Desire

  “I will guard this isle, its people, and its lady with more care than I would use to guard my own life,” Gareth said so that all could hear.

  Clare saw the unwavering promise in his strong face. She knew that he meant every word. Their personal relationship was far from settled, but she could be certain that her isle was in good hands.

  She smiled tremulously. “I have chosen well.”

  “I would have you believe so.”

  Clare could hardly breathe. For a moment it was as if she and Gareth were alone in the hall. She could feel the unbreakable, invisible cords that now bound them together.

  Friends first, Clare reminded herself. It was far too soon for her and Gareth to become lovers.

  Much too soon.

  They barely knew each other.

  Joanna rose from her place at the table and hurried toward Clare. The movement freed Clare of the spell that had settled on her. It was time to leave the hall.

  Aware of the growing curiosity and expectation of the throng, Clare gripped the heavy sword and looked at Gareth.

  “I go now to prepare to welcome my husband to the bridal chamber,” Clare said very distinctly.

  The crowd cheered and tankards were raised.

  Gareth raised his goblet once more. “I pray you will not delay a moment longer, my lady. As a gardener, you know well that some herbs are most potent when they are shriveled and dried. There are others, however, which are best used when the stalk is strong and fully erect. ‘Tis the latter variety that I shall bring to you tonight.”

  Laughter shook the hall.

  Clare’s eyes widened as the meaning of his words sank home. “For a man who claims that he does not jest, my lord, you have an unusual turn of phrase,” she muttered.

  “Aye, well, a wedding is an unusual event, madam.”

  Joanna seized her arm. “Come. We must hurry.” She tugged impatiently.

  Clare sent Gareth a speaking look as she was led away.

  “Have a care with my sword,” Gareth called after her. “It is the only one I have.”

  More shouts of laughter rang through the chamber.

  “I vow, I shall find some good use for it.” Clare clutched the blade hilt very tightly as Joanna drew her toward the staircase. “’Twill make an excellent stake from which to string pea vines in my garden.”

  Shouts of encouragement accompanied Clare and Joanna as they picked up their skirts and hurried toward the tower stairs.

  “Take this,” Joanna whispered to Clare as they went down the hall. “Hide it about your person. Do not let Lord Gareth or anyone else see it.”

  Clare’s fingers closed around yet another small object. “Let me hazard a guess. Chicken blood?”

  “Aye. Sprinkle some on the sheets before morning and all will be well.”

  Several other women appeared in the hall. Giggling and laughing, they all crowded into the bedchamber to prepare the bride.

  Within a few minutes Clare’s gown had been stripped from her. A beautifully embroidered night robe of fine soft linen was dropped over her head and she was tucked into the sweet-smelling bed.

  “There, now, ye look lovely,” Eunice said as she ran a comb through Clare’s unbound hair. She leaned close and lowered her voice. “Don’t be forgetting the chicken blood.”

  “Believe me, I am unlikely to forget it.”

  Joanna went to the door and put her ear to the wood. “I can hear Lord Gareth and his men on the stairs.”

  “Grooms is always an impatient lot.” Agnes elbowed her way to the side of the bed. “As yer old nurse, ‘tis my right to say good night to the maid I helped raise. On the morrow, I’ll greet the woman who rises from this bed.”

  “Hurry,” Joanna said. “They’re almost here.”

  Masculine voices and roars of mirth could be heard echoing down the corridor. The serving girls quickly poured wine into two goblets that stood on a table near the fire. Eunice dabbed a tear from her eye and smiled benignly.

  Everyone’s attention was on the door, waiting for it to open. Agnes leaned over the bed.

  “Here, now, take this, m’lady.” She pressed a small object into Clare’s hand.

  With a sense of resignation, Clare glanced down at yet another small vial. “Thank you, Agnes. You cannot know how much your thoughtfulness means to me.”

  “Hush.” Agnes cast a quick look about to make certain no one had overheard. “Be sure to dab a few drops on the sheets ere morning and all will be well.”

