Risk Everything (14 page)

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“Aye, we leave them. Do you ken what they say? Or was Connor too great a coward to show you?”

“If Connor ne’er showed me the notes, he didna for his own reason. He has not a coward’s bone in his body.” She grasped the belt that rested on her hips, else she would strike him for saying such about her brother. Rolf ’s written words had made no sense.
Ye destroyed that which I loved most.

Look to yer own.
“The Morgans of Blackthorn have taken naught from ye.”

“Aye, they took from me! What they took I held most dear.”

“What? They have taken nothin’ from ye,” she shouted. “If one of our men broke the agreement, he did so without Connor or Damron’s knowin’.” She smacked her hand down on the table so hard it rattled the cups nearby.

“My wife!” Rolf struck the table with his fist. Cups flew.

“My son!” He struck again, so hard she heard a board crack.

“Nay!” she screamed. “Ne’er would Connor do such.”

Rolf turned and nodded to a squire who stood close behind him. While Meghan watched, the young man brought a heavy stand that held armor. His body was between her and the stand until he placed it on the floor across from her and drew back.

Meghan caught her breath. It held a helmet, a hauberk, a tunic. Blood stained them, the tunic’s sleeves as well. Bile surged to her throat, almost choking her. There for all to see was the elegant Gaelic letter for
C
on the front of the helmet and the bloodied tunic. She could not speak.

“Because she refused to yield to him, your ‘honorable’

brother pitched Ingirid down those very same steps that brought you to the great hall.” He spit the words at her with icy venom.

“Ye are wrong! He couldna.” She denied him. “When did this ghastly thing happen? I will prove to ye it wasna him.”

Never would Connor do such to any woman. Women made their way unbidden into his bed. That is, until Elise entered his life.

Rolf’s hard stare cut through her. It was then she realized the

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silence in the room. All held their breath as they watched and listened to what passed between their lord and his captive.

“I was with Hereward the Wake. In 1072, leagues outside Abernethy, King William’s patrols came across us. In order for Hereward to get away, others and I led them in an opposite direction. They captured and held me. I escaped and made my way home. I entered hell!” He reached for the flask of wine and drank straight from it, his expression bleak with his memories.

“Do you ken what it is like to return home to find someone you love unable to move even a finger? Unable to speak?” His jaw hardened, his hands clenched. “Naught but her eyes could move. They filled with a terror so horrible it burned my soul to see it. My bairn lay beside her. Too small. Too helpless.”

Tears filled his eyes. Meghan near cried out seeing his pain.

“The midwife had just delivered my son. I held him and begged God to help me find a way to aid him. The bairn took but two short breaths. Ingirid didna last the night.”

Meghan held on to the table edge, for her legs were ready to buckle.

“God in heaven, Rolf, Connor
couldna
have done that.”

“He did!” Rolf roared back. “Ask Garith. He tried to stop him. Connor twisted his arm behind him and left it near useless.” His fists twitched, looking impatient to strike out again.

“It had to be another disguised as Connor,” Meghan insisted. “How can anyone tell who is behind a helm with a nose piece? My brother wouldna have been here at the time.

He was with Damron at Abernethy. Go to Blackthorn with a flag of truce, and we will prove neither he, Damron, nor Mereck could have done this.”

“Alpin recognized his clothing when he pursued them.”

Murmurs spread throughout the room, though they had heard the story many times already. “The smell of so much blood must have sickened Connor, for he was fool eneuch to throw down his helmet and armor.” Rolf smoothed out the table-cloth where he had bunched it in his fist.

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“So, it comes to this. You insist ’twas Connor. I insist it couldna have been. Connor was at Abernethy as ye were.

From there, he went to England with Damron to bring Brianna of Sinclair back as Damron’s bride.” Meghan shook her head. How could she prove it to him? Cold dread ran down her back. What
did
he want from her? He had said ’twas not for ransom. What then?

Ye destroyed that which I loved most
. He had explained that.

Look to yer own
. She, obviously, was the answer to that.

Her gaze met his.

“What do ye want from me, Rolf?” What could he want? Not money. Not jewels. No ransom of any kind. He would have already sent messengers about such. She dreaded his answer.

He motioned to the squire, who turned the armor’s stand to face them. Rolf folded his arms and spread his legs wide in a battle stance. His jaw tightened, his face hardened to punishing stone.

