A VERY TUDOR CHRISTMAS (3 page)

He raised their entwined hands to study her pale, ringless
fingers as if he had never seen them before. As if they fascinated him.

“Do you still take what you want with no thought to anyone
else?” Meg whispered.

Robert’s eyes met hers, and for an instant she saw a bright
flash of something like anger or pain in those ocean-blue depths. Then they went
ice cold again. “You know nothing of what I’ve done in my life. If only you
had...”

“If only I had what?” she said, bewildered.

“You drive me mad,” he growled, and suddenly his arms came
close around her again. He pulled her body hard against his, drawing her up on
her toes, and his mouth swooped down to cover hers.

He wasn’t harsh, but he was deliciously insistent, his mouth
opening hungrily over hers, his tongue tracing the seam of her lips as he sought
entrance. She opened for him, meeting him eagerly as a raw, hot hunger swept
over her and she couldn’t resist it.

She hadn’t realized until his mouth claimed hers again how much
their long-ago first kiss lived in her memory, how much she had longed to feel
that way again. That sensation of the real, everyday world, where she had to be
the sensible, practical Meg, flew away and she felt herself falling down into
pure emotion. It was terrible, delirious—and all too wonderful.

Robert’s hand slid down her back as their kiss deepened,
pulling her body closer into his. He caressed the curve of her lower back
through her satin bodice. When she moaned against his lips, his hands slid under
her hips and lifted her high against him.

As she held onto him, her head fell back and his lips slid down
her arched neck. The tip of his tongue tasted the hollow at the base of her
throat, where her pulse beat out a frantic rhythm. How she wanted him, even
after all this time! She knew she should berate herself for it, but it was an
emotion so dark and primitive it seemed she could not banish it.

His hand cupped her breast through the stiffened satin,
stroking it until she moaned again.

“Meg—it’s been so long....”

“I know,” she gasped. She threaded her fingers through his
black-satin hair and drew his mouth back against her skin. He hungrily kissed
the soft skin of her neck, his breath warm. She could only hear the mingling of
their harsh, uneven breath, the pounding of her heart in her ears.

One of his hands slid lower, grabbing the slippery fabric of
her skirts and drawing them up. The cold air swept over her bare skin like a
whisper. A chilling touch of reality.

Meg suddenly heard a burst of laughter beyond the closed doors
of the great hall, and the noise reminded her where they were. At Cecil House,
with half the court just a room away. She tore her lips away from his,
struggling to breathe. Her emotions tumbled over each other inside of her, lust,
confusion, joy, anger. It was surely madness.

“Please,” she gasped. “Please do not do this to me again.”

“Do what, Meg?” he said hoarsely, his breath warm on her skin.
“All I ever wanted was...”

“Meg?”

Meg spun around at the sudden sound of Bea’s voice. Her cousin
stood at the edge of the room, staring at Meg with startled eyes.

Meg felt Robert ease away from her, into the shadows under the
staircase, and she hurried toward Beatrice. She swiped her hands over her damp
eyes and tried to smile. “Am I needed for the masque now?”

“Y—yes,” Beatrice murmured, still peering past Meg into the
shadows. “You are to be an Hour of Night, I think. Who was that with you?”

“No one at all,” Meg said, firmly steering Beatrice back into
the crowded great hall. “An old friend of my parents’, who has been abroad for
some time. He was offering his greetings.”

“Truly? He seemed rather young to be friends with my uncle.”
Beatrice tried to glance over Meg’s shoulder, but Meg pushed her into the great
hall and slammed the door behind them.

“Perhaps so,” Meg said. “But never mind that. Tell me about our
roles in the masque....”

Margaret. Meg. It was really her, at last, after all these
years. But she was not entirely the Meg he remembered.

Robert raked his fingers through his hair, pacing up the
Cecils’ corridor and back again, the sound of his bootheels on the polished wood
floor the only noise to break the silence.

From beyond the closed doors of the great hall, he heard the
sunburst of youthful laughter, cut off by a stern word from Lady Burghley. He
knew he should be in there, keeping an eye on his kinsman Peter Ellingham, but
he had to regain his calm senses first. All he could see, all he could think
about, was Meg’s cool, fathomless dark eyes, looking at him as if she had never
seen him before.

She had never replied to his letter, left at Clifford Manor
before he went on his travels to make his fortune, and he’d always known there
was a chance she wouldn’t wait for him. In truth, they barely knew each other. A
dance, a walk, a kiss. But in those few meetings had been a—a knowing. A
realization, such as he’d never had with anyone else. She was the main reason he
was driven to make his fortune thus.

Everywhere he went, Paris, Rome, Venice, the frozen wasteland
of Muscovy, he remembered her. She was why he did what he did, so he could be
worthy of her pure spirit. But the Meg in his memory, with her quick laugh, her
bright enthusiasm for everything around her, seemed vanished.