  “But, Agnes—”

  “’Tis just a useful precaution.” Agnes fussed with the bedding. “When you’ve lived as long as I have, ye learn it pays to help nature along now and again. Especially when a man’s honor is involved.”

  The door crashed open before Clare could argue.

  Ulrich and the other men thrust Gareth into the chamber. The serving maids shrieked.

  “Here’s your new lord, my lady.” Ulrich swept a deep, mocking bow toward Clare. When he raised his head, he wore a distinctly lecherous grin. “He has come here tonight to practice with his sword. I trust you’ll see to it that he gets a good deal of exercise with it. We would not want the Hellhound of Wyckmere to grow soft.”

  The men succumbed once more to uproarious laughter. Joanna and the other women shooed them back out of the chamber.

  It took a minute or two to clear the room, but at last the door was firmly closed.

  Clare and Gareth were alone at last.

  Clare held the white linen sheets very tightly to her breast as she met Gareth’s eyes.

  He looked at her as she lay back against the scented linen pillows. The air of possessiveness in his eyes stole Clare’s voice.

  Gareth finally broke the short, taut silence. He glanced around the chamber with an inquiring expression. “My sword?”

  “Over there.” Clare moistened her lips with the tip of her tongue. “On the window seat.”

  “Ah, yes. Safe and sound.” Gareth did not go to the window seat to collect his blade.

  Instead, he crossed the chamber to where a small table stood in front of the fire. He picked up the goblets full of wine and turned toward the bed.

  Clare realized that she was clutching the sheets with such force that her knuckles were white. She made herself unclench her fingers one by one and then searched frantically for something appropriately casual to say.

  This was not a real wedding night, after all.

  “Well, I’m certainly glad that business is over and done.” Clare shoved aside the bedding and fairly leaped out of the massive, four-posted bed.

  Gareth watched impassively as she grabbed a chamber robe and flung it quickly around her shoulders. Holding the garment closed at her throat with one hand, she summoned up what she hoped was a comradely smile. “I suppose weddings are always troublesome affairs, are they not, my lord?”

  “I wouldn’t know.” Gareth watched her intently as he offered her one of the goblets. “I have never been married before.”

  Clare blushed. “No, of course not. I did not mean to imply that you had.” She snatched the wine from his hand and took a healthy swallow. She’d had almost nothing to eat or drink all day. For some reason she’d been too tense to partake of the feast. “I vow, I do not understand why I am feeling so odd tonight. I wonder if I am ill.”

  “Mayhap you are feeling some of the same things that I am feeling tonight.” Gareth took a sip of his own wine. Then he removed Clare’s goblet from her fingers. He set both small vessels down on the table.

  “My lord?” Clare realized that her voice had risen to a small squeak. “Are you feeling unsettled, also?”

  “Aye.”

  “Mayhap we both could use a draught of camomile and mint tea,” she suggested helpfully. “‘Tis excellent for an uneasy stomach. I shall summon one of the servants.”

  “Nay, I know of a far better cure.”

  Gareth pulled her gently but relentlessly into his arms. When she stood shivering against him, still clutching
the chamber robe as if it were a talisman, he claimed her mouth with his own.

  8

  Gareth felt Clare’s undisguised shiver of surprise; a flash of confusion washed through her, causing her to tremble in his arms. He kept his mouth pressed against hers, willing her to respond the way she had the last time he kissed her.

  He knew she wanted him. He had sensed the passion in her that first afternoon. All he had to do was get past the logical defenses she had erected.

  Relief soared in him when he heard her tiny, half-strangled gasp of excitement.

  She would be a true wife to him. The bastard of Wyckmere had got himself a bride.

  And a future.

  Her mouth was hesitant at first and then her lips softened deliciously beneath his own. Gareth knew for certain that he had guessed correctly. He had not misread the feminine curiosity in her eyes, nor had he misjudged the significance of her trembling fingers.

  The good fortune that had kept him alive during his years as a hunter of outlaws had followed him into his new life as a farmer of flowers. He had gained far more from this match than he had dared to hope.

