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Until now.
When the little tumbler fell down, she had glanced to Henry to share the joke, and instead she’d found him watching her with an expression she could not mistake. Desire had been in the tense line of his jaw, in the burning blue of his eyes. Desire and lust. She knew it—read the signs. Because she felt it, too. And now her body was heating up.
She knew why she could not pretend.
Because she didn’t want to forget what they had done in Uther’s Tower. She wanted to think on it, linger on it, close her eyes and squirm with pleasure at the thought of those hot, blissful moments they had spent together. She wanted to dwell on each and every glorious detail.
I have been too long without a man, Jenova’s practical voice informed her. That is all. It has naught to do with Henry; he was simply in the right place at the right time. Any man would have done. I could have been trapped with…with Alfric and the same thing would have happened!
It was clear she needed to set matters in motion for her wedding as soon as possible, then she could escape this fix. Mayhap Alfric could take pity on her and wed her immediately. Surely if she let him know it was urgent, he would set aside his father’s absurd demands and do away with the formalities.
Jenova had to bow her head, hiding her smile as she considered herself upon her mare, riding madly through the snow to Alfric’s door, demanding he wed her without delay, crying, “For who knows what man I shall bed with next if you do not!”
Her smile faded, and her eyes grew bleak. It was all nonsense. She did not want Alfric, or just any man, to bed her. It was not Alfric who had made her body sing. It was Henry, and there was not another man in the whole of England who could take his place. Something had happened between them; it was as if a spark had been lit that could not now be extinguished. And Jenova, widow and mother and lady to the manor of Gunlinghorn, did not have a clue what to do about it.
“Mama, look!” Her son was pointing and laughing at the jugglers, and gratefully Jenova allowed him to distract her. Raf was a good boy, a fine boy, and she had great hopes for him. As a babe he had been sickly, but he had fought, and she had fought with him, and he had survived. Now she recognized that his thin, wiry frame belied his strength. Raf might look as if he were fragile, but in reality he was tough, he was a survivor. He was her son, and he would make the best of whatever fate threw at him.
Earlier, she had seen Raf seek out Henry. Henry, as she well knew, did not care for children; Henry could be a vain and selfish man in many ways. That did not detract from his abilities as a soldier and a loyal subject of the king and a basically good man—oh, yes, he could be charming. Jenova had felt the tug of his attraction more than once in the past, but she had laughed and marveled and shrugged it off. Henry the lover was not for her. She had much preferred Henry the friend. And she had come to depend upon his unencumbered affection, knowing that if she ever needed him, he would come to her.
Well, so he had, but how could she have known that this time it would all be so different?
Jenova lifted her head and allowed her gaze to settle once more upon the object of her confusion. Her heart gave a great thud, a terrible mixture of fear a
nd joy. He was watching her, too. Not slyly, not with the hope that she wouldn’t notice. No, not Henry. He had turned fully in her direction, his hair a dark halo in the candlelight, and his blue gaze was fixed deliberately upon her. Assessing, lingering, seducing—eating her up with his eyes. Jesu, had he decided not to honor their vow after all? Because it looked very much to Jenova as if he wanted more of her and was letting her know it.
Jenova gasped, and color warmed her cheeks. Like a simpering maid, she thought in disgust, but still she could not stop the blush. Aye, he was devouring her with his eyes, and she, who knew him so well, could not mistake the set of his shoulders, the tilt of his head. There was fire in the blue, a blaze of passion and remembrance and longing.
Jenova turned away jerkily, lifting a hand to shield her face. One of her ladies, Agetha, asked her what was wrong, but Jenova smiled and said she was tired. She did not dare turn to Henry again. She did not trust herself. She, who had always been so sure and practical, who had always done what was right, could not trust herself to behave in a manner appropriate to the Lady of Gunlinghorn.
“Appropriate” never stopped Mortred, did it?
The thought made her stiffen. Mortred had lied to her, treated their marriage—and their love—with contempt. Mayhap it was time for Jenova to do the same? She had meant to marry Alfric, but wasn’t that just more of the same “appropriate” behavior? Jenova, Mortred had said to her once, you are always so predictable. Now Jenova wondered if there wasn’t another, more reckless, manner in which to take her revenge and at the same time indulge herself in this new and unexpected passion.
Like a lightning flash in the darkness, she knew that making that vow of abstinence with Henry had been a mistake. In denying them both, she had only made it more difficult to forget. Mayhap, she thought feverishly, if she were to wallow in her madness, saturate herself in this newfound passion, then she could revenge herself upon her dead husband and wear out her folly at the same time? The end result would be the same, but the getting there would be so, so much more enjoyable….
“My lady?” It was Agetha again, her slightly protruding blue eyes watchful, disapproving. “You seem distracted.”
“’Tis nothing, Agetha. I was puzzling over a problem, but now I have made a decision on it. I have chosen my path.”
Agetha fingered the jewel at her throat and looked as if she would like to ask more, but Jenova turned to call one of the servants to refill the wine jugs. She did not want to talk about what that decision was to anyone; it was no one’s business but her own.
And Henry’s.
Henry lay awake in the darkness. He could not sleep. And although the reason he could not sleep lay in a chamber below, he could not seek her out. He was a guest in Jenova’s castle; he could not destroy her trust in him by coming to her bed like a rutting boar. He should not have looked at her like that at the table. She might have been ignoring him, but that was no excuse to give her such a blatantly sensual stare.
He had wanted to shatter her pretended calm. Force her to remember what he could not forget.
For a moment there, he had almost believed he’d seen reciprocation deep in her moss green eyes—a flicker of need as hot as his own. And then it had been gone and he’d been left doubting his own senses. Well, that was a first! Henry the great seducer, the conqueror of women, the master lover! Henry, who always boasted he could have any woman he wanted! Except that the woman he wanted this time was the one woman he could not have. Whom he had sworn not to touch again, ever.
Henry groaned and turned over in his bed, restless and uncomfortable. Just thinking about Jenova aroused him, and knowing he couldn’t have her was only increasing his longing. He could send Reynard for a whore, but he did not want a bought woman; for the first time in his memory he would rather suffer unfulfilled passion than be comfortable.
The sound of the door opening was slight, but in a moment Henry had bent and snatched up his sword, within easy reach beside the bed, and thrown back the covers. He rose up, entirely naked, feet apart, ready for any intruder.
Candlelight wavered through the narrow opening the door made, and with it came an ethereal figure. Long, brown tresses hung to her hips, the silken strands catching the light in a myriad of colors. A sheer shawl, wrapped loosely about her form, was more an enticement than a covering. Henry could see the shadow of her body through it, and, as she stepped softly into his room and half turned to close the door, he realized he could see more than just a shadow. His eyes feasted on the delicious curve of her waist, the warm pink of her nipples, and the rich brown curls at the apex of her thighs.
“Jenova?” His whisper sounded harsh. “Why have you come?”
“Why do you think, Henry?”
