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To his credit he did not smile back, but his blue eyes glinted before he lowered the long lashes over them. “Do it then,” he said in a harsh voice. “No more games.”
“You mean like the games you and Mortred played with me?” she retorted. Once again the powerful sense of anger gripped her. Before she could change her mind, Jenova stepped into the bath, uncaring for the dangerously swishing water. With one foot on either side of his hips, she lowered herself, her body sprawled across his. His erection brushed her swollen flesh.
He groaned, his fingers white as he gripped the rim of the bath. She lifted herself, then lowered herself again, allowing him limited access before withdrawing. His hard length prodded her swollen, secret layers. She gasped and moved forward, allowing him to suck at her breasts, murmuring encouragement.
“Jenova,” he groaned. “Please…please…”
Mercilessly, Jenova lowered herself onto him again and again, teasing him. But each time it was more difficult to pull away, and in truth she wanted to sink herself fully upon him. It was not in her nature to hold back, and this was Henry, her Henry. She wanted to enjoy him and let him enjoy her.
“Now,” she gasped. “Touch me now, Henry.”
He did more than touch. He caught her hips in his hands and pushed up, deep, so deep inside her. Jenova felt her body go fluid, and a great shudder then overtook them both. She was flying toward the sky—a clear midnight blue meadow strewn with gleaming stars—and the world vanished below her.
When it was over, she lifted her head from his chest, her damp hair curling about her, a pulse still fluttering in her throat. “You are not like Mortred,” she said, and there was a new certainty in her voice, and a kind of wonder. “I have been telling myself that you were, but you aren’t like him at all.”
“No,” he agreed, making a joke of it. “I am like Henry.”
But there was an expression in his eyes, a combination of joy and fear, as if she had found him out.
“Do you forgive me? For keeping the truth about Mortred from you?”
Jenova leaned forward across his chest, their bare, damp flesh sliding together, and looked into his eyes. She saw contrition there, and warmth, and the desire to comfort her and make her happy. “Aye, Henry,” she murmured, touching a finger to his lips, “I forgive you.” She traced the shape of his mouth. “I think I would forgive you almost anything….”
Henry caught his breath, and something flashed in his eyes, startling her. But before she could ask him what was the matter, he drew her up against him, and his mouth closed hard on hers, drowning her in passion.
Chapter 12
Once again Alfric and Rhona came riding into Gunlinghorn. Alfric’s spurs were shining, his tunic of fine brown wool was brushed smooth, and his fair hair was neatly cut. He looked like the handsome young lord that he was—a widow’s dream.
Any other widow but the one keeping watch from her chamber, the one who did not want to see him and stated so aloud.
“But you must, my lady!” cried Agetha in dismay, her blue eyes wide. “’Twould be very ill mannered if you refused him access to you, and after you said you would wed him not so long ago.”
“I do not wa
nt to elevate his hopes again, Agetha.”
Agetha stabbed her needle into the cloth she was embroidering, her mouth pursed. She had always favored Alfric; Jenova had not realized just how much until she had rejected him. Now Agetha alternated between singing his praises in the hope Jenova would change her mind, or grieving for the loss of the handsome young man. Jenova did not know which was worse, hearing a dozen times a day how perfect Alfric was, or listening to how she could expect to be full of regrets in her dotage over the fact that she had not snapped him up when she’d had the opportunity.
Jenova wished she could be as blind in love as Agetha desired her to be, that she could believe in someone as wholeheartedly as Agetha did Alfric. But Jenova was older and wiser by far, and she told herself she had been hurt too badly by Mortred to ever trust blindly again…. Her mind drifted to the evening before, and lying in Henry’s arms in the warm, fragrant water. She found herself smiling for no particular reason.
“Poor Lord Alfric,” Agetha muttered, hauling the needle through her embroidery and tugging it tight. “He must be feeling so confused and bewildered. His feelings must be so hurt. He is so sensitive. How can he bear it if you now refuse even to see him when he has come all this way—”
“It is barely two hours’ ride from Hilldown Castle to Gunlinghorn,” Jenova retorted. “And I can bear it very well.”
Agetha’s lips tightened. “The Baldessares are your neighbors, my lady. One day Alfric will stand in his father’s stead. Does that not make you anxious to be on good terms with him?”
Agetha was right. In these dangerous times who knew when it might be necessary for her to call upon his help. Jenova felt her heart sink. Aye, she would see Alfric and listen to him, and refuse him. But, she vowed, it would be the last time.
“Very well, Agetha,” she said. “I will see him, but in the great hall. I do not want to be alone with him.”
Triumphantly, Agetha tossed her ill-treated embroidery aside and went tripping down the stairs. It crossed Jenova’s mind, not for the first time, that Alfric would be far better off with Agetha as his wife. She was sweet and pretty and certainly loyal. ’Twas a shame the girl had little in the way of dowry to offer the land-greedy Lord Baldessare.
When Jenova reached the great hall, she saw that Alfric and Rhona stood by the fire, waiting, their heads close together, as if they were plotting against her. Jenova, pausing in the doorway, thought that perhaps they were. Rhona, in particular, was cunning enough for anything—Jenova had never trusted her. And Alfric was too gentle and easily led to be trustworthy beyond Gunlinghorn’s boundaries. Wed to her, living here with her, he would never have disobeyed her. Away from her, he would be like a leaf blown by whichever breeze was stronger.
She was well rid of the pair of them.
“My dearest l-lady!” Alfric spotted her as she approached. He strode to meet her and took her hand, pressing a fervent kiss to her flesh. Jenova struggled not to jerk her fingers free. Despite his greeting, his brown eyes were cautious, anxious, as if he were uncertain of her reaction. She could not blame him for that—if she had a sire like Lord Baldessare, she would be anxious, too.