  Clare made a small sound of anticipation. Her fingers clutched at his shoulders. Gareth groaned. He had been enduring the torments of a half-aroused body all day. Now he was fully erect, eager for what awaited him. The time had come to claim his wife.

  Gareth felt Clare shudder and press herself against him. An urge to laugh nearly overwhelmed him. He fought it back. This was not the time to succumb to mirth. Still, he reveled in the moment. It was obvious that all Clare’s foolish talk of waiting until their acquaintanceship had deepened into friendship was simply that: foolish.

  Clare was as eager to taste the pleasure of the marriage bed as he was.

  Gareth was relieved and exultant. Now another battle lay ahead of him. But he was accustomed to fighting for what he wanted. And he most definitely wanted Clare.

  He recognized that Clare’s disgust for Nicholas of Seabern was genuine. He still was not certain what to believe about her past experience of lovemaking. But Clare’s sweetly eager mouth told him that whatever had happened between her and Nicholas, it had not given her a distaste for the business.

  Mayhap it was Raymond de Coleville who had taught her how much mutual pleasure a man and a woman could find together.

  Whichever man had been responsible, Gareth was not particularly grateful to him.

  “My lord.” Clare’s voice was a breathless sigh against Gareth’s lips. She was warm and soft against his chest. Her arms wound slowly around his neck. “No doubt we should not kiss in this manner yet, but I vow, I cannot seem to stop.”

  Her confession sent Gareth’s blood pounding through his veins. The heavy beat was a distant echo of his war-horse’s hoofbeats. His whole body reacted violently to the promise of Clare’s gentle surrender.

  The lady was ready and willing, not an anxious, innocent maid who had to be led slowly into bed.

  “Be assured that I have no intention of halting these kisses yet.” Gareth stroked the edge of her mouth with the pads of his thumbs. Her lips trembled and parted. Her cheeks, flushed and glowing, were warm to the touch. Her eyes were fathomless emeralds that held the secrets of a woman’s passion waiting to be unleashed.

  If it wasn’t Nicholas who had taught Clare the arts of love, Gareth thought, then it had most likely been Raymond de Coleville, her much-vaunted pattern of chivalry. Damn his soul.

  Which one had it been? he wondered.

  Or had she taken two lovers?

  In that moment Gareth could cheerfully have given each of his unknown rivals a view of the Window of Hell.

  Having made the acquaintance of Nicholas, Gareth concluded that it was the mysterious Raymond de Coleville who worried him the most.

  Yet another challenge for the Hellhound of Wyckmere to conquer, he told himself. He had never been one to back down from a challenge.

  He deepened the kiss, knowing that he had no right to resent the fact that Clare had lain in the arms of another man. He was no virgin, either, Gareth thought. And he was a bastard into the bargain: no great prize for any lady of her station.

  Clare was a healthy young woman of three and twenty years who had been on her own and burdened with the responsibilities of managing the manor for much of her life.

  She was also a very curious and obviously intelligent woman who had never planned to wed. Such a woman would not have been averse to tasting the forbidden fruit when the opportunity presented itself in the guise of a handsome young knight.

  Gareth knew he was swiftly driving himself mad. It struck him that he had never before known the knife-sharp pangs of raw jealousy.

  Jealousy?

  The realization brought him back to his senses.

  He tore his mouth from Clare’s and framed her face between his hands. Her eyes were luminous and full of wonder as she looked up at him.

  “What’s done is done,” Gareth muttered.

  “I do not understand, my lord.”

  “It matters not. From this night forward, you are mine. You are my lady wife, the future mother of my children. I vow, I will make you forget Nicholas and Raymond de Coleville and any other man who has come before me.”

  Her brows drew together in a quizzical expression. “But why would I wish to forget Nicholas and Raymond? One is a neighbor and the other was a friend.”

  “Enough. Do not speak of either of them again tonight.” Gareth ensured her silence with another kiss.

  She mumbled something unintelligible which sounded very much like a protest, or at the very least an attempt to start a spirited argument. Gareth did not want to listen. He eased her lips apart and sank his tongue into her mouth.

  Clare made another odd, somewhat strangled sound. Then she tightened her arms around his neck and touched her tongue to his.

