Seize The Dawn (37 page)

"That's a pity. You can rest when we are done."

"I believe that...
people
are waiting for you downstairs."

"I am waiting for you, right here."

He came closer to her, reaching across the chair to catch her hand. She would have evaded him; she was not fast enough. His hold was insistent; his eyes like knives, cutting into her. "Come, dear countess, sit!"

"I don't care to sit—"

But she was turned to the front of the chair, and pressed down into it. He didn't leave, or sit himself, but hovered over her.

She was almost glad to be sitting; she couldn't stop the trembling that had seized her, a rage of emotions. Her body had gone weak. She lowered her head. Alain was barely gone. Aye, he had been a friend, not a lover. Not what Brendan had been ...

Her stomach knotted, and she hated herself for the jealousy she felt, just seeing someone else touch him. She had no rights. Neither did he. She had married another man.

He had come for her.

She didn't want him to see how eager she was just to touch him, nor did her longing sit well in her conscience, for no, she never would have harmed Alain, never, not for any power of love or desire. Yet so many of the things being said were true.

"Damn you, Eleanor, talk to me!" he suddenly roared.

"I'm telling you, Isobel is incapable of the truth—"

"But are
you
capable of speaking the truth!" he demanded. His hands were on the arms of the chair, his face so close to hers.

"Aye, then!" she cried, angry in return. "You want the truth? There
is
a child."

"Because I knew your husband. And I know you. And I know that you didn't kill him. And I will also believe what you tell me. And I listened to Isobel."

Was he so angry that she would be having his child? Or had Alain been right, that to a man like Brendan, the child was his at all costs?

"What would you have had me do?" she flared, rising. "I had to marry Alain; I had to! Even King Philip warned me that it would be your death knell if I did not! And to what end? I returned to England—you, to wage your war, against my people!"

"Your people!" he repeated disgustedly. "The ones who now want your throat!"

"The English populace is not all evil, all cunning, all devious!" she informed him passionately. "You saw the men and women of Clarin, coming to my defense—"

"No! Clarin is my home! Where people work hard, live good lives, and believe in God, and their moments and season of happiness. But if you would say that Clarin is just land— then it is the same here. Scotland is land—nothing but land!" she returned. "And from France, you returned here, and you fought again, and you'll fight again, and again .. . and every time you win a few steps, Edward will come and hammer you back down. You'll run your glorious raids; you'll roust with your fellows, gamble, drink and take your amusements. Then you'll live your desperate life again—and you'll lose in the end, and you'll die."

Eleanor inhaled a deep breath. "Oh! Why can't you comprehend any of this! I was married to Alain. You lived somewhere in the woods in Scotland. What would you have had me do?"

The child would have his name. He thought that if he commanded it, it would be so, and the rest of a harsh world would not matter.

"This is far more grave than any disagreements between the two of us! Don't you see? The child will have no name worth having, if his mother remains branded as a murderess. I must find a way to clear my name. I must have a fair trial."

She lifted her hands in a futile gesture. "If I remain here ... with you, I give credence to all that they are saying! I turned to the enemy, I betrayed my husband for another. I married one man for his money—while planning to run away with one of the direst foes of my country. What will happen when this child is born? Rumor will haunt the babe's life—"

"I know that you will not go back to England while carrying this child." His voice had an ice-hard edge to it that frightened her.

"There has to be a way to clear my name!"

"And what would that be, Eleanor? We send messengers asking for an audience with King Edward, he agrees, and you explain, and it will simply be all right?"

"You're being absurd!"

"What is your solution?"

"I don't know! I don't have one. There
is
one, though; because I am innocent, and therefore, someone else is guilty. I can't keep running—"

"Why can't you see that there is no choice but to run?" he demanded angrily. "My God, Eleanor! My life is mine to risk, but men rode with me to secure your freedom!"

"I'm grateful! So grateful. Aye, you and your men saved my life! But it doesn't change—"

"It doesn't change the fact that you are a countess, accustomed to wealth and privilege, and the idea that your child should grow up the son of a commoner—"

She leaped to her feet in a raw fury, slamming her fists against his chest. "Stop it! Aye, I grew up with wealth, and it is hard to abandon all that my father loved—that he fought for! But that is not my argument, and you fail to understand that whether we are in Scotland, England, or France, for me to be labeled a murderess will destroy the babe's future!"