“What do I want from you?” He raised his brows, his voice silky. “Have you not guessed?” After a long, deliberate pause, he added, “
You know
.”

She shook her head. Slowly. She wouldna e’en think on it.

“A son.” His chin lifted. His expression became unyielding, arrogant. “I want a son.”

“Ye wish to wed me? Sister to the man ye believe caused the death of yer wife and child?” His words astounded Meghan.

“Nay, Meghan. Not wed. You will be my leman until you birth a healthy son.” His eyes burned stark with misery. “After I know the bairn will live, I will release you.”

She could not speak. His leman? He wanted a son? A bastard? By her? Yet he would send them back to Blackthorn after the babe was born?

As hot rage sparked through her like blinding lightning strikes, Rolf spoke again.

“The bairn stays with me.”

Chapter 11

His leman! He wanted to couple with her as he would breed a stallion to a mare? Without thought to consequences, Meghan’s hand cracked across Rolf ’s cheek with all the force she could muster.

“Ye cold-hearted whoreson.” The words hissed through her teeth. “Ye would breed me like an animal and take the bairn from my breasts?” She paid no heed to the hand that whipped up and clamped her wrist with fingers of steel. He twisted her arm down and around her back.

“Ne’er do such again, Meghan, lest ye wish mine own hand to return the favor,” Rolf shouted. “And ne’er call me whoreson.”

She felt the force of his words resounding through his chest as they sprang forth, for he held her crushed against him. His eyes blazed down at her, daring her to defy him.

Ugsome barked, then snarled as he tried to shove between them. He became ever more aggressive when he could not separate them. Not with Meghan, though. He clamped his jaw on Rolf ’s booted ankle. Rolf shook his leg, and the dog let loose only to circle behind Meghan. He braced his paws against her hips, and his teeth tugged the sleeve of Rolf ’s arm that held her in such a cruel grip.

With Ugsome’s weight pushing against her hips, Meghan’s stomach made forceful and shocking contact with Rolf ’s groin. Each time Ugsome snapped and tugged, the hot hardness there grew to alarming proportions.

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“Begone, beast,” Rolf growled out the order as he released her wrist. “Garith. Control him.”

Meghan sprang back from Rolf. Her left hand darted out to grab the wine flask from the table. She slammed it against his chest. Wine trickled down his clothing as the flask bounced its awkward way to the floor.

Rolf went as still as a well-built cairn. His lips thinned, his eyes narrowed to slits. His soft voice commanded everyone in the room. “Leave us.”

They needed not to hear his words. Rolf ’s lips pressed together, and his nostrils flared with fury. ’Twas enough to make grown men charge from the room, some scurrying like mice before a hungry barn cat. Alpin, Garith, and Dougald did not move until his wintery gray eyes turned to them.

Meghan took a deep breath to calm her rage. It didna help.

Her hand twitched at her hip. Oh, how she missed her dagger!

Were it at her side, he would have felt its prick against his throat.

Not to kill. To warn. No man would treat her as a baseborn slattern. Not even the king himself could command her to his bed. She would die first.

“I willna play the whore for ye,” she blazed at him.

She backed up and started to circle the tables. Her eyes searched over each. Mayhap in their haste, someone had left their eating knife behind.

Rolf followed. One slow step at a time, he stalked her.

“Heartless, churlish swine.” She spied a pewter tankard and threw it. It bounced against his waist. Ale sloshed onto the rushes. When the tankard clanged to the floor, the noise rang out in the empty room. Grasping a soggy trencher, she hurled it at him. To her great satisfaction, it landed against that hard bulge that was ever more apparent. The veins in his forehead bulged. His jaw twitched harder, and she heard him grind his teeth together.

“Ne’er will I bear a babe and discard it like offal that means nothin’ to me. Ne’er,” she shouted. How could he know so little of her that he believed she would agree to such

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a terrible deed? She could not understand this man who had changed so.

He remained silent as he stalked her. She bounded onto a bench and was on the other side of the trestle table afore he could blink. He followed just as quickly.

She somersaulted over the next table. Her hair escaped its bounds to fly about her face. It almost blinded her. He was hot on her heels. Silent still. He came after her, the veins in his neck pulsing and swelling, his face tightening, becoming ever more grim, if that were possible.

