Leigh, Tamara (2 page)

Gabriel's hatred burrowed deeper. Doubtless when Juliana grew into her woman's body she would prove no better than the one who had borne him. Selfish. Deceitful. A whore.

God help Bernart Kinthorpe.

Chapter One

England, March 1195

"I want a son."

The terse words fell into Juliana's consciousness. Thinking she could not have heard right, she looked up from the ledger she'd been poring over.

Bernart stood before the dais upon which the lord's table was raised, his eyes alive with such hunger it sent foreboding coursing through her.

"A son?" she asked.

"A son."

Knowing he would not jest about something so sensitive, Juliana glanced past him. Where minutes earlier servants had bustled about clearing the remains of the evening meal, now the hall stood empty—excepting the young woman who sat unaware before the hearth. As usual, Bernart had overlooked Juliana's sister, as if Alaiz did not exist.

Juliana moistened her lips. "Forgive me, husband, but I do not understand what you speak of."

He stepped up to the dais, pressed his bloated hands to the table, then leaned forward. "I want a son."

Of course he did. Didn't every man? But for Bernart it was not possible. Cautious lest she goad him into one of his grim moods, she pushed the ledger back and folded her hands atop the table. "You know better than I it can never be."

Pain flickered across his features. "But it can be."

Though he was careful to avoid alcohol, Juliana wondered if he'd been drinking. She drew in a breath of air. There was no such scent upon it. "Tell me," she said quietly.

The harsh lines of his fleshly face eased, allowing a glimpse of the handsome man he'd once been. "The child would not be of my blood, but I would raise him as if he were."

Juliana shook her head. "You propose to bring another man's child into our home?"

"Aye. Through you."

"Through me?"

Hunger grew in his eyes. "He would be your son. Born of your body. Of your blood."

His words struck Juliana with the force of a blow. "What are you saying?"

Bernart's limp was more pronounced than usual as he walked around the table. He lowered himself beside her and took her hands in his. "I love you, Juliana. We were meant to be together. We are one."

She had once thought so herself. "What are you saying?" she asked again.

"If you..." His voice cracked as it did when he was not careful to modulate it. "If you lie with another man, you could give me a son."

She could not move, could not speak, could only stare at this man who asked the unthinkable. Surely this was but a horrid dream. It had to be.
Wake up. Juliana,
she bade herself.
Wake up clinging to your side of the bed as you do every morning.

Bernart pressed his brow to the backs of her hands. "Do this for me and no more will I ask of you. I swear it."

She jumped to her feet. Out of the corner of her eye, she caught her sister's start of surprise, but was too roused to pay her heed. "I am your wife! You would have me give myself to another man? Commit adultery?"

Slowly, Bernart stood. "I would not ask it were my need not great."

Grasping for a sliver of sanity in a world gone mad, Juliana drew a deep breath. "Even were a child born of such an unholy union, it would not be yours. Not of you."

"But he would be of you. That is enough for me." He reached to take her hands again.

She sidestepped. "Why do you ask this of me?"

Bernart's struggle to control his temper showed in his tightening fists. "I am without an heir."

"You have an heir. Your brother, Osbern—"

"Is not my brother!"

Juliana shook her head. "Deny him though you do, he is of your blood. This child you ask me to bear would be a bastard. He would never be recognized as your heir."

Bernart took a step toward her. "No one but you and I need know the circumstances of his birth."

She blinked. If not drunk, then he was mad. There was no other explanation.

"I have thought long about it," he said. " 'Tis what I want."

So badly that he was holding onto his terrible temper. She swallowed the bitter lump in her throat. "What you want? What of me? You would have me whore myself!"

A tic started at one corner of Bernart's mouth. "You have always wanted children. A dozen, you once said. Remember?"

Juliana remembered. She swung away and stared at the tapestry that scaled the wall behind the table. "I wish children, but not like this.
Never
like this."

A long silence followed; then Bernart's hands fell to her shoulders. "There is no other way."

She closed her eyes. "Then I shall be childless." Just as she had long ago accepted.

