True Love (28 page)

“I told Aldis you want to sleep and that she
is to see to the guests this morning,” Gwendolyn reported. “It
won't matter whether or not you are in the great hall. Most of the
women guests don't bestir themselves until the morning is half
over.”

“What will Aldis think of me?” Catherine
murmured.

“Who cares what she thinks? She probably
won't think at all, she'll just spend her time flirting with
Robert. Braedon was right, you know,” Gwendolyn continued. “Achard
must have accomplices, so I am not going to leave you alone. Now,
go to sleep.”

Oddly content to allow the maidservant to
give her orders, Catherine let her eyelids close.

The sun was high when she wakened. She
stretched and turned over, then sat up abruptly when she saw who
was sitting by her bed. The covers fell away and Catherine grabbed
at them, pulling them up to her shoulders.

“Gwendolyn promised she wasn't going to leave
me,” Catherine said.

“She seemed to feel you would be perfectly
safe with me,” Braedon told her.

“She was wrong.” Aware of Braedon's warm gaze
on her exposed skin, Catherine gathered the coverlet closer still.
“I don't feel at all safe. Please leave.”

“If I go, you will be unprotected. I sent
Gwendolyn to her bed and your father is leading the hunt.”

“What, after he was up all night looking for
me?” she exclaimed. “Why didn't you stop him?”

“Like you, I took to my bed at dawn,” he
said. “When I awakened, the hunters were gone. I fear your father
is annoyed with me. I said a few things to him last night that he'd
rather not have heard.”

“Well,
I
have a few things to say to
you.
”

“Have you?” He took her hand and began to
nibble on her fingers. “Tender, agreeable things, I trust.”

“Angry things. Have you any idea how
devastated I was when I thought you had killed my father?” She
tried to pull her hand free. “Braedon, stop that. I have every
intention of scolding you.”

“Stop what?” His lips were slowly working
their way across her palm, to her wrist, and then up her arm.

“Stop kissing my hand.”

“I already have. It's your elbow I'm kissing
now. Didn't you notice?” His tongue flicked over the sensitive skin
at the inside of her elbow.

It was as though his lips were a fiery brand
searing her arm. The heat raced upward, drenching her shoulders and
then her breasts in warmth. When Braedon's mouth reached her bare
shoulder Catherine moaned and tried to push him away.

“I am very angry with you.” She tried to
sound stern but the words came out as a throaty gasp.

“No doubt. But I saw in your eyes last night
that even when you believed I had killed Royce, still you wanted
me,” Braedon said, nibbling next at her earlobe.

“To my shame,” she whispered.

“No, Catherine. You wanted me because in your
deepest heart you knew I could never hurt anyone dear to you.”

“You made me believe that you had.” His face
was buried in her neck and Catherine put up a hand to stroke his
thick, dark hair. “It's true. I admit it. I wanted you no matter
what you had done.”

“Aye.” He looked deep into her eyes. “What's
between us is beyond blood, or good sense, or even sin. I don't
know what the end of this will be. I only know that for the rest of
my life, you are the one woman I will truly want. No one else will
ever mean anything to me.”

“Are you saying you intend to have other
women?” she cried.

“I am saying I want only you.” His mouth
brushed lightly over hers. “I cannot think of any other woman. Only
you, Catherine. Only you.”

He bore her down on the bed, his mouth hard
on hers, his strong hands pulling away the bedcovers she held so
tightly to her bosom. His tongue plunged into her while his fingers
played with her nipples, and Catherine groaned, arching against
him.

Then she was pulling his tunic up, tearing at
his hose. When he was naked he stood next to the bed, watching her
reaction to what he said.

“Your father has promised to kill me for
making love to you. Since he can kill me only once, let me die in
your arms again, first. Then I'll know what Paradise is like.”

“You could have died at Achard's hand,” she
said. “You fought him for my life as well as for your own. After
that, how could I not forgive you for the pain you caused me last
night? I even forgive you for all the lies you've told me.”

“I will lie to you no more,” he promised.

