‘Are you...commanding me?’ he said.
The words she’d said to him that day at the market. He had tried to humiliate her, but it hadn’t stayed that way.
‘I don’t know why I said that—’
‘To taunt me.’
She almost smiled. ‘I suppose that’s true.’
‘They had another effect. Theyhauntedme, and it’s all I can do not to show you.’
It hadn’t only been him affected by her words. For many nights afterward she dreamed of Hugh like this. ‘Won’t you?’ she said.
His chest rose and fell suddenly, his lids narrowed. ‘The fire’s lit. I want to see you now. There will be no more waiting, no more stalling, no more longing. And Idolong, Alice. Even if I have to wait.’
‘I don’t want to wait.’
He closed his eyes briefly on that. ‘You need me to wait. You need me to even if you don’t know it.’
His words added to the tension between them, like wool being expertly twisted between the distaff and the spindle. Even the low reverberations of laughter and song downstairs tightened the need to be with him. As if they could be caught.
She feltensnared.
Keeping her gaze on him, she undid each shoe, rolled down each of her hose. Her fingers fumbled as she tossed them aside.
Hugh wasn’t looking at her eyes. Instead his gaze skimmed up from her bare feet along her still covered legs and down again. He bent, his movements swift, sure, as he tossed his boots aside.
She slid off the bed. His haste in removing his boots encouragement enough as she untied the laces at her sides, as she shrugged to let her gown fall to the ground and stepped out of the clinging fabric until she stood in only her chemise.
She waited, but Hugh stood still. ‘Tell me, Alice.’
She licked her dry lips. ‘Tell you what?’
‘What do you want from me?’
She felt as if he was preparing her for something—like wool about to be sorted and cleansed. As if she was being readied to be made into something else.
‘I told you I don’t know why I said that to you that day.’
‘I think you do.’ He paused. ‘I’ve wanted you all my life, and I feel as if I’ve been bound to stay away from you. Now you’ve suddenly given me a way to untie those bonds. But my hands are shaking. I need you to tell me.’
Didn’t he know? He wasn’t boundawayfrom her. He was boundtoher. That thread she felt—he felt it, too.
His hands might be shaking, but her whole body quaked at his words, at what he implied. He wanted her to...tocommandhim. Her heart sped, warmth filled low in her belly. He was right, she wanted it, too.
‘Take off your tunic and belt.’
Huffing in a breath as if she jabbed him, he roughly unhooked his leather belt and it fell heavily to the floor. Grabbed the back of his tunic and tugged it over his head. She watched the muscles in his stomach ripple, saw the flexing of his arms as they lifted so light a weight. He threw the fabric as if he wanted never to see it again.
He was bare except for leggings that hid nothing from her. The flames’ light illuminated his tanned skin, the light dusting of hair along his chest and down to his breeches. Tall, lean, corded in ways she hadn’t imagined. Had felt, but didn’t know the full extent of. Magnificent male. A knight. A warrior.
And every glimpse of his skin showed the hours of training, the scars and wounds from past battles.
Some injuries were far more recent. There was a fresh wound surrounded by bruising on his left side. Healing, still red. He’d received that while he’d been in Swaffham. Training or something else?
‘Does it hurt?’ She pointed to his side.
His brow rose, he looked at his side, and shook his head. ‘Worried for me?’