With a sharp oath, Bernart dragged her around. "You think I do not know what is said of me?"

Of course she did, just as she knew what was said of her—that she was barren or frigid. Servants talked, and what other conclusion was to be drawn from three years of marriage that had begotten naught but indifference between their lord and lady?

Bernart's fingers dug into her shoulders. " 'Tis said my seed is bad. Worse, that you are without child because I prefer... men!"

All the more reason for him to hate his brother. Not that Osbern dared flaunt what he was. He simply did not deny it. Thus Bernart thought to prove his lost manhood by asking this heinous thing of her.

"I can withstand it no more." Tears quavered in his voice. "I beseech you, Juliana, give me a son."

Not since their wedding night, following his return from the Holy Crusade, had his eyes shined so brightly. It was then he'd revealed the injury done him by the infidel, that she would be his wife in name only. Never to know his touch. Never to bear him children. Through her sorrow Juliana had told him it did not matter and tried to comfort him, but he'd rejected her. It did matter. To him. With each passing day, his bitterness had pushed them further and further apart. A sob catching in her throat, Juliana laid a hand alongside his face—so smooth, so hopelessly devoid of beard. "I am sorry, Bernart, but what you ask I cannot do."

He squeezed his eyes closed. "Do you love me, Juliana?"

She
had
loved him, had thought she would die if he did not return from the crusade. But then, she'd been barely thirteen when he had set off for the Holy Land, and he a man worthy and capable of love. No more. "You know 'tis so," she lied.

A long moment passed. "Had I not been faithful to you before we wed, just as you asked of me, 'tis likely I would now have a son. True, a bastard, but a son."

She dropped her hand to her side. "Mayhap you do have one." After all, it was only when she had come upon him trysting with a wench from her father's hall that she'd demanded his vow of celibacy—only months before he had left for the Crusade.

"You think I have not searched?" Bernart demanded.

Had he? "I... did not know."

His nostrils flared. "For you, Juliana, I am denied a child made of my loins. And for what? I cannot even hold you."

"That is your choice!"

"I have no other."

Nay, he did not. He couldn't stand to touch her when there was naught he could do to slake his desire. He clung to his side of the bed and she to hers.

"Please," Juliana said, "let us speak no more of this. I know you are hurting—"

"You know naught!" He shook her so hard her head snapped back. "I ask only that you give back some of what I have given you, and you deny me."

She strained away, but he held tight. "Have I not been a good wife?" she cried. "I keep your household in order, your accounts—"

"You think that is enough?"

" 'Tis all I have to give."

"Nay, you can give me a son."

Her throat so tight she could hardly breathe, she shook her head.

In his eyes she saw that he wished to strike her, but he thrust her from him. With higher-pitched curses that belied his earlier attempt to lower his voice, he knocked over her chair, swept the ledger from the table, sent the ink pot soaring. The latter missed the tapestry by inches and dashed its dark contents against the wall.

"Juli... ana."

The timid voice reminded Juliana she was not the only witness to Bernart's fury. Regretting that she had not sent her sister from the hall, she turned.

Alaiz stood before the dais, hands clasped at her waist and bottom lip caught between her teeth as she peered at Juliana from beneath sweeping lashes.

Fearing Alaiz might become an object of Bernart's wrath, Juliana hurried around the table and stepped from the dais. She laid an urgent hand to her sister's shoulder. Not surprisingly, Alaiz radiated heat and smoke. She always sat too near the fire.

" 'Tis all right," Juliana spoke amid the din. "Go above-stairs."

"B-Bernart... angry."

"Not with you. Now go." Juliana gave her a nudge. "You will come... soon?"

"Aye. Hurry along."

With Alaiz's retreat, silence descended upon the hall. Fearing it, Juliana looked around.

Bernart's gaze was fixed past her to where Alaiz mounted the stairs.

What was he thinking? Embarrassed as he was by Alaiz, he quickly looked away anytime she fell under his regard. Now he followed her progress with something in his eyes that twisted Juliana's insides.

"What of Alaiz?" he asked.

