Catherine closed her eyes briefly. It was true; Jack was the source of all the good that had come to her. He had given her food and warmth, even the warmth of his body. The air around her chilled her skin, but where she was pressed against him, she was warm. She belonged to no one, and she was glad; those who survived best in the alley chose whom they belonged to, and the idea that she belonged to someone she did not know or choose made her feel trapped. She opened her eyes and stared at Jack. “I will choose whom I belong to. I will choose. I will choose who to kiss, or who will look at me.”
Desperation seized her as she gazed at him, as he shook his head. “It is not as simple as that. I will not dishonor you or my word—” he began, but she put her hand over his mouth.
“Shut up!” she cried. “Shut up!” She drew down his head and kissed him.
He groaned, his arms came around her, and he pressed his lips hard upon hers. For one moment, a faint unease made her pause. She withdrew a little, gazing at his eyes, and wondered at the look of sorrow and loss that flitted across his face. But a soft heat grew in her heart, and she wished suddenly to erase the grief that seemed to live in his eyes, and she drew even closer to him, moving her hands inside his jacket and onto his chest. “Don’t be sad,” she said. “Kiss me.” Surely kisses would remove the sadness.
He said nothing, only brought his lips down to hers again, and she felt the towel come undone, until she was bare. She shivered at the chill air on her back, and she nestled closer to him, putting her arms around him. “I am cold,” she said. “Make me warm.”
He gave a groaning laugh then and took her to the bed, lifting her gently onto it, then pulling off his jacket and kicking off his boots before he followed her onto the sheets. More clothes came off Jack as he kissed her, and then his hands touched her breasts.
His hands were gentle. “Mmmm. More,” she said, and kissed him again. But his lips left hers, trailing down her neck and one shoulder, making shiver. She shifted toward him, closing her eyes so she could better feel the heat of his body. She wanted to be closer to him, close enough to feel the source of the heat he put on her with his hands and his mouth. His lips were at her belly now, making her shiver more, and she cautiously touched his hair. Her fingers threaded through the surprisingly soft locks, soft like feathers, and then she clutched at them, for his lips touched her secret places, making her eyes open with surprise and her breath come fast.
No heat now, but fire, and she twisted beneath his hands that held her gently down to the bed. She felt his fingers on her, moving where the heat was, and then they moved inside, an odd, familiar sensation—
Fear struck like a knife and she twisted away, kicking her feet on the bed.
“No. No!” she cried. She closed her thighs, closed her eyes, and it seemed her lungs closed and she could not breathe. “No, stop, stop, stop, stop!” She twisted away from him, curling up into the mattress, her hands clawing the bedclothes into a shroud over her head. The dark comforted her, and she felt she was safe, as if in the alley hidden from everyone.
Silence. She could hear the crackling of the fire, and breathing—her own, a gasping, shaking breath—and then another, heavier and regular, from outside the bedclothes. She wished she had her dagger. The mattress beside her sank—slowly, so she managed not to flinch from the sensation.
“Catherine.” It was Jack. She remembered he had taken her from the alley, and he had given her warmth and food. “Catherine.” His voice was gentle. Her shoulders relaxed.
The sheet over her head came down slowly, and Jack’s face appeared above it. His brows came together in a frown, but she thought perhaps he was not angry, for his eyes held concern, as well. He looked puzzled, she realized. She let out another long, shuddering breath and let herself relax. He came closer, moving slowly, and though she flinched when he touched her, she allowed him to turn her on her side. She felt the mattress move behind her, and then there was his warmth again, his body strong underneath his skin, smooth along the length of her back.
His arm came around her, slowly, as if he were moving around a wild creature, and settled on the bed in front of her. She tried to make herself relax, but the effort made her tremble instead.
“Hush, ma chère, hush.” Jack’s voice was soothing, and his breath brushed her hair by her ear. “I will do nothing you dislike, and will not hurt you.”
She closed her eyes, nodding slowly in acknowledgment. A mist obscured her mind, and beyond it was terror, confusion, a memory out of her reach, thankfully out of her reach.
