The Legacy (29 page)

“Is that so?” she said, already breathless as he pressed hot, open-mouthed kisses alongside her neck. She loved the way he called her
wife.
“What about you? You cannot possibly be ready again—oh!” Her breath caught as he found a particularly sensitive place he had not yet explored.

“This isn’t for me. This is for you,” he said with a husky murmur, pursuing that place to her intimate delight. “Only for you.”

She groaned, nearly curling her body forward to fold over his hand. “Wolf, you do not have to—”

“I know. I can’t seem to help myself,” he admitted. “I want to touch you all the time. I
need to,”
he said gruffly.

It was a momentous declaration coming from him. She sighed in sweet wonderment and lapsed into languorous silence, drifting between relaxation and desire.

As he stroked, her body reawakened. He seemed able to gauge her responses as he played with her, gently led her to the edge of release, and then away from it, delaying it for maximum gratification. Incredibly, an aching need filled her once more. Unable to bear it any longer, Sabina eagerly shifted toward him.

“Now,” she urged.

“Patience, my sweet,” he answered with a slow smile, “patience.”

Titillated to the point of frustration, Sabina reared up over him and grabbed him by the shoulders.

“Now, for God’s sake, or I will—I will—,” she stopped, having no idea what kind of a threat would work in this sort of situation.

Wolf laughed deep in his throat, and then rolled her onto her back with a hungry growl.

By the time it was over, they were both gasping for breath, limbs shaking from passionate exertion. He collapsed on top of her and then rolled off, bringing her with him until she rested against his chest. Perspiration sealed their bodies together. Even now, he clasped the rounded globes of her bottom, stroking them possessively. It mattered not. Utterly sated, she could not have responded to him again if she willed. She batted his hands away and heard the rumble of soft laughter in his chest once more as he wrapped his arms around her.

While her mind drifted in the pleasurable aftermath which comes with intense ardor, she was grateful for the coolness of the night. She flowed toward sleep, listening to Wolf’s heartbeat slowing beneath her ear, and knew she had never felt so overwhelmed with love for another person, so surrounded by passion. Yet, somewhere deep inside her, she realized neither of them had spoken words of love, despite the intense craving driving them together.

She fell once more into an exhausted sleep, the bittersweet taste of disappointment tempering her joy.

Chapter
21

S
abina awoke, the chilled air in the room whispering over her naked flesh in the predawn light. The fire in the grate had long since burned out, and she was momentarily disoriented, expecting to see the familiar furnishings of her own chamber. After an instant, she remembered where she was, and smiling, she reached over to the opposite side of the big bed. She found nothing but an empty depression where Wolf had lain before. She sat up quickly and realized she was alone. The wave of loneliness that swept over her surprised her. At that moment, the chamber door opened slowly, a loud creak echoing into the room.

“Who is it?” she called out with apprehension, the unease of waking in a strange bedchamber by herself obvious in her voice.

“Only me,” Wolf reassured her as he entered the chamber quietly, closing the door behind him. He wore his shirt and hose, but as he padded toward the bed, he quickly divested himself of both. She admired his chiseled form as he slipped under the sheet, and scooted over to him. Smiling, he pulled the bedclothes over them both, trapping their heat beneath as a hedge against the predawn chill.

“I didn’t mean to frighten you.” He set about kissing the anxious frown lines that had no doubt sprung up around the corners of her mouth and between her brows.

“Where did you go?” she murmured sleepily, once again at ease.

“I wanted to see Gisel. I knew she would be asleep, but I needed to see her for my own piece of mind.” He fell silent, staring pensively into the darkness. She wondered what he was thinking, but hesitated to ask. Finally, he spoke as if he answered a question she had not asked aloud. “There was a girl, a furrier merchant’s child,” he began, but then said no more.

“She reminded you of Gisel, in some way?” She did not wish to pry, but she wanted him to know she was strong enough to hear whatever he wanted to tell her.

