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“Your tongue is as sharp as my sword.”

“I will thank you not to laugh at your wife, Sir Guy.”

He cleared his throat, still smiling.

Uncrossing her arms, Sabine took a bite of the pie. After a day of riding, she was so very hungry.

“My tongue,” she said between bites, “is none of your concern.”

Leaning forward, Guy opened his mouth and touched his own tongue to his top lip. Slowly. Deliberately.

Sabine forgot to breathe.

“Alas, your tongue is very much my concern.”

Elbows on the table, he leaned even closer. “If you would but make your offer, I could show you exactly how it is so, my lady wife.”

Lord help her, Sabine very much wanted to learn of what he spoke.

“I told you,” she ground out, “no such offer will be forthcoming.”

Guy sat back, lifted his fork, and began to eat. But this wasn’t just about sating his appetite. Nay, he lingered over every bite. Once he licked his lips, allowing Sabine to see the pink tip of his tongue.

Her core clenched as it had never done before. She wondered at her stubborn refusal to indulge herself. This man was her husband, was he not? Would it not be permissible to give in to this small temptation?

Nay!

Intimacy between them would not end well.

Instead of answering, she continued to eat. It struck her that Guy had been quite correct in his assessment of the situation. Although a few people glanced their way, they garnered far less attention than when they’d first entered.

“Who are you?” she blurted.

“I have many monikers, my lady. But that of your husband is my current favorite.”

Sabine rolled her eyes.

“When we met, I thought you an arrogant bastard,” Sabine admitted.

“When we met . . .” He took a swig of ale and clanked the mug back onto the table. “I thought you a nun.”

“An easy enough assumption, given the circumstances.”

Sabine finished the meat pie, peering up at Guy occasionally.

“What do you want to know?” he answered finally.

She had so many questions, but she kept coming back to the question of his knighthood.

“All right. How does a mercenary come to be knighted?” she tried asking again.

“It was the year of our Lord twelve hundred and six,” he said with a flourish. Sabine shook her head gently at his antics. “An invasion by your king saw me fighting for Philip at La Rochelle. The very same man knighted me on the battlefield after a hard-fought victory.”

She could not have been more surprised. “You fought for France?”

“Aye.”

“Against England?”