I will not be afraid. I have vowed not to be afraid. This was Jack, and he would not hurt her. She let out a deep breath, and her body relaxed.
She felt his hand on her waist, and she managed not to flinch, though she knew she tensed. But he did nothing but stroke her waist, a soothing sensation, and she relaxed again. His hand went up to her breast—he had done this before and she had not minded it, she remembered. More stroking, and his thumb came up over her nipple, moving across the tip slowly.
She moved back against him, for his warmth meant safety to her, and he was the source of it. A hardness moved against her buttocks, and she thought perhaps it was his manhood, for she had seen men’s privates as they worked on the prostitutes in the alley. She did not want to see it, though; it was enough that he stroked her breasts and her belly, and that his body against her back was very warm.
He kissed her neck, and his breath was soft on her skin. “That does not hurt, does it?”
“No,” she breathed.
“How does it feel?”
“Good.”
He kissed her just under her ear, and his hand moved from her breast to her belly. “And this?” His hand stroked in a circle on her stomach, massaging gently.
“Good.”
Jack let out his breath, controlled the heat in his loins, making himself touch Catherine’s skin and run his hand over her body as if she were not a woman he wanted desperately, but a wild creature needing to be gentled.
He did not know what else to do. She had seemed willing, had wanted him to kiss her, and had not protested when he began to make love to her. She had even seemed pleasured as he began to touch her woman’s parts . . . but then she had cried out not in passion, but in terror.
He knew terror. He had heard its cries on the battlefield . . . and heard it as Cromwell’s soldiers had invaded that most sanctified of all places to him—invaded his home. He had heard terror in the cries of his mother and sister. He remembered it like an old knife wound with bits of splintered steel still inside of him, knowing he had led the soldiers to them.
He closed his eyes. The memories took the lust from his body; he touched her now for comfort, for him and, he hoped, for her.
She moved closer to him, her back pressing into his chest, and she gave a shuddering sigh, as if a long bout of weeping had shaken her. He brushed her face gently with the tips of his fingers and felt no tears. He remembered he had never seen her weep.
Her breath continued to shudder, but he moved his hand over her waist to her stomach, rubbing his fingers gently over the muscles of her belly, moving up to her breasts and down again in a widening circle. He did nothing else, only brushing the soft hairs at the base of her belly, going no farther. Her chest’s rise and fall became regular, and the shuddering became the smooth and even flow of breath. The tension in her body seemed to fall away as she relaxed into his chest and stomach.
His touch must have given her some comfort, but there was none yet for himself. He smoothed his hand across her belly again, then cupped her breast. Catherine did not tense this time, but let out a deep breath.
“This does not hurt, does it?” he said again.
“No,” she said. She drew in a deep breath and let it out again. “It feels . . . pleasant.”
Pleasant. Hope allowed a chuckle to escape him. “Good,” he said. “But before I do anything else, you must tell me what frightened you.” Perhaps she was indeed a virgin . . . but he remembered the
terror in her cries for him to stop. A virgin might be fearful, but the few virgins he had known had been more curious than fearful at the threshold of pleasure. The liquid heat he had felt inside of her told him she had begun to feel at least some pleasure.
“I wasn’t—”
“Shhh!” he said. “Don’t lie. You were terrified.” He let his hand drift down from her breast to her belly, circling her navel with gentle fingers. “Did I hurt you?”
“I . . . no.” Her voice sounded puzzled. “I thought I remembered . . .” A hint of fear sounded underneath the puzzlement.
“Did someone hurt you before, down here?” His fingers slipped among the fine curls below her belly, caressing with a light touch. He stilled his hand, moving no farther, for tension hardened her body against his. Her skin was soft and warm against him, but her fear dampened his desire. He did not want her afraid; he wanted her to want him. She had come willingly to him so far, and lay with him now, not rejecting him. He wanted more.
He heard her release another long breath. “I don’t know . . . but I am afraid, Jack.” Catherine turned slightly toward him, a little on her back, so that she could look at him. Sorrow clearly lived in her eyes, and it struck him hard. “I think I am not a virgin, and am afraid this will hurt,” she said.