He nodded his head. “Her father wasn’t there to protect her. Those animals—attacked her. A child, for God’s sake! While I was out there, I kept thinking about what could happen to Gisel, all by herself—”

She stopped him with a soft hand pressed against his lips. “She was not alone. She had an entire household of people to defend her. Even if she had not, I would never have allowed any harm to come to her. I made provisions to protect her before anyone or anything else.” She clenched a fist on his chest. “And if anyone dared come near her, I would rip them apart with my bare hands. I swear it to you before God and man. If it is up to me, no one you love will ever be hurt again,” she finished fiercely.

He blinked and stared hard at her. Emerald green eyes met midnight blue in the darkness, held. “I believe you,” he finally answered. “May the Elector himself have as staunch a protector as you.”

Sabina grew embarrassed and turned away, afraid she may have revealed too much of her feelings for him with her outburst.

“You mock me,” she said stiffly.

“Nay.” He took her chin in his hand, turning her to face him once again. “Never. Truly,” he insisted as he saw her disbelief. “I saw the preparations you made, spoke to the servants about them when I arrived. They said it was all your idea. You were like a little general, striding about, making certain everything was ready to defend Sanctuary if need be. They were very impressed—as have I been, since the day I met you.” He kissed her, his lips pressing softly against hers, then released her.

“Thank you,” he said simply.

Mollified, she smiled. “You are welcome. Still, I could hardly have done it without their help. Good people, Wolf, surround you. You are very blessed.”

“In many ways.” He gathered her to him and cleared his throat. “Are you … that is, how do you feel?”

Confused. Wonderful. Stupendous.

“Fine,” she replied. “Why do you ask?”

“Well, if you aren’t too tender, I thought, mayhap I could show you my appreciation in some small way.” She could hear the smile in his voice.

She reached down to stroke him.
Unbelievable.
“Not
that
small, I would say.”

The rumble of his laughter sounded deep in his chest as he lifted her to him.

Much later, Wolf heard a rooster crowing far away, somewhere in the outside world where time still existed and people went about their daily lives. He and Sabina had spent the entire night making love, stopping only when she finally winced at his entry, and he realized although she was willing, she was not used to so much in one night. She complained when he withdrew, but he contented himself with only holding her close and describing in great detail what he would do to her on the nights to come. She had smacked his chest at one point and demanded he stop or fulfill his promises, but he had only laughed and drawn her closer, while she drifted in and out of slumber.

Eventually, they would have to leave this room, return to their routines, settle all the things that must be settled between them. He could feel reality intruding on them already, and he moved her closer, nestling her atop him, idly stroking her back as he fought to keep the world at bay. However, it was no use.

Something was bothering him, and the time had arrived to discuss it.

“Speaking of the day I met you …” he began, and felt her stiffen.

“Yes?” She spoke the word cautiously, her tone wary.

He spread his palm across her back, kneading it gently to release the tension. She lay very still, barely breathing.

“I’ve been thinking,” he said.

“About what?”

“Your adoptive father. And you. And why it is he seems to despise you so much.”

She did not answer for a long time. Then finally, she said, “I humiliated him before all of Wittenberg. Is that not enough?”

He contemplated her words for a moment. “Nay, I don’t think so. If Gisel, God forbid, years from now ever took it into her head to do what you did, I would never react the way he did. You were willful, certainly, by defying him in your choice of a mate, and when he tried to arrange a marriage between you and the young man. Any father would want to make the best possible match for his daughter. He had a right to be angry, even disappointed. But there’s more to it. His hatred of you is … palpable.”

“I do not know what you mean,” she said, trying to draw away from him. He refused to release her, however, and casually draped a long, muscular leg over hers, trapping her beside him.

“The way he treated you at the chapel, and before, for instance.” He wondered how much he should tell her about what he knew of the baron’s treatment of her, and decided to confront her directly. “Sabina, I know some of what he did, besides starving you, of course. I saw the bruises on your arms, and Bea told me what she saw as well.”

“She had no right to tell—” she began angrily, sitting up and facing him. The sheet slid down around her waist, but she seemed not to notice.

Wolf tried not to allow the delightful picture she made to distract him. “Bea did her duty, as she saw it. She answers to me for her livelihood. She knew I’d be displeased if I found out some other way that she was aware and hadn’t told me. Don’t blame her.”