She had made a foolish mistake. In her rage, she failed to note he guided her so that solid wall stood behind her. She twisted to run. His hand darted out to grab a handful of hair and pull her up short.

When he hauled her around to face him, his eyes were no longer the gray of a winter’s sky but the hot ash of a well-stoked fire. Hard arms encircled her, pinned her own against her sides. His demanding mouth cracked down with such force he ground her lips against her teeth. Holding her with one arm, he grasped her jaw and forced her to yield and open to him.

His hot tongue invaded her defenses and tasted of wine and passion. He left no part of her mouth unexplored. She could not move. The hard length of his sex pressed against her stomach and felt like a thick, white-hot poker taken from the fire. Her mind rebelled at a hideous thought.

Did he intend to take her here on a table strewn with food?

A shameful whimper escaped her throat.

His lips gentled and feathered across hers, soothing them.

Her heart slammed against her ribs as he relaxed his harsh grip on her face. Calloused fingertips smoothed as soft as a butterfly’s wing over her cheek as he stroked her jaw and then made their way down her neck to linger on her collar bone.

She gasped and drew her head back. “Dinna.”

“Dinna what, Meghan?” His voice growled low in his throat as his hand wandered down to caress her breast. In her efforts to escape him, the ties at her neck had come undone, and the

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material gaped wide to expose her enticing softness. His heated eyes delayed there. “Dinna beat you?” He glanced up at her.

“Hmm?”

His hand stilled as he studied her face. “Nay. You dinna fear a man who throws you to the ground and grinds you in the dust. Often enough I spied you hidden beneath your squire’s clothin’, wrestlin’ with Damron and Connor.”

“I ne’er hid. Grandda knew I trained.” She gasped for breath.

“You have not answered me, Meghan. Dinna what?” His arm around her moved lower and tightened to grind his arousal against her soft flesh.

“Ye well know. Dinna shame me by raping me. That is the only way ye’ll have me. I will ne’er yield to ye as yer whore.”

“I dinna need your yielding. Whether you do so or not, I will have a bairn of your body.” His eyes changed to cold slate again. “Connor of Blackthorn tore my son from me. Meghan of Blackthorn will breed me another.”

“I swear to ye, Rolf,” she said slowly, clearly, “force me to accept yer body and I will kill ye.”

He shrugged his shoulders, no doubt dismissing her words.

“Dinna think I wouldna. Mayhap not this day. Not this night. One day, when ye least expect it.”

“Do you think I would be fool eneuch to allow you a weapon?” He slanted a cynical brow at her. “Or allow you to attack me in any way?”

“Ye need not
allow
anythin’.” Deep sadness filled her that he would force her in such a shameful and sinful way. “If I canna stop ye takin’ me, I
will
stop ye from keepin’ me. Some way. Somehow.” She gazed hard into his eyes. He had to understand. “When no one expects, I will cease to be. Many stairways lead to the parapets. Many window openings are high above the stones. Dinna think ye will always be there to stop me. Ye willna.”

His eyes registered shock, and his arms fell from her. “You wouldna do so. ’Tis sinful to think such thoughts.”

“ ’Tis the shame that ye would pile upon my head that causes them.”

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“We will talk on it no more.” His eyes hardened with new grimness as he took an abrupt step back. “I will grant you two days to accustom yourself to amending your brother’s wrongs.”

When she would speak again, he clamped his hand over her mouth to silence her.

“Nay. Not another word.” He looked down at the wine and food splattered on his clothing and shot her a ferocious frown.

“I should beat you for this alone. Be glad I have not.”

She glared at him, defying him to even think on it. With slow, deliberate movements, she backed away from him as she retied the ribbons at her neck. Raising her chin in defiance, she swept the tumbled hair from her face and turned.

“Bastard,” she muttered low in her throat.

He brought her up short. A hand on each of her arms pinned them to her side. “You tempt me to change my mind and forgo waiting to have your body beneath mine.” He pressed himself against her back and ran the tip of his tongue along the outline of her ear. “Tempt me not, lass. Anger me not. Your defiance heats my blood and makes my tarse ache and throb. ’Tis eager to ram its way into your woman’s heat.” He lowered his face to stroke his cheek against hers.