  Gareth sucked in a savage breath, swept her up into his arms, and tumbled her onto the bed. The hunger to be inside her nearly consumed him. He lowered himself heavily down onto the white linen sheets and reached for Clare.

  “My lord.”

  “Hush.” He flung one leg over her thighs. Conscious of his great weight and her much smaller size, he braced himself on his arms as he leaned over her. “We will discuss the matter later. Right now I only want to kiss you.”

  “Oh.” The frowning uncertainty vanished from her eyes. She touched his cheek with her fingertip. “Well, I suppose there is no great harm in mere kissing, is there?”

  “None, And even if there were, I doubt the knowing would stop me tonight.”

  He gazed, enthralled, at the sight of her dark hair flowing across the herb-laced pillows. Slowly he fisted one hand in it and looped the silken skein around his fingers. He brought the stuff to his nose and inhaled deeply. “You smell of flowers, just like everything else on the isle.”

  “I expect that you’ll grow accustomed to it, my lord.”

  “Aye.” He bent his head to nibble at the elegant line of her throat. “I expect I will.”

  He eased aside the edge of her chamber robe and listened with deep pleasure to her quickly indrawn breath. He moved his mouth downward to the swell of her breast, which was partially revealed by her white linen night robe.

  “My lord—”

  “My name is Gareth.” She was so amazingly soft. Her skin was finer than the costly silks he had given her as a wedding gift.

  “Gareth.” She sounded breathless. “You said you only wished to kiss me.”

  “Aye. Everywhere.” The pure, perfect curve of her small breast was the most alluring sight Gareth had ever seen in his life. He ached to see the nipple that was still concealed beneath the daintily embroidered neckline of her gown. The outline of the small, ripe bud was plain. He stroked one finger across it, delighting in its shape.

  “Gareth” Clare froze at the caress. She stared up at him, wide-eyed. Her hands gripped his shoulders as if she would push him away. “Sir, I do not think this is a sound notion. You said there
was no harm in kisses and I agreed. But this is too much.”

  “You want kisses, my lady?” He deftly unfastened the laces at the front of the robe. “Kisses you shall have. A hundred of them. A thousand.”

  “Gareth.” She batted ineffectually at his big hands. “I do not think—”

  “Aye, madam. Do not try to think. Not tonight. The devil knows well that I certainly cannot.”

  Her rosy nipples looked even more enticing than he had imagined, and his imagination was very powerful. The crowns that graced Clare’s breasts were puckered and firm and full of promise. Gareth put his mouth to one and sucked it gently between his teeth.

  Clare’s reaction was a small shriek. Her fingers dug into his shoulders. “By Saint Hermion’s elbow, my lord. You call this kissing?”

  “Aye. Although ‘tis more like drinking nectar made of honey and almonds.”

  “Are you—” Clare seemed to have difficulty getting the words out. She clutched at him. “Are you speaking the truth, sir?”

  “The absolute truth.”

  Gareth wondered if Raymond de Coleville had not bothered to sample Clare’s breasts when he’d helped himself to the other delectable dishes she’d offered. It occurred to him then that his rivals had no doubt been obliged to work in haste when they had gone about the business of seducing Clare.

  Nicholas had been bent on forcing a marriage.

  Raymond’s undertaking had been a more perilous affair. He had no doubt been well aware at the time that he had no intention of offering marriage. Mayhap the need for secrecy and haste had made him careless and clumsy.

  Gareth kissed the valley between Clare’s breasts and decided there was a great advantage to being a husband. A man had all the time in the world to seduce his wife in the privacy of the marriage bed.

  Gareth trained his kisses lower, easing apart the night robe as he traveled slowly toward his goal. The scent of Clare’s womanly arousal, far more intoxicating than the rose and lavender of her perfume, drew him now. She was responding to him and the knowledge sent another wave of desire crashing through him.

  “Sir. My lord. Gareth” Clare squeezed her eyes shut and arched up off the bed. “You must not kiss me anymore. I fear my senses are as scattered as bees in the wind.”