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“Matilda,” he said in a low voice. “Snail-legs?”
She shrugged carelessly. “He daydreams.”
“Gaston is not clever, I agree, but that is a poor excuse to harangue him. Did I not require you to halter your spiteful tongue and learn to use one with the grace of a lady?”
They emerged into bright sunlight and he spotted the angry pout before she wiped it away.
“Very well, since you can’t contain your childishness, we shall turn about and forgo—”
She pulled sharply on the reins. “Oh, no, my lord. Please don’t. I so look forward to flying Diana. I will try harder, I promise. I didn’t mean to be... mean,” she ended limply.
He observed her face carefully. The alarm was genuine, the disappointment too. And he felt sure she was also aware that he had offered her this threat as an alternative to another.
“You will be good?” he asked softly.
She nodded. “Yes, my lord. Very good. I shall keep my tongue in check.”
They continued to the meadow in better harmony. Gervais’s spirits lifted, for he had applied his authority without resorting to harsher methods, and the warning had worked, it seemed, at least for the moderation of her unladylike behaviour. However, the breaking of rules, the ones he had strictly applied, was a different matter. The forthcoming appointment in the tower remained unbroken. Weighted down once again with pangs of desire, he kept his hands to himself. She must not know how constant she was in his thoughts and how close the beast lurked below the surface of his serene face.
* * *
The undressing on this occasion was sublimely conducted without shame. She provocatively wriggled her hips, allowing the gown to slither down her thighs.
“Sir, would you unlace me?” she asked whimsically.
He crossed the highest chamber of the tower, his hands loose at his sides, and approached her taut back. He tugged on the lacework of her corset, a simple criss-cross binding, one that she probably undid daily without assistance. Smiling, he unwrapped her, revealing the flat discs of her straight spine and the neat angles of her shoulder blades.
There was nothing left to cover her. Her bareness was complete from her narrow neck to her ankles. Stepping back, and using sharp eyes, he tracked the ins and outs of her figure, how her ribs rose and fell restlessly, nervously. He kept smiling unseen behind her back until she peered over her shoulder, flouting his instruction to keep forward and focused on flickering candles.
He clucked his tongue and she shot him an apologetic glance before returning to the correct direction.
“You may now bend over the table.” His pulse quickened with the command. It was not the sound of his own severe voice that roused him; it was the shiver across her buttocks, which fetched up a cluster of goosebumps on each lobe.
“Oh, sir,” she protested sweetly, and foolishly. “Might I not lie over you?”
“For this punishment, detachment is necessary. For you must not invoke me to discomfort.” The irony of punishing her: his cock was already proud and painful in its containment.
She bleated, “But I’m not resisting you. I am here, in your wretched tower, answering for stirring your Zalim to life. It was not my fault I knew not what I awoke.”
“This is a punishment for breaking a rule—you entered when you must not,” he corrected. “And you accused me falsely.” The conversation was a prelude, one that she felt was necessary to justify her acquiescence. He understood her train of thoughts. A spirited wife in training, tainted by her upbringing, and promisingly circumspect, she would not simply bend over a table without attempting to persuade him otherwise. But she did bend, and part her legs willingly, offering him an excellent view of her plump privates and the portals he craved. Gods, he moaned in his head, she was already wantonly brazen.
Matilda stretched out and clutched the edges of the table, and pressed her nose and lips to the surface, as if to kiss the smoothed wood. The table was splinter-free, polished in secret by Lionel, who came up to the tower when Gervais requested it to make preparations, to ensure the fire was stocked with wood, the tapers tall, and the basin on the stand filled with fresh water and rose petals. The room swam in the aroma of a garden, and not damp stonework.
Outside, the drumbeats of thunder crept closer, heralded by splinters of lightning flashing through the narrow windows. The torrid weather seemed appropriate to the scene. He especially liked the way she flinched with each burst of light.
Gervais reached over to her head and unpinned the bundle of peach hair, combing it with his splayed fingers until it lay like a gold threaded blanket on her back, and shimmering under the candlelight.
On the bench lay the implements, placed there by Lionel, and arranged in severity—from a soft frond of suede to the packed birch sticks. He opted for the plain leather scabbard, which lay in the middle.
Flexing it, he circled the table to check that no tears christened her pale face, and that she wasn’t biting down on her tongue. He smacked the scabbard down on the palm of his hand, and she jumped.
The circuit complete, he touched one raised arse cheek with the tip of the scabbard and pressed into the flesh until a dimple formed. Such was the tightness of the stretched skin, it took a measure of force to create the dint.
She snatched a sharp breath in, then blew it out slowly. All the little tells were there that she was ready and able.
Lifting the unadorned scabbard, he aimed for the ridge of her bottom, and with a flick from the elbow, and not the wrist, he smarted the contour.
“Ow,” she squawked. One arm shot behind her back and she frantically rubbed the welt.