He caught her wrists, and pinned them behind her back. She struggled against him in a rage of emotions, yet he seemed made of steel, and her anger only made that steel hotter, more molten. And all she could remember then was his touch, and how good it felt to lean against him, feel the encompassing warmth of his fire, burrow against the strength of his being.

"Let me go, you understand nothing!" she protested, but his hold tightened. Her hair became tangled in his fingers, and her chin was forced up and she met his eyes, and saw the sudden heat of desire within them. She tried to remember that Alain, dear, beloved good friend, had died so recently, tried to remember right and wrong, and all she felt again was the desperate longing to be with him, loved by him. But pride lived within her almost as strong as the desire, and she told him again, "I believe you have
friends
who await you downstairs!"

She wanted to assure him that she was not, swear that she was not, rail against him with greater anger. But when she opened her mouth, his was upon it, forceful, passionate, hungry. She tried once to twist away ... yet the consuming thirst of his touch held her still to that desire, the force made her yield, and the strength in her body and arms seemed to slip from her, and fall away, as leaves shed from a tree in winter. When his mouth parted from hers, she was weak, shaking. She tried once again to find words, or truth, or substance of protest as he lifted her, held hard against his chest, her head against the power of that vastness.

"I tell you again—"

"Tell me no more!" he commanded, and walked with her to the bed, and came down upon it with her, as if he'd give her no chance to escape, to think, to find more just reason that this should not be so.

Indeed, no chance.

His hands, his lips, were upon her. She heard a shedding of clothing, and knew it must be her own, for he was adept at discarding the plaid and kilt. She felt the fierce sear of his naked flesh against her own, the fever with which his caress was given. She laid her fingers against him, yet thrilled to the vital muscle and movement they touched, and she matched his kiss next with a passion and fury of her own, molding against him, desperate then for more. Her fingers trembled as she touched his cheeks, tested the richness of his hair, stroked the lean hard length of his back. His body moved against her, the rough texture of his palms moved over her breasts, his mouth moved against her, and she nearly shrieked aloud as the stream of fire and flame that seemed to burst out through her length, rays of a warm sun sent down a cold and barren field, waking it to life. How often, alone at night, she had dreamed . . . and now the flesh, the pulse of blood, the reality again. Her lips fell against his shoulder, and trembling still, she touched him with abandon, his back, buttocks, the rage of muscles within his length. She felt a gentle touch upon her abdomen, a stroke, featherlight, fingertips upon her thighs, calloused, arousing, felt them move, within her, without, and the stream of fire took flight throughout her again, until she cried out, and he was with her. He moved like a tempest, and she clung to each violent sweep and pulse, as if she consumed all of him, and would be consumed as well, and therein, find the source of wind and fire. Time had passed, but she knew him, and the knot of muscle and sinew, and the force of his hunger. Always, always, he would sweep her along, he would read her as if he read her soul,
knew,
and the storm had swept to the highest tor. He would hold her first, feel the tremors that would seize her, and explode then with a sea of searing crystals, liquid fire to fill her, radiate within her, drench her in an aftermath of slow cooling warmth in which to drift back to the world again, and the reality around her. She heard the crackle of the fire at the hearth as a log snapped; felt him adjust to her side, careful of his weight. She was aware of his breathing then, and the still rapid pulse of his heart. He lay by her side, yet his hand rested upon her midriff, and she couldn't help but wonder then if he lay so casually with that restraining touch upon her, or if there was a statement in his touch.

She didn't speak, but lay very still, listening to the fire, trying not to shiver as her body cooled. Seconds later, she realized that his hand moved, that he tested the contour of her abdomen, far more apparent in her bare state than beneath the concealing flow of clothing. She knew his thoughts, and wished she dared draw away, for he remained bitter, she knew, that she would have borne his child in England as another man's own.

She reached for the tangle of sheets in the darkness, but he stayed her hand. "No," he said, rising to an elbow, his eyes upon her. "I have dreamed too often of such a time when I lay too many nights awake, in too great a blackness."

She bit lightly into her lower lip, eyelashes falling. She shivered, unable not to do so, and it was he who then drew the covers around her.

"You dreamed of me ..." she whispered. "All night, every night? There were not other such occasions, when there were not flocks of lovely young nationalists, eager to know a hero's touch?"