In her place was a cool, still statue, a court lady with
coiffed hair and the armor of her embroidered gown. It gave him such a chill to
think of his dream of Meg Clifford, so long cherished, was vanished.

And yet—yet for just a moment, after that fiery kiss, he looked
into her dark eyes and saw the glimmer of his Meg. Like the gleam of a diamond
under ice, precious and beautiful. Far away, but not completely beyond
reach.

If he could just crack that ice.

The front doors of Cecil House suddenly banged open, letting in
a blast of icy wind and the loud clatter of a group of young men. It was the
bridegroom, the golden-haired Earl of Oxford, surrounded by his posturing
cronies. Their swords clanked, their furred cloaks swirled, and their laughter
echoed mockingly off the luxurious walls of the bride’s dignified house.

Robert couldn’t help but feel sorry for young, quiet Anne
Cecil, despite the luster of the title she would soon acquire. He was only glad
Meg had not ended up married to such a one as Oxford and his friends. That she
was still available—if she would only listen to him.

“Erroll!” Oxford called. “Come to celebrate my nuptials, have
you? Every man should be wed, or so my guardian says. I vow you will be
next....”

Chapter Three

Meg was lost.

She held tight to the reins of her horse and tried to peer
through the snow, falling so heavily around her now that the whiteness
disoriented her. She cursed herself for leaving the hunting party, but when she
turned away from them down another path the day was cold and gray but clear. The
snow had come on suddenly, too fast for her to turn around, and she couldn’t
even hear the echo of their laughter in the muffling silence.

Aye, she was foolish indeed to run away. But when Robert joined
the party, the day had turned all closed-in and confusing. She didn’t want to
see him, to hear his voice, watch his smile, and remember his kisses—remember
what a fool she had once been over him.

What a fool she could still be, if she let herself.

She would have left the party and gone back inside the palace,
hidden her ridiculous feelings away in her own chamber, if she hadn’t already
been mounted on her horse. Luckily Bea was too preoccupied with Peter Ellingham
to see Meg’s blushes, and Robert seemed intent on making the too-solemn
bride-to-be Anne Cecil laugh. He was very good at that—making ladies forget
themselves.

And now Meg was lost, a long way from the palace.

“This way!” she heard someone shout through the snow. “Meg, can
you hear me?”

The voice was hoarse, tinged with worry, but Meg knew it was
Robert. She recognized his voice all too well, and her heart pounded at the
sound of it.

“I—I am here,” she called back. “I fear I am lost.”

“Just stay where you are! I will find you.”

Meg took a deep breath and forced herself to stay still.
Running away had got her into this trouble in the first place. At last Robert
appeared out of the whiteness, a figure all in black, his short cloak swirling
around him, his cap tugged low over his brow so she couldn’t see his expression.
He reached out a gloved hand to seize her bridle.

“I noticed you were missing and feared you had become lost in
the snow,” he said. “I saw a hunting lodge not far from here. It looked empty,
but we can shelter there until the snow ceases.”

He had come looking for her? The thought made her shiver even
more than the snow. Meg nodded quickly. She didn’t want to be alone with him in
an empty house, forced to face their past with no distractions around them, but
she knew she couldn’t stay where she was. The cold was seeping through her
fur-trimmed riding clothes and into her very skin.

She swiped away the damp snow from in front of her eyes and
nodded.

He led her slowly back down the path and over an icy bridge to
where a small, square, dark brick house loomed out of the snow. It was indeed a
hunting lodge, far enough from the city to be quiet, but near enough to be an
easy travel to court. The windows were dark and no smoke curled out of the
chimneys. But a wreath of holly hung on the door, a small sign of the festive
season.

“Holly,” she said whimsically as Robert helped her down from
her saddle. “My nursemaid used to say fairies would hide under the prickly
leaves to get away from the winter’s cold.”

“That’s an old tale indeed.” His hands lingered at her waist,
warm through her woolen doublet. She swayed toward him helplessly, but he
stepped away.

She shook away a pang of regret at losing his touch.

“Why don’t you go inside while I settle the horses?” he said
quietly. She could read nothing from his voice, his eyes that watched her so
closely. His gloved hands clenched into fists.

She nodded and hurried inside. It was a small house, she saw as
she made her way through a narrow corridor into a sitting room. Plain and
functional, with carved beams criss-crossing the low ceiling and a dark wood
floor covered by a luxurious green carpet. A few chairs and stools were
scattered about, and painted cloths hung on the white-plastered walls to keep
out the draft. A swag of greenery hung over the large fireplace.

Surely a court family lived here, Meg though as she swept off
her damp cloak and hung it on a peg. She would have to thank them later for
sheltering her.

Her and Robert.

