Shattered Vows (17 page)

His forehead creased. ‘I am giving you a choice.’

He lifted that thought-stopping hand from her breast and twined his fingers with hers. If only he cared for her. He’d been honest – he’d told her plainly that he could never love her. Was that the truth?

Why couldn’t he love her? Because she was a peasant? Sad to say, most of the inhabitants of the castle would see no wrong in forcing a villager to be the squire’s lover. Everyone knew that Baron Geoffrey and his family saw the villagers as cattle, as beasts of burden, and Marie had confirmed it. Marie had also said that Oliver was one of them.

Oliver was to be knighted. He was to be married to Lady Cecily. Not many maids would turn their noses up at the chance of becoming a knight’s lover. Here was an opportunity to taste the life that her humble birth had denied her. Baron Geoffrey doubtless thought he was giving her a great privilege. He knew Oliver hadn’t forced her. Would the outcome have been the same if her lord thought she’d been forced? Rosamund had no way of knowing, but she suspected it would be very much the same. She was a chattel.

No, the thought of offering Rosamund a choice hadn’t entered any of those superior, aristocratic minds. Except Oliver’s. He was offering her an escape route, and it would seem that he meant it. She really could choose.

Why? Squires weren’t known for heeding the wishes of their lord’s vassals. Surely there was hope in the fact that he was allowing her to decide?

Oliver liked her enough to want her goodwill, but she wanted it to be more than that.
He needs me.
Lord, she hoped she was right...

Taking a deep breath, she smiled. ‘I choose to stay.’ Her voice was as clear as a bell. ‘I chose you for my lover and I choose to stay.’

He caught her to him and pressed a shower of kisses on her nose and cheeks. ‘You’ll remember I gave you a choice?’ He nibbled her ear.

‘I will,’ she said, recalling another moment that first day on the beach, when cool grey eyes had turned as blue as the sky and she thought she’d glimpsed a longing for love. ‘I will.’

Two simple words, and she’d cast all sense to the winds. Her marriage vows – and Alfwold – were forgotten. When she’d made her marriage vows her heart hadn’t been in it. It was in it now. ‘I will.’ She was no longer an innocent victim, she was a willing lover. She was Oliver’s
belle-amie
– a sinner without so much as a shred of decency. And all because she took a flicker of light in his eyes to mean that he had a heart. She was staking her happiness on a fleeting expression. If she’d misread it, she was lost, but if she was right...

She rubbed her face against his chest. She’d been lost since May Day. Lost. At the time she hadn’t realised, but the moment she’d met Oliver, her marriage to Alfwold had been doomed.

Her marriage didn’t feel real. It never had and it never would. She’d fallen in love with Oliver de Warenne. There was simply no other explanation for her willingness to risk everything to be with him. The disapproval of her father seemed unimportant; she no longer cared what the villagers thought. She loved Oliver de Warenne. Why else would she risk so much merely to be with him?

One day he would reciprocate. One day...

His lips were seeking hers. He moved his mouth gently, barely touching her, giving her lower lip the softest of nibbles. Rosamund’s insides went molten and her thoughts scattered as the kiss deepened and changed. It was demanding, a lover’s kiss. Confident and sure.

For all his protestations to the contrary, Oliver kissed like a passionate man. A man who understood love.

He lifted his head. ‘You taste so sweet.’

She sifted his hair through her fingers, it was soft and springy under her palms. His head was silhouetted against a starry backcloth, his wind-ruffled hair seemed to merge with the night, and all she could think was that she wanted to pull his head to hers, find his mouth, and melt into him.

His hand cupped her breast and his thumb caressed her through the cloth of her gown. She found the flesh of his back beneath his tunic. It felt like velvet – she could feel the muscles beneath. His eyes glowed silver, and she thought that he smiled.

‘Not here, my angel.’ His voice was warm but firm. Removing her hand from beneath his tunic, he enfolded it in his. With a murmur of protest, she wriggled closer.

The dark head shook. ‘I’ll not take you on the beach, it’s far too cold. We’ll go to the bedchamber where it’s warm and we can lock the door against interruptions.’ He pulled her to her feet and into the haven of his mantle. ‘Lord, I only hope we can find our boots.’

***

Oliver urged Lance on, and smiled into Rosamund’s hair. It had been a good day. The best. She sat before him as she had done on their way down to the beach and this time her body was completely relaxed. He was holding her slender waist and she had covered his hand with hers. She was playing with his fingers.