She gazed up at him, rejoicing in the
muscular arms that had fought to save her, delighting in his broad
chest covered with dark hair that she knew would be soft beneath
her fingers. Braedon's flanks were hard, his thighs like small
trees. She put out a hand to touch him and noted with burning
pleasure the way he quivered when she caressed his hard
arousal.

“If you had died during your fight with
Achard, I would have died, too,” she said. “I will not let my
father harm you. I cannot allow you to die.”

“Except here,” he whispered, moving between
her legs. “Allow me this brief death, I beg you.”

“Come to me, Braedon.” It was on the tip of
her tongue to say she loved him, but he began to caress her, his
skillful fingers sending her senses spiraling so rapidly that she
could no longer speak.

There was a deliberate tenderness in
Braedon's lovemaking that indicated how tightly he was leashing his
passionate desire until Catherine was ready to receive him. He
welcomed her caresses, telling her in soft whispers what pleased
him. With Braedon, Catherine did not feel unskilled or awkward,
though this was only her second time with a man. His generosity,
when she thought most men would have grabbed and used her and
quickly been finished with the deed, touched her deeply. Because of
Braedon's care of her, she gave herself up to him in pleasure and
joy, and when she felt the slow, smooth movement of his hard body
into hers she almost wept at the sweetness of his possession.

“Catherine. My heart.” His breath was warm on
her cheek.

Still he did not rush her. He gave her the
precious moments she needed, letting the tension build and build,
heat curling ever tighter within her, until she moaned and clawed
at his back, trying to pull him even closer. As if he knew exactly
what she most wanted, Braedon gave one last, deep thrust and
Catherine trembled into delirious ecstasy. He hushed her wild cries
with his mouth, even as he shivered and shook and with a long,
aching groan, went rigid in her arms.

“I must be mad,” he said later, while he was
still inside her and Catherine's hands were caressing his back and
shoulders. “Twice now, I haven't been able to stop in time. There's
a need in me that cries out for you. You are a danger to me, and to
what I am pledged to do.”

“How can this be a danger to your work?” she
asked, fingers sliding along the ridges of his shoulder and back
muscles, teasing him and yet soothing his worries.

“You are dangerous because I put you before
my duty,” he said. “I confessed as much to your father, when I
scolded him for letting Achard court you.”

“Don't talk about Achard,” she whispered.
“No, wait. How has my father explained Achard's absence?”

“Royce said he was called away and that he
will return in a day or so,” Braedon answered.

“There must be at least one person at Wortham
who knows that isn't true.”

“Exactly. I think Royce hopes to prove that
person's guilt within the next day.”

“He must have a strong suspicion about who it
is. Phelan, perhaps?”

“I don't know.” Braedon's eyes met hers with
no hint of evasion. “Your father is not in a mood to confide in me.
He was distinctly irritated with me for not stopping Achard from
abducting you, and he claimed my scheme to expose Achard went badly
awry. He wasn't far wrong in that assessment, though we do have
Achard locked up and there are three honest people who heard his
threats against you. Furthermore, you can bear witness that Achard
expressed his pleasure when he thought Royce was dead. Catherine,
will you do something for me?”

“Of course I will.” She answered so readily
that Braedon smiled and kissed her.

“During this evening's feast I will again sit
at one of the lower tables. I want you to pretend to be annoyed
with me.”

“After the last hour, that will be
difficult,” she teased, one finger outlining his lips.

“Pay attention.” He nibbled on her finger,
then caught her hand and held it. “I have promised not to lie to
you again and I will keep that promise, but you must understand
that there are some things I cannot reveal to you, secrets that are
not mine to tell. You must also understand that your father's first
duty is to the king and nothing –
nothing!
– will deflect
him from it.”

“I do understand.” She said with a sigh.
“Sometimes I think my father undertook his work for King Henry so
he could forget, now and then, just for a little while, that Mother
is gone.”

“You are probably right,” Braedon said. “He
mentioned her once and it was clear to me that he loved her and he
still mourns her death.”

“Thank you for saying that. You see, I miss
her too. I've always been sorry that I wasn't at home when she
died. I was away, being fostered at Cliffmore Castle. But that was
ten years ago, and now we have an urgent problem to solve. You were
going to tell me how I can help you.”