She shivered as she remembered that she was not alone there.
That he would be in that cozy room with her at any moment. Part of her knew she
should run from him, even into the snowstorm, because she knew all too well his
effect on her. But she stayed where she was.

“You are cold,” he said behind her, startling her. She spun
around to find him stepping through the doorway, ducking his head under the low
lintel. She thought again how very kind the years had been to him, carving his
youthful beauty into something truly extraordinary.

“No, I’m fine,” she said, but he swept off his fur-lined short
cloak and laid it gently around her shoulders. Its fine, soft folds smelled of
him, of lemony French cologne and clean, cold air, and it still held the warmth
of his skin.

“I’ll build us a fire,” he said. He took her arm in a gentle
clasp and led her to a cushioned cross-backed chair near the fireplace.

“You know how to build a fire?” she said, bemused.

Robert laughed as he knelt down by the grate and reached for
the wood piled up beside it. “I am not completely useless, Meg. I have learned
many useful skills in my travels.”

“Nay. Not completely useless, I suppose,” Meg murmured. She sat
back, wrapped snugly in his cloak, and watched as he shed his close-fitting
doublet and set about building a fire. She wondered where he had been and what
he had done in the time they were apart.

The long, lean muscles of his strong back and shoulders shifted
beneath his thin linen shirt, and she remembered too well how his bare skin had
felt under her touch. She swallowed hard and tried to turn away, but she feared
she could not.

Soon he had a fire blazing in the grate, crackling and
snapping, driving away the cold. He found a jug of wine and some bread, and they
shared the repast in silence for several long moments. Gradually the warmth and
the wine worked their subtle magic, and Meg found herself relaxing back into her
chair. Robert leaned back against her legs, his body hard and strong through her
skirts. It almost felt like what might have been.

“Tell me what else your old nursemaid said about Christmas,” he
said, as if he sensed that they should not yet talk about personal matters. Of
what had once driven them apart. This was too sweet a moment.

Meg slipped down to sit beside him on the carpet, near to the
fire. She stared into the cheerful red-gold flames, sipping at her wine as she
remembered the old tales her nurse would tell by the nursery fire.

Meg stared into the fire and remembered Christmases when she
was young, the feasting and music, the games she and Bea would play trying to
divine their future husbands. But she couldn’t tell Robert of those silly,
girlish games.

“There was a song we would sing,” she said, “about the holly
and how no matter what comes it stays green and true.” As love never did. Softly
she began to sing the old words.

“The holly and the ivy, when they are both full grown, of all the
trees that are in the wood, the holly bears the crown...”

“The ivy... The ivy...” she faltered, and whatever she
was going to say was lost when he leaned closer and brushed his lips softly over
hers. She felt their breath mingle, the damp heat of his skin, his lips. It was
more intoxicating than any wine could be.

“Meg...” he whispered.

She didn’t want him to let her go. For that moment, surrounded
by the snow and the fire, the past dropped away, and she was just that young
girl again, longing for this touch. She knew she should not be with him, that
she had to keep being the sensible, staid Meg she had become at court. But she
was so tired of being that girl.

Before she could think, she wrapped her arms around him and
pressed her lips harder to his. She felt his hands close around her waist, and
he shifted their bodies so they lay next to each other on the soft carpet.

“My sweet Meg,” he said hoarsely, and his tongue traced the
curve of her lower lip, light and teasing, before she parted her lips to him and
he slid inside to taste her.

And she soared up and up, free, even if it was only for the
moment.

Through the haze of her dream, she felt his touch slide around
her hips, pulling her closer against him, their bodies so close even a snowflake
couldn’t come between them. She arched against him and felt his erection, the
proof that he desired her, too, through the layers of their winter clothes.

He groaned deeply, and their kiss slid down into a wild,
frantic need. Her fingers plucked at the lacings of his shirt until she could
touch the bare, smooth, warm skin of his chest. She felt his breath catch under
her touch.

Sensations raced through her, like lightning over her skin, and
she remembered that only he had ever been able to make her feel alive like this.
She dug her fingers into his hard shoulders and held him with her as their kiss
deepened. She wanted more and more, wanted to forget....

But he drew away from her. “Meg. My pretty Meg,” he said
roughly. He pressed his forehead against hers, holding her as their ragged
breath mingled. “It can’t be this way. Not now. Not yet.”

Meg was deeply confused, cold where she had been warm, dizzy
and lost. He was leaving her again? “What do you mean?”

He just shook his head, and gently set her away from him. “It
must be right. After all I have done...”

Meg shivered, feeling abandoned all over again. She gathered
her disordered clothes around her with shaking hands, unable to look at him, to
say anything at all. She just wanted to escape.

“It has stopped snowing,” he said. “We should go back and find
the others.”

Only then did Meg notice that the gray sky was clear outside
the small window. Why, then, did she feel colder than ever?