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I moved my hand to his shoulder, and he looked down at me, his eyes empty.
“They came to kill us?”
Branford nodded.
“Do you think they would have targeted both of you?” Dunstan asked.
Branford turned back to his men.
“This just proves everything I have feared,” Branford said quietly. “He will stop at nothing unless I…”
He turned to me, and the pain in his eyes hit me through the heart. I knew what he was saying.
“You would allow this?” I finally whispered. “You would allow Edgar to push me from you?”
“You would still be with me,” he said quietly, looking away. I reached up to touch the side of his face, but his eyes did not meet mine as he spoke. “You would still have my heart—you would still be my only love. You would take Hadley’s place as my concubine.”
I shook my head slowly.
“It would be much more commonplace in my position,” Branford said through clenched jaws, “to have you as my concubine. W
ives are for the politics of the show, and concubines are for love. It will always be you I love, Alexandra. You are the only one in my heart.”
“How can you say that when you would deny my place at your side? The very first day you brought me here, you said you would defend my position.”
Branford covered his face with his hands. He took several slow breaths and then turned to Sir Brigham.
“Go,” he said. “We will return shortly.”
“Sire, I would not want to leave you unprotected…”
“Go!” Branford shouted. “Leave now! Send someone to deal with this…this mess.”
With only murmured protests, Sir Brigham and Dunstan returned to their horses and rode slowly away from us.
“Pack up our things,” Branford said to me.
“Get them yourself!” I spat back. “Or perhaps your new wife will come get them!”
I stomped away, infuriated with Branford, with the dead men on the ground near his feet, with Edgar, with Whitney, and with myself. I went to where Romero grazed on the other side of the meadow with Branford’s footsteps close behind me.
“You will not speak to me in such a way!” he yelled as he grabbed my arm and turned me around. “I am your king whether you are my queen or my slave!”
He gripped my shoulders, and he pulled me close to him, his eyes blazing.
“Whether it is in the morning, midday, or night, you will speak to me with respect! Even in twilight, you will know your place!”
The word he emphasized hit me as hard as if he had slapped me in the face, and I immediately understood. We were not alone. There were others still nearby, listening to us. Whether they were also there to kill us or only to report back on what they had seen and heard, I did not know, but I knew we were most certainly not alone.
I swallowed hard and nodded my head once in understanding.
“Yes…yes, sire,” I responded as I stared into his deep, green eyes.
We rode quickly and quietly back to Castle Silverhelm, and though Branford never turned around to look behind us, I could feel the tension in his grip on me as we rode through the forest. His head was tilted slightly, angling his ear toward our backs. Once we returned, he leaned close to my ear and told me to make sure I did not go anywhere without my guard.
Branford slept little that night.
I could still feel the presence of Sir Brigham and Dunstan behind me as I strolled through the marketplace outside the castle gates the next morning. I stopped near the fruit stand and purchased apples and pears, which I placed in a basket on my arm. My guards followed at a respectable distance as I walked through the stalls though they came closer as I left the security of the castle walls.