Dear God.
Though Alaiz had been schooled for the church and destined to one day take her place among the great abbesses, a fall from her horse a year ago had impaired her mind. The nobleman who'd bought wardship of Alaiz, their mother, and younger brother upon the death of Juliana's father six months earlier had refused to pay the enormous sum the church demanded to care for Alaiz. Thus, had Bernart not grudgingly agreed to allow her to live with them, she would have been turned out to wander the countryside. He had been more than generous, Juliana conceded, but must she pay for that generosity with so cruel a fouling of her body?

Looking the predator in spite of his flaccid figure and limp, he traversed the dais and stepped down beside her. "When there was no one who wanted her, I allowed her into my home."

Juliana lifted her chin. "She serves me well."

His laughter was harsh. Mean. " 'Tis you who dresses her. A lady in waiting, indeed! She is an imbecile."

Juliana gasped, swept a hand up to strike him.

Bernart caught her wrist. "She is of no use to anyone. An embarrassment."

Juliana began to tremble. "Do not speak so of her."

" 'Tis the truth. For the love of you I took her in."

She nearly laughed. Though she could have sought an annulment on the grounds that Bernart was incapable of consummating their marriage, for the love of
him
she had not done it. Only when he had refused to allow Alaiz to come to Tremoral two years later had she threatened to reveal his terrible secret. Thus he had agreed, but not for love of her, as he claimed.

"Juliana?"

She met his gaze. Now he was the one with power. "You are cruel," she said.

"I am what you make me." He thrust his face near hers. "Give me a son. If not for me, then for Alaiz."

As much as she wanted to cry at the injustice, she would not. "Truly you would send her away?"

The man her child's heart had once loved flickered and died in his eyes. "I would."

Could he do it? Not Bernart Kinthorpe who'd set out on that fateful Crusade six years ago, but the man he had become... Juliana drew herself to her full five feet, two inches. "I shall never forgive you for this."

"You will do it?"

"Have I another choice?"

Relief dropped his rigid shoulders. "I thank you."

She jerked her wrist out of his hold. "Whose seed will you plant in my belly?"

He averted his gaze. "I have not decided."

But he would, and soon. "And if this man whom you choose tells?"

He skirted her. "Fear not; I will see to all."

"Would you kill him?"

He halted, was slow to answer. "Nay," he said, keeping his back to her.

Did he lie? His eyes—she had to see them. She came around him, but he dropped his lids. Emotion was cleared from his eyes when he gave his gaze back to her.

Juliana filled her chest with breath, took a step back. "Then if 'tis not by death he will hold your foul secret, how? You will pay him?"

A muscle convulsed his jaw. "No payment will be necessary, for he will not know 'tis you who comes to him."

"Not know...?" She shook her head. "Pray, how will you arrange that?"

"Enough!" He backhanded the air between them, missing her by a breath. "There is naught more to be said."

She was dismissed. "I shall pray for your soul," she said, and started for the stairs. She'd taken only a few steps when another question came hard to her. She swung around. "If he does not get me with child, what then?"

Bernart's answer came without hesitation. "When is your next monthly flux?"

He had thought of everything. Though she was tempted to lie so he would not know her time of fertility, she realized it would not turn him from this terrible course. God willing, it would take only once to sow a babe. "A fortnight hence," she begrudged.

He nodded. "The seed will take."

Nausea roiled, burned. "And if 'tis a daughter I birth, would you ask it of me again?"

As if this were an eventuality he'd not considered, his eyes shifted and his brow doubled on itself. "I will not."

Though it was a son he longed for, a daughter would as well prove his manhood. "I will have your word," Juliana said.

"You have it."

Now to put distance between herself and this man who'd once fed her foolish dreams of love. She turned away.

Halfway across the hall, Bernart's voice reached to her. "Forgive me."

She faltered, but ascended the stairs without a backward glance. She found Alaiz in the small chamber her sister occupied next to the lord's solar.

Looking forlorn where she sat cross-legged on the bed, Alaiz glanced up as Juliana stepped inside. "Bernart is still angry?"