned with the rapture of it. She did not understand how he knew to arouse desire and rapture without the frenzy that might have caused her pain, but she accepted his knowledge and his expertise with gratitude and love. Sweet glory flowed against his hand and had her moaning and then smiling up into his eyes. He was smiling back.
“Don’t move,” he said. “I will try not to jar you. If there is any pain, stop me immediately. There is to be no pain for you today.”
His hand slid beneath her but lifted her only slightly. He did not come down on top of her but continued to kneel between her thighs. Her eyes dropped from his and watched as he slid his length deeply and firmly into her. She drew in on him and throbbed about him.
“Ah,” she said.
It was wonderfully pleasurable, she found, to be able to watch herself being loved, to watch thrust and withdrawal as well as to feel. He did it slowly and gently without sacrificing either depth or intensity. Her grip on the sides of the bed tightened as she watched and as her muscles pulled him farther inward and relaxed for his withdrawals.
His eyes looked as drugged as hers felt when he spoke and she looked up into his face again.
“Shall I come alone?” he asked her. “Will it hurt you? Shall I wait for you?”
“Wait for me.” She smiled at him once more. “I am coming. I want to be with you. It won’t hurt. Wait for me.”
And so he stroked her with gentle patience while she closed her eyes and focused on the inner ache that would blossom about him and take her into the world that they could occupy together and simultaneously. One body, one soul. One impossibility made gloriously possible for one single moment in eternity.
“Yes,” he was saying. “Yes. Now, my love. Now. Yes, Siân. Now.”
And they entered that moment together.
“Cariad,” she heard him say as they went in.
22
SHE had asked to see him. And so he was waiting, very formally, in his study for her to come downstairs. His first instinct had been to go up to her, to take the stairs two or even three at a time in his eagerness. But he would not do that. There was probably talk enough belowstairs about the fact that he had personally tended to her wounded back yesterday morning. Perhaps it had even been noted that he had spent longer than an hour in her room later in the afternoon. Doubtless it was already known in the house that he had fought for her honor up on the mountain.
And so he waited for her to come down. She had fallen asleep after they had made love, so deeply asleep that he had realized how much under the influence of the laudanum she still was. He had felt guilty, lying beside her, her hand clasped in his. Perhaps after all he had taken advantage of her at a time when she could not make a rational decision. He had eased himself off the bed and left the room, not to return.
But he could not believe that she had not fully understood what was happening and had not fully acquiesced in it. He had never made love like that before. He had never before joined himself to a woman and felt unity. One body, one life, one soul. It sounded silly put into words. But it had happened. It could have happened only if it really had been so. He could not have felt that alone. She must have felt it too.
The door opened and he turned to watch her come inside his study. She was her usual neat and lovely self—and very straight-backed. Someone closed the door behind her. He hurried across the room to her, but something stopped him from holding out his hands to her. Her self-containment, perhaps.
“How is your back?” he asked.
“Sore,” she said.
“Miss Haines rubbed more ointment on it a short while ago. It will heal. I knew yesterday that your right eye was going to be black this morning.”
“I think it makes me look rather like a pirate,” he said. “Don’t all women fall for a pirate?”
She smiled fleetingly. “Alexander,” she said, “I am going home.”
“I would prefer that you stayed here until you are quite better,” he said, “but I know how close you are to your grandparents. Go, then, Siân. Take a few days off—until you can move freely and without pain. I will persuade Verity that holidays are meant to be relished.” He grinned at her.
She was looking not quite into his eyes, he noticed, and he felt the first twinge of alarm. “I meant that I am going home to stay,” she said quietly. “I will not be coming back.”
“I did take advantage of you, then,” he said. “I am sorry, Siân. I thought you were free enough of the drug’s effects to know exactly what you were agreeing to.”
“I did.” She looked up into his eyes. “It was wonderful, Alexander. It was the most wonderful experience of my life. Thank you.”
He stared blankly at her. “But you are leaving my house,” he said, “and my employment.”
“It happened beneath your own roof,” she said, “a few rooms from your daughter’s room.”
“It was not sordid,” he said quickly, hurt.
“No, it was not,” she agreed. “It should have been, but it was not. What happened between us on the mountain should have been sordid but was not. They were saved from ugliness by being moments of spontaneous—tenderness. But they cannot be repeated, Alexander. Now we know times like that can happen, it would be sordid to allow them. I cannot be your mistress and I will not be your casual love, either. I thought perhaps I could. But I can’t.”
“Siân.” He possessed himself of her hands and kissed the palms, one at a time. “You are not my casual love. There is nothing casual about my feelings for you.”
“It doesn’t matter,” she said. “The result is the same. This town and these people are important to me, Alexander. I have fought to belong to them, to be accepted by them. I suppose I will never be truly one of them. My background and upbringing set me somewhat apart. But I value their respect. I need to be able to look them all in the eye.”
“And you cannot?” he said harshly. “Because you love the common enemy and have slept with him?”
“I still can,” she said, “because I am not ashamed of what we have done. But I would be ashamed if I deliberately invited more by continuing to come here.”
He hated himself for sneering, but he sneered. “So the people of Cwmbran mean more to you than I do,” he said.
She looked at him calmly for a long time. He could not believe that her answer was not instant. He had expected dismayed denial.
“Yes,” she said so quietly that he hardly heard the word.
They stared at each other. The one word had erected a brick wall between them, or perhaps a wide ocean, or miles and miles of sky and space.