He kissed her gently, hopeful that she was not a virgin, and angry that she had suffered. “If you are not a virgin, ma chère, then it will not hurt. I will make sure of it.” He shifted himself lower, watching his own hands move over her body and gentling it until she relaxed again. She closed her eyes, and he did not ask her to open them, for he feared seeing the sorrow and terror there.
Instead, he kissed her belly, then the indentation of her navel, then lower, beginning again where he had left off when she had cried out in fear.
I will not stop him this time, Catherine thought. I choose this, not anyone else. I choose. Not memory, not fear—nothing would choose for her.
She let him kiss her breasts and belly; she let him kiss her woman’s parts, and then she gasped and opened her eyes, for again there was the heat when she felt the movement of his tongue upon her. She trembled, but this time it was not from fear but an odd tension that she had not felt before. Again, his fingers slid between her thighs. She tightened her legs together.
“Shh, ma chère, open for me.” His breath brushed her hips like a breeze. Cautiously Catherine moved her legs apart. His hand was hot between her thighs, moving slickly between them, making her twist against them and breathe a soft moan. This was not so terrible, Catherine thought. She was not certain why she had been so frightened or thought it would hurt. But Jack’s hand slipped inside again, and all thought fled.
Instead there was the heat and the smoothness and an ache that was all yearning, not pain. A cool draft wafted over her skin, and she shivered, but she was not sure whether it was because of the chill or the sensations Jack was making in her body.
But he rose up next to her, and all was well; he turned her on her side, facing him, as he pulled her hips toward him while he kissed her and caressed her waist. She tensed once more when his hardness moved between her thighs, but he did nothing but what his hand had done, gently sliding back and forth until she could not help moving with him.
His kisses heated, insisting that she open her mouth to him, but she did not mind. She felt as if she had no mind at all, but was all sensation as she moved upon him—feeling, tasting, hearing his quickened breath, the heat, the tension, and then, then the bright unbearable flash, making her cry out.
She shuddered again and again against him, and he smoothed his hands over her skin, holding her close, until she breathed evenly and the shuddering stopped.
Her body grew lax in his arms then, and Jack opened his eyes and gazed at her. Her eyes were closed. He could feel his lips twist in a wry smile. He had not allowed himself to enter her, but had taken his satisfaction between her thighs instead; he would not risk giving her a child when she could still belong to another. But he doubted Catherine appreciated his efforts, for she clearly slept.
And he would let her. He had worked her hard—he grinned at the thought—in more ways than one, and she deserved rest.
He gazed at her again, at how her face softened in sleep, no longer guarded or wary. He wished suddenly he could banish the habitual caution in her eyes, or at least when she looked at him. Perhaps if he continued his lessons in swordfighting, and taught her all he knew, she would trust him.
He grimaced. He had told her more than once that she should not trust him—and now, he wanted otherwise?
He bit back a groan. He was an idiot. He needed no such commitment. Catherine had been betrothed to the Marquis de Bauvin, and for all he knew, the marquis would wish her to be his wife once she returned.
God knew he would.
So he wished. Jack closed his eyes. It ever came to that, wishing and hoping and building castles in the sky, and furnishing them with elaborate plans to regain his estate and be wealthy once again—all pretense. He lived in a play of his own making; even claiming that Catherine was his wife was as much a dream as protecting her reputation.
She deserved more than a vagabond whose future was uncertain. Until he could claim his due, he could not ask her to marry him.
He ran a finger across her cheek. . . . She was so fast asleep that she did not move. Hope drained from him. Even if he did regain his estates, it would mean very little; if they had not been ravaged by war, they would have fallen into neglect. He had not even the deed to the land, for he had had to escape as soon as he could when he was a boy. It would take the return of his king to give him even a little chance at it.
In short, he had nothing to offer her.
Nothing but this comfort, this closeness, and whatever aid he could think of.