There was an unfamiliar lightness in his chest. He couldn’t stop smiling. It must be due to his rising fortunes. He had found his place in this northern hold, and at last the knighthood he had fought for was within his reach.

It was odd though, this morning when Geoffrey had told him about his change in fortune, he’d felt hollow. It was as though he was reaching out to take his prize and before his eyes it was turning to mist. His lips twisted. The surprise of meeting with success after years of striving must have temporarily stunned him.

He rubbed his mouth against Rosamund’s hair and her fingers tightened on his. She was warm, she was soft, and she was going to stay. She wasn’t going to turn into mist. Lord, but he ached for her. Thank God, she’d chosen to stay.

A wave of relief had swamped him when she’d agreed. He’d not expected to be so pleased. But then, she was so fair, so warm, so giving. No other girl held a candle to her. He grinned as he remembered the power of those wide, blue eyes; as he remembered the pleasure that shot through him as she returned his caresses. Even after he had lain with her.

Yes, today had been a good day. ‘A remarkable day.’

Her head turned questioningly towards him and he was presented with a moonlit view of her profile. It was delicate, heart-achingly beautiful.
Rosamund.
Her lips were slightly parted, and her teeth were white as pearls in the starlight. His loins throbbed, insistent, demanding. Lord, they’d better hurry, else he’d be changing his mind about the need for reaching their bedchamber.

‘Remarkable?’

‘You, my sweet,’ he said, surprising himself with his candour. ‘I find your beauty remarkable.’

Luminous eyes smiled back at him and something shifted inside him, an emotion he couldn’t name. Longing. Desire. God, but he wanted her. No other woman had ever made him feel like this. He forced himself to concentrate on the road ahead. He must keep his thoughts shielded. She must never know the extent to which she affected him. The person did not live whom he would trust with his soul’s secrets. A man must be self-reliant.

This was lust, pure and simple, it should be easy to keep it in its place.

She’d agreed to stay, that was enough. He’d take her back to their chamber and they’d take their joy of each other. This time it would be even better, because this time he’d know he wasn’t going to lose her. She was his to keep. His enjoyment wouldn’t be marred by the thought that soon she would be lying in another’s arms.

Oliver hadn’t lied when he’d told Rosamund that there were pretty girls in the castle. A couple of serving girls had sent bold looks his way and he’d known that were he to press his attentions on them, he wouldn’t be rejected.

A delicately scented strand of hair fluttered across his cheek, he made no move to brush it aside. This was the woman he wanted.

‘Oliver, look!’

A slender arm pointed towards the castle gate. The braziers had been fired on top of the towers.

At first glance it looked as though the castle was ablaze, light was streaming through the open portcullis from a score of torches, bright splashes lit up the road. His warrior’s instincts flared into life.

‘Hold on,’ he said, and spurred forward. Lance’s rocking canter made short work of what remained of the cliff path, and a couple of heartbeats later he was reining in before the gatehouse.

‘Holà!’ He hailed the guards. ‘What’s amiss? Why was the portcullis raised?’ He reached into his purse and a silver coin described a shining arc in the air.

A guard snatched it. ‘Rebels. Lord Gilbert of Hewitt found them on his land. He caught some, killed others, and he’s tracked the rest into Baron Geoffrey’s territory.’

The bailey was thronging with soldiers and horses. Helmets flashed in the torchlight; horse harness glittered; dogs yelped. Oliver frowned at the guard. ‘Rebels? I thought Angevin activity was confined to the south?’

‘Eh?’

‘Never mind. My thanks, man.’ Oliver swung off Lance and led him past the stable boys struggling with Lord Gilbert’s herd of horses. ‘
Mon Dieu
, what a mêlée.’

Rosamund’s eyes were round as she took in the chaos. She had never seen so many warhorses before, and all fighting for space in the overcrowded castle yard. Her heart jumped. The noise was deafening. Knights were swearing at grooms struggling to find quarters for the extra horseflesh. Huge hooves threw up clods of mud from the ground of the inner bailey and trampled them back into the earth. Yellow teeth flashed. She watched as one ill-tempered brute of a horse took a chunk out of the haunches of another. A scream of pain and rage trumpeted out. Harnesses jingled.