It was an impossibility, then. A foolishness. A stupidity. An idiocy. In his life before Cwmbran he had never thought to try to bridge the gap. He had taken his responsibilities seriously and had always treated his subordinates well. But he had always accepted that the gap was there. It was the way of the world. Here in Cwmbran the gap was wider than he had ever known it because here he was separated from his people by suspicion and perhaps even hatred and he was guilty of neglect. And yet it was here that he had conceived the notion of closing the gap?
Simply because he had fallen in love with her?
“Then you had better go,” he said, clasping his hands behind him, “before I debauch you beyond redemption.”
“Don’t be angry,” she said. “Please, Alexander, try to understand.”
“I understand,” he said, “that I have been foolish to fall in love with this place and these people. And with you. I stand alone. So be it. Perhaps you and your people would be more comfortable if I went away and if life continued as before. I am not going to go away and life here is not going to be as it has been in the past years. I will act alone if I must. Good-bye, Siân.”
“Alexander,” she said softly.
“Go,” he said. “I’ll have your week’s pay sent to your grandfather’s house. You are no longer in my employ.”
He thought she would never go away. She stood and gazed at him wide-eyed.
“I’ve hurt you,” she said at last. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
And then she whisked herself around, wincing noticeably at the sudden movement, and let herself out of the room before he could reach beyond her to open the door for her. He stayed where he was, resisting the urge to go after her.
He swore silently and at some length as he stared at the door.
* * *
Her grandmother fussed over her, feeding her at frequent intervals through the day as if she needed fattening up. Emrys had taken all her things up to his room and brought all his things down. His room upstairs was to be permanently hers. Her grandfather was inordinately pleased that at last she was at home and he could support her, as a man should support his women. There was no question now—it was tacitly understood—of her marrying next week.
It was good to be home. It felt almost as if she had been gone a month instead of just one night.
No one mentioned Owen. Or the Marquess of Craille. She had to wait for visitors to do either.
Mari hugged her and brought her some freshly baked Welsh cakes—and told her that during the fight up on the mountain Iestyn and Huw and Emrys had acted as seconds to the marquess. Iestyn came later on his way over the mountain to call on his girl. He kissed Siân’s cheek and told her again that he was proud of her—and told her that he thought the Marquess of Craille a decent sort for not dismissing Owen from his job.
“I don’t think he likes to use his power in any negative way, Siân,” he said. “He is handy with his fists, mind—we never thought to see the man who could put Owen down in a fair fight. But he was content to leave it at that. No dismissal. And he did not use his whip after all.”
“His whip?” Siân looked at him sharply.
“No,” he said. “He was going to. But you could see that he was unable to hit a man when he was down. He would not take an eye for an eye. Which I was glad to see because that idea came very early in the Good Book, Siân, before people realized that God is not really like that at all.”
It was Huw who told her later that Emrys had used the whip—fifteen times across Owen’s back. And that Owen had made no attempt to avoid the lashes, though no one was holding him down.
“I almost admired the bastard,” Huw said, and then had to apologize because Hywel was there and heard him. He went on to tell Siân about the meeting the marquess had called at the chapel. The townspeople were divided between those who were willing to give him a chance and those who still sided with Owen and were suspicious of any good thing the marquess seemed to be offering them.
Siân had shut her mind to Owen. She did not want to think of him. She did not want to hear about him. Or see him. She felt hurt and bruised and raw all over. She wanted to heal. There were two men she wanted to blot from her memory, from her very being. She wanted to be given time.
But when a knock came on the door one evening and no one followed it up by lifting the latch, Emrys opened the door and then immediately stepped into the doorway to block it.
“Get away from here,” he said, “where you are not wanted and where you might be given two black eyes as a welcome.”
“I want to speak to Siân,” Owen said quite steadily.
“Oh, do you?” Emrys said, his voice menacing. “And where is your whip, man? Everyone knows that our Siân can be controlled only with a whip. And not always even then. It is a pity you could not whip her spirit as well as her back.”
“Get away from my door, Owen Parry,” Hywel Rhys said from his chair. “And don’t come back.”
“There is wicked of you, Owen, to come here, knocking on the door as if nothing had happened,” Gwynneth said. “Unchristian it is of me, but I must ask you to leave. Siân has nothing to say to you.”
Siân had set her head back against her chair and closed her eyes. She could hear him again telling her in a voice he had forgotten to disguise to open her mouth so that he could stuff the rag between her teeth.
“Siân,” Owen said from behind the protective bulk of Emrys in the doorway, “will you come for a little walk with me? There are things that must be said.”
She wondered suddenly what it must have cost him to come here like this, knowing very well what reception he was facing. And he was right. There were things to be said. It was the eve of what was to have been their wedding day.
“Which eye would you like me to blacken first?” Emrys asked. “It is all the same to me, Owen Parry.”
Siân got to her feet. “It’s all right, Uncle Emrys,” she said. “I will go for a walk with him.”
“Over my bloody dead body,” Emrys said.
Siân noticed irrelevantly that her grandfather did not reprimand her uncle. “Sit down, fach,” he said to her instead.
“I’ll go, Grandad,” she said. “Owen will not hurt me. And there are things we need to say to each other.”
“Crazy woman,” Emrys said, standing aside. “You should be put on a leash, Siân Jones, and kept on it. Go on, then. But you set one finger on her, Owen Parry, just one finger . . .” He did not complete the threat.
“Have her back within the hour, mind,” Gwynneth said.
Siân lifted her warm cloak from behind the door and drew it about her. It was autumn and chilly and damp, the sort of evening best spent indoors before a crackling fire. She did not look at Owen as she stepped past him out the door. They walked along the street, a few feet of space between them. Neither spoke until they turned and took the familiar route up into the lower hills.