The Blacksmith's Wife (9 page)

‘It will be nothing like last night, I promise you,’ he breathed.

Joanna nodded. Hal began to kiss her again. She put her arm about his waist and he sighed deeply, his tongue running across her lips. She barely realised she was kissing him back until his lips left hers and began travelling slowly to her neck, planting feather-light kisses on her skin. She sighed in pleasure at these sensations, gentler yet more stimulating than any touch of Roger’s had been.

Hal’s hands dipped below the sheets as he removed his braies. The same hands began to inch Joanna’s shift higher. Cold air hit her feet, her calves and finally her thighs as his fingers teased their way upwards until they reached the place her legs met. His fingers brushed against her, spreading wide and stroking the soft mound of hair. A moan of alarm erupted from her as a violent throb shot through her lower half.

The sound seemed to excite Hal because he growled and eased himself astride her, covering her body with his. His legs eased hers apart as his weight pinned her down. A strange calmness descended upon Joanna and she closed her eyes. It would be over soon, she told herself. Hal stroked his hand between her legs once more, firmer this time and sending ripples of heat coursing through Joanna’s body.

Hal shifted his weight, there was a slight pressure, a little pain, and he was inside her. He took hold of Joanna’s hands and guided them about his waist. He was gentle at first with a slow rhythm and Joanna was aware of every stroke as he moved within her. She felt him grow harder, his thrusts becoming faster and deeper. His hands roamed across her hair and face, his breath hot and rapid on her neck. A sensation of pressure began to build in Joanna and breathing took more effort. She was starting to fear it would never come to an end when Hal’s arms slid behind her back and he clutched her tight, lifting her towards him. He gave one long groan and a final deep thrust then sagged down, burying his face in Joanna’s hair.

When Joanna opened her eyes he was smiling at her with a warmth she had never seen before. Her cheeks flamed as he kissed her gently. He rolled on to his back, wriggled one arm underneath Joanna and held her close in the crook of his arm, shutting his eyes. Joanna wrapped her arms around her body and stared at him curiously. He was clearly content with what they had done. For her part it had been neither as painful nor as unpleasant as she had feared it would be. It had not even been as uncomfortable as the embraces Sir Roger had cajoled her into. Mary Vernon had been right; it could be tolerated.

Her stomach tightened with guilt as Sir Roger’s face flashed into her mind. Her longing for him tore a hole in her heart whenever she thought of him, but she had promised to be a faithful wife to Hal and today she had put the seal on that promise. If she had ever entertained the thought she could be freed from her marriage that was behind her now. For Sir Roger to come to mind when she had just committed such an intimate act felt tantamount to a betrayal. She squeezed her eyes tight in an attempt to banish him and gave a heavy sigh of regret.

‘What are you thinking about?’ Hal asked sleepily.

‘Nothing,’ Joanna replied, much too quickly. She could hear the guilt clearly in her voice.

The muscles in Hal’s arm tightened. Joanna glanced away.

‘Liar!’ Hal withdrew his arm and sat up, his eyes hard with jealousy. ‘You don’t need to tell me. I can guess well enough,’ he said bitterly.

He climbed from the bed and pulled his braies and tunic on.

Joanna pushed herself on to her elbows. ‘It wasn’t what you think!’

Hal folded his arms and scowled, his mouth twisting downwards. ‘Was it all night you thought of him, or only this morning?’

‘Just now!’ Joanna answered without thinking. ‘No! I don’t mean... Not while we... Only afterwards...’

All her words were coming out wrong. She hit her pillow in frustration.

‘We need to leave soon. We’ve stayed too long already,’ Hal said curtly. He picked Joanna’s dress from the floor and tossed it on to the bed. He busied himself repacking their belongings while Joanna dressed silently.

As Hal opened the door he stopped, dipped into his money pouch and folded Joanna’s hand around something cold and hard.

‘Your brooch, Mistress Danby,’ he said.

Joanna pinned the brooch on her dress, wishing she could turn the time back, or had the words to explain to Hal. Maybe then his eyes would not be so full of hurt that made her heart ache in response.

Chapter Nine

J
oanna said nothing as they left the inn. She sat silently as Hal led the horse and cart towards the town gate, but the sight of the gallows and their occupant drew a sharp breath from her. Hal turned to offer her a word of comfort, but the memory of her deceit rankled and he bit his tongue, turning a grim eye on the limp body that twisted slowly from the end of a rope.

Last night he’d vowed to be there to see the man’s end but this morning finding Joanna warm and peaceful in his arms had proved too much of a temptation. It should have struck him as suspicious that Joanna was so amenable when the night before her reluctance had been a wall between them, but it had been far too long since Hal had woken with a woman in his bed. The touch of her fingers on his flesh as she believed him still asleep had inflamed him beyond resisting and he’d broken his intention without even thinking about it.

Now he reflected that he’d have been better off ignoring the urges that whispered so enticingly and gone down to the square with the rest of the townspeople. He’d never enjoyed witnessing suffering, however, and the sense of satisfaction at seeing the man meet his deserved end would have been hollow before long. As hollow as the pleasure he had taken from his time in Joanna’s arms, he thought bitterly.

They passed through the gate and Hal climbed beside her on the seat. She stiffened as their shoulders touched, drawing her arms closer to her sides.

‘Sit behind if my touch is so alarming to you,’ he muttered, not bothering to keep the resentment from his voice.

Joanna turned her blue eyes on him reproachfully, but she settled her arms by her side again until they were touching Hal’s. Scowling, he urged the horse faster as they reached the open road and they made their way along the familiar route towards Pickering.

Crops gave way to sheep, green pasture to yellow moss and the scraggy, twisted bushes where purple heather would bloom. Hal’s mood began to lift as the track began to climb into the hills. However far he had travelled he never returned home without joy at the sight of the moors as they rolled away into the distance. His hair whipped about his face and he brushed it out of his eyes.

Joanna spoke, dragging him from his reverie. Her voice was quiet, the sound carried away by the wind and drowned out by the rattle of the wheels. Hal had to strain to catch her words. He raised an eyebrow questioningly.

‘I never thanked you properly for what you did last night,’ Joanna repeated, a faint blush tainting her cheeks.

‘No thanks needed,’ Hal replied stiffly. ‘Anyone would have done what I did.’

He regarded Joanna surreptitiously from the corner of his eye. She had wrapped her cloak tightly around her body and sat hugging herself. Her hair was braided back from her face, trapped under the linen filet that all married women wore. It gave her pale