So saying, he pulled her back down, adjusting the sheet more modestly around her. He had more questions for her and didn’t want to be diverted from them quite yet.

She nodded her head against his chest, acknowledging the rightness of his words. Wolf waited for her to speak, but she said no more.

He prompted her gently. “Sabina, what happened when you came home?”

She was silent for several more moments. “I am too ashamed,” she finally whispered, and her face burned hot against his skin.

His heart lurched. “Don’t ever be ashamed with me, my sweet,” he reassured her. “I’m your husband, now, and you’re my wife. There should be no more secrets between us.” Then he remembered his father, and he inwardly cringed. There would always be at least one secret.

He waited for her to proceed, and finally, hesitantly, she did.

“I came for my inheritance. I tried to explain to him it was rightfully mine, I would not bother him again if he would just promise to give it to me. He was so angry. He called me a—a whore, and so much worse. He asked why he should give me anything? What good had I been to him? He said I was worthless to him, and I should have stayed in the convent where he might have forgotten I was alive.” The words tumbled out, as though once freed, they were unable to be restrained.

“It was as if… as if he wished me dead. He locked me in a chamber until he could decide what to do with me. I escaped, but he caught me and brought me back. One of the maidservants had sympathy on me, and helped me to escape again, but he caught us before we could get away, and he beat us both. Then he—” she stopped, her voice raw with remembered pain.

“Go on,” he said softly, trying to swallow the fury threatening to crowd out his breath.

“He chained me to the wall, and took everything, all of my possessions from the convent and burned them. He said I would depend on him totally—for my food, my water, my very life.” She sniffled. “And then he locked the door. I thought… I thought I was going to die.”

She suddenly broke down, crying with gulping sobs.

Wolf held her tightly, futilely trying to protect her from the horrible memories, knowing the power they could have over one’s heart.

There was something else he had to know. He feared to ask the question, and yet he feared not asking it as well. He forced the bile from his gullet, and made his voice as calm as he knew how.

“Sabina did he—did he touch you improperly in any way? That is, not as a father touches a daughter?”

“Nay!” She said it with such shocked vehemence, he instantly believed her. “Oh, did you think that?”

“I didn’t know. I felt I had to ask. Of course, if the answer was yes, I would have had to remove his bowels with a spoon, so perhaps it is just as well.”

“He would never … he despises me.” Her sobs slowed to a halting hiccup.

He nodded, relieved. “Go on with your story. What happened next?”

“He wanted me to wed. I refused, and that is when he stopped feeding me altogether. Then, one night—I do not know how long it was—he came and told me he had found me a husband,” she snuffled. “I was to be married to a man I did not even know. A commoner,” she said with a watery smile at him. “I told him I did not want to marry a man of his choice. I wanted my inheritance and nothing else.”

Even under such conditions, she still had the courage to demand what was rightfully hers. Truly a remarkable woman.

“I was starving. He knew he would win, one way or the other, and he would be free of me either way. I knew it as well. So I finally gave in. And that is how I came to be at the chapel the day we met.” She looked up at him. “Of course, if I had known everything about you that I do now, I probably would have said yes much sooner and saved us all a good deal of trouble. But there is no value in perfect hindsight,” she sighed.

“But why does he hate you so, Sabina?” Wolf asked. “Why does he treat you this way? Surely there is some reason other than he is a son-of-a-bitch?”

Sabina smiled faintly at his description. “Actually, my grandmother was rather nice,” she jested half-heartedly.

“Why?” he asked again.

She took a deep breath and sat up, biting her lip. After a long while, with eyes downcast, she mumbled, “He has the best reason of all. I killed his son.”

“What?”

“I killed his son,” she repeated, looking up at him, and her eyes filled with shame. “It is why the baron hates me so much, why he can never forgive me. Carl was his only male heir, and the family will lose the barony if he dies without one. Remember, without him, it goes to a distant relative who still shares the von Ziegler name. Everything he has done to secure the line will be for naught. Moreover, I think—I think he genuinely loved Carl, as he has loved no one else before or since. And every time he sees my face, sees me alive and breathing, it is a reminder to him Carl is dead and I am not.”