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My God… I want him to kiss me… more than I’ve ever wanted anything before.
“I’m sorry, Rowan,” she managed to whisper. “Mary must have been very young… when it happened.”
Rowan swirled his wineglass, then took a sip, and Blanchette caught the sweet scent of the wine on his breath.
What would happen if he tossed the glass into the hearth, captured my face in his large hands, and kissed me senselessly?
How would he taste?
How would he feel in my arms?
He held her gaze with unwavering intensity, drawing her deeper. She couldn’t take her eyes off him—off the strong jut of his chin or how his raven-black hair fell just above his ears and curled slightly. She yearned to twirl that hair between her fingertips while his eyes gazed into her own.
“She was less than a year old,” Rowan said, his voice heavy with pain. He swirled his glass, and the red wine soundlessly sloshed inside it. It reminded Blanchette of blood. “Not even ten feet away from the bed where her mother died.”
Raw, visceral emotions emanated from Rowan. Never had he looked so vulnerable and defeated. That scared her a little. She laid her hand on his shoulder. His rigid muscles relaxed beneath her caressing palm. She kneaded the tight muscles and heard as his breathing slowed into a steady rhythm.
Then he shook his downcast head and stared at his blood-red wine. “It was my punishment for disobeying his orders. Sir Edrick had warned me. And I’ve suffered every day since. Mary has too…”
Panic coursed through Blanchette as she grasped the gravity of his words. She withdrew her hand, the weight of their reality crashing down once again.
“His orders? My father’s, you mean,” she stated firmly, leaving no room for ambiguity.
They both stared into the hearth as the silence rose around them. Firelight licked at the ravens engraved in the mantel and set them aglow.
Rowan emptied the contents of his glass with a single swallow before placing it on the table. It hit the wood with a jolting bang. Then he stood with a sudden nervous energy, pacing toward the hearth. His hands found purchase on the mantel, his palms cradling the Winslowe sigil. She watched the firelight swim in his dark hair and play off his handsome, drawn face.
He looks lost. Like just another ghost haunting Winslowe Castle.
His hazel eyes had transformed into two pits of miserable grief.
“Tell me, Rowan. Please. Help me understand.”
With his inner turmoil lay bare, Rowan turned to Blanchette, that raw agony deepening in his eyes. “I don’t understand it all myself.”
And then he began.
Sixteen
Seven years earlier
Dietrich Castle
Rowan knew things were amiss the moment he arrived. He stared up at his family’s ancient holdfast, watching stoically as the two towers pierced a bruised dusk sky. A groomsman hustled to him within moments of his arrival. Rowan leaped down from Sunbeam while the groomsman took the reins and refused to meet his eyes. He had a nervous energy about him and an anxious air in his shifty gaze. That heightened Rowan’s premonition.
I’m too late.
He glanced back at the way from which he came. The drawn portcullis resembled a mouth of rotten teeth, and the smoky, burned town lurked beyond it.
Rowan paced through his great hall, which was unusually barren.
With his hand wrapping his longsword's hilt, he took the stone steps by twos and raced down the darkening corridors. Only a handful of braziers were lit. They fought off the shadows, the flames licking at the stone walls.
He heard his boots pounding against the floor, echoing hollowly, his heartbeat banging in accord. He listened to his breaths coming fast and the blood rushing through his ears.
God, please don’t let me be too late.
Two servants rushed by him, but Rowan gave them no more than a cursory glance. He was stalking his own halls, the heat of battle fever rising inside him. Stalking toward a reality he could already see take shape. Stalking, like the wolf that had guarded his family’s sigil for so many years…