These horses would scare off the devil. Rosamund was more used to thinking of horses as beasts of burden. But these great hulks were bred to battle. They were instruments of war, trained to do violence. To kill. Like the men who rode them. She shuddered.

‘I’ll stable Lance myself,’ Oliver was saying to a flustered groom.

Rosamund gripped the coarse white mane and kept her eyes fixed on Oliver’s back as he shouldered through the sea of horses. He was one of them. A warrior. The gentle lover who had covered her in kisses was blown away like thistledown on the breeze and Lance was suddenly an island of safety, the only thing that would stop her falling into that wild threshing of legs and hooves.

At last they gained the sanctuary of Lance’s stall. Oliver reached for her and briefly clasped her body to his. A strong hand touched her cheek. ‘You’re white as milk. Did you think I’d let you fall?’

‘No, but warhorses frighten me.’ She couldn’t admit that he frightened her too – that his easy competence in the face of such an army had raised a barrier between them.

‘It’s not long since Lance had the same effect on you. That first time on his back, you went just as white.’

‘I’ve grown used to him.’

‘And his master?’ Oliver asked, with unnerving percipience. ‘Have you grown used to him too? Or does this...’ he glanced at the heaving bailey ‘...change matters?’

Her blood returned in a rush and she stumbled to the stable door. If it weren’t for the mill of horseflesh, she’d have stomped across the bailey and left him. Behind her she heard the gentle chink of Lance’s bridle being removed. She watched the seething bailey until the warmth of Oliver’s breath caressed her neck.

‘
Ma dame
, you wait for my company?’ he murmured, voice amused.

She nodded, reluctant to admit the extent to which the horses frightened her.

A dark eyebrow lifted. ‘I’m afraid our rendez-vous will have to wait.’

‘I beg your pardon?’

His palm ran down the length of her arm from shoulder to hand. Taking her fingers, he gave her a gentle squeeze. ‘Much as I long to fulfil my promise to you on the beach, my first duty lies with my lord. There will be a council meeting tonight, and I must attend. Our pleasure must wait for another day.’

‘Your first duty is to Baron Geoffrey. Oliver, I do know my place.’ She lifted her chin and gestured at the jostling horses. ‘I’m not used to these monsters and I’d welcome your escort across the courtyard. If it’s not too much trouble.’

‘It’s no trouble at all, my angel.’

‘I hate this...this warring.’ She sighed. ‘Maybe I shouldn’t have agreed to stay.’

Oliver stiffened. ‘It that a threat?’

She opened her eyes. ‘A threat? How could it be? Can a miller’s daughter threaten a squire?’

‘Rosamund, I’m warning you...’

‘I shouldn’t be here. You think that in giving me a choice you made everything right between us. But you grant me no right to pride and I’m beginning to see that without pride what happens between us is as nothing. I should go.’

Strong fingers caught her by the shoulders. ‘Go? Where shall you go? Back to the husband who loves you?’

‘At least Alfwold admits he loves me, which is more than you ever will. You’re an unfeeling wretch.’

Grey eyes bored into her. ‘Unfeeling, eh?’ He jerked her against him. ‘Does your loving Alfwold set you alight as I do? Do you moan in delight under the press of his body? I’ll warrant this unfeeling squire stirs your blood more than your loving husband would if you spent a lifetime in his bed!’

‘You swine!’ And before she knew it, she’d slapped him in the face.

The stables went horribly quiet. It was impossible, of course, what with the noise in the bailey, but so it seemed. Above her, his eyes glittered as cold as the winter sea. Flinching at what she’d done, she put up a hand to ward off the blow that must surely fall. Peasants didn’t strike their betters and go unpunished.

The blow never came. His face was a mask of indifference. ‘You may well cringe,’ he said, as steely fingers clamped round her wrist. ‘But much as you may deserve it, I won’t hit you. Come, I shall escort you across the yard and you can await my pleasure in the bedchamber.’

‘I won’t!’

‘You will. You made your decision. It’s too late to change it, you are back in Lord Geoffrey’s hold and he has given you to me. I will not release you.’

‘I was wrong to agree! It’s not enough, can’t you see?’

‘It has to be enough. You’re staying.’

So saying, Oliver escorted her through the press and took her to the bottom of the steps that led into the keep. ‘Until later, my angel,’ he said, and vanished into the throng.