It was little enough. He pulled Catherine closer to him, letting his cheek rub against the soft curls of her hair. But perhaps for now it would be enough, and perhaps he could find some other way to aid her, for whatever her situation at home, she had suffered grievously.
He smiled wryly. Damn his charitable instincts. Even his mother had complained that he had brought home too many mongrels, too many stray cats—
He turned away from the memory, focusing on the sensation of Catherine sleeping next to him.
He grew hard at the feeling of her soft skin, the heat of her buttocks against his loins, but he forced himself to move away. It was too soon, and she was clearly too recently scarred for him to press more of his attentions on her.
Better that he prepare for the journey ahead. He’d let her sleep, for she’d earned it, and then he’d waken her for a meal. He smiled slightly. She would welcome a meal once she awoke, he was sure.
Carefully he disentangled his legs from hers and rolled from the bed to his feet. He looked at her; she barely moved, only leaning slightly more into the mattress than she had before, and breathing in long, slow breaths. She had, indeed, earned her sleep, as any trooper might. She would make a good soldier, he thought.
She would make a good soldier’s wife, came the next thought.
He let out a quick, impatient breath at himself, found his scattered clothes, and quickly put them on. He looked about, found Catherine’s clothes, and draped them on the foot of the bed so that she’d be able to dress quickly once she woke. He was an impractical fool, but not that much of a fool to dwell on useless thoughts. They would move quickly on to Normandy, finding other opportunities for bringing in funds as they could. Once they arrived at the de la Fer estate, he would collect his reward and go on to Breda. It was for the best.
He took one more look at Catherine sleeping. Even she agreed that it was necessary that she return home to understand what had happened to her. No doubt all would be revealed to her satisfaction, and she would be welcomed with open arms. It was, at least, what he hoped for her.
Enough. Enough of pondering and wishing. Jack opened the door and, with a last sigh, gently closed it behind him before he went down to order
a meal.
Chapter 8
CATHERINE AWOKE WITH A START. The room was cold, as were her shoulders, which were naked above the sheets and blankets of the bed. She pulled up the sheets and attempted to find more warmth for a while, but restlessness made her thrust away the bedcovers and pull on the clothes she found at the foot of the bed. Jack must have put them there, she realized. As far as she remembered, they had fallen to the floor as they had . . .
As they had made love.
Warmth flooded her, and she was not certain whether it was embarrassment or the remembrance of pleasure and comfort. Remembrance, perhaps, because she could feel a smile moving her lips upward.
Except for that one instance of unreasoning terror, she had felt comfortable, warm, and oddly secure. She frowned a moment as she pulled on her shirt and trousers. “Secure” was not the right word. She had felt vulnerable and exposed, and there was nothing secure in that. She picked up a hairbrush and made a face at it. She hoped she could untangle her hair as well as Felice had done.
She sighed, remembering the warmth of Jack’s arms around her, the heat of his body, the strange, soothing excitement of his kisses and touch. She had not minded any of it; she had, after a while, sought it.
Trust. The word came to her, and a part of her recoiled—she trusted nobody. But Jack . . . she did trust him, at least with her body. He had fed her and taken care of her, and then had pleasured her.
She caught sight of her hands in the small wall mirror as she clumsily brushed her hair. She put down the brush and looked at the palms of her hands, then turned them over. There were no marks on them, and even better, they looked strong and competent.
A defiant glee made her grin. Well, she had no doubt sinned in laying with Jack, and if Père Doré was right that her stigmata was a holy thing, then it would surely not return. Good. She was better off without it, and she could not see what purpose it had other than to give her pain. She wrinkled her nose in disgruntlement. If God had wanted to give her a blessing, she did not know why it was not something more useful, such as healing powers or the ability to lead armies to victory. Certainly King Louis’s armies could use some help, and it was not as if God hadn’t used a woman to lead the armies of France before. And if the stigmata was some kind of punishment, it made no sense that God would keep her from remembering what sin she had done to warrant such a punishment. If she did not remember the sin, she would very likely repeat it, after all. She shook her head. No, it made no sense at all.
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