“I intend to strike up a quarrel with Royce,
if he is agreeable,” Braedon said, “or with Cadwallon, if Royce
won't participate in my new idea. Later this evening I am going to
storm out of Wortham, leaving Robert to pack up my belongings and
follow me.”

“Leave Wortham?” she exclaimed. After only a
moment’s thought, she added, “What do you want me to do to aid your
plan?”

“Tomorrow,” Braedon continued, “I want you to
attend the tournament and act as if nothing is amiss. Invite
Cadwallon to sit beside you.”

“You told me once that I could trust him,”
she said, trying to discern what Braedon's plan was.

“So you can. Trust Sir Desmond, too.”

“When we met Sir Desmond at the fair, he said
he wasn't coming to the tournament.”

“He will be here,” Braedon said. “Not in
plain view, but when he reveals himself do as he tells you, and
don't be afraid. He and Cadwallon will keep you safe.”

“They are both in King Henry's service, too,
aren't they?” Catherine asked. “And you haven't told me everything,
have you?”

“I warned you that there are some things I
cannot reveal.” He looked into her eyes as he spoke, and Catherine
saw the plea in his midnight gaze, and responded to it.

“Very well,” she said, “I will do what you
want, because I trust you. I believe you are an honest man.”

“If you believe in me,” he said, releasing
the breath he had been holding, “how can I be anything but honest
and true?”

That evening Braedon made a thorough job of
being obnoxious. Wine cup in hand, weaving a bit as if he had
imbibed too much, he snapped at Cadwallon in a voice loud enough to
be heard by most of the guests in the great hall. In response
Cadwallon blustered and shouted back at Braedon, giving every
indication of having been deeply insulted, until Catherine began to
fear the kindly knight was overdoing his part in the pretense.

Perhaps Braedon thought so, too. He turned
abruptly from Cadwallon to utter a rude remark about Phelan's
bright red tunic and the way it stretched tightly over his paunch.
Catherine smothered a giggle, thinking that Braedon was accurate,
if not polite.

Lastly, Braedon attacked Royce's abilities as
a host, claiming the tournament was a mockery and no true test of
arms. He further charged that his dear friend Achard had absented
himself from Wortham in protest over the way the contests were
being presented, with several days' lapse between each meeting on
the field of honor, and only a few paltry gold cups for prizes at
the end of it all.

“If you are dissatisfied,” Royce responded,
appearing to be aloof and disinterested in the lord's chair at the
high table, “then you are free to leave.”

“Aye,” Braedon declared, waving his wine cup
until the contents splashed red across his blue tunic, “that is
just what I intend to do. Fare you well, my lord.” He made a deep
bow to Royce, sweeping out the hand holding the cup in a grand
gesture, thus spilling the remainder of his wine.

“My lady.” Braedon bowed to Catherine.

His eyes twinkled when they met hers and it
was all she could do to keep from breaking into laughter. She knew
she must not laugh; there was a very serious purpose behind
Braedon's exaggerated actions. Still, she was convinced that he was
enjoying himself. She must remember to tell him later how much she
admired the skillful way in which he appeared to be drunk, yet he
avoided every obstacle in the great hall with remarkable agility.
She just hoped no one else noticed that he didn't bump into tables
or benches or servants on his way to the door.

“
Really,”
said Lady Edith, who was as
usual sitting at Royce's right hand, “blood will always tell. There
is no doubt that bastard has a common origin. I cannot but wonder
whether he is a real knight or a fraud.” Her delicate nose
practically twitched in distain.

“What's gotten into Sir Braedon?” Gwendolyn
asked as she refilled Catherine's wine goblet. “I've noticed that
he usually drinks little or nothing.”

“Perhaps that is why the wine affected him so
badly tonight,” Catherine said. “He must have drunk an extra cup or
two.”

“Or three.” Gwendolyn frowned. “You don't
mind if he's gone?”

“I mind that he behaved like a drunken boor,”
Catherine responded. To distract the persistent and much too clever
servant she added, “I believe Lady Edith would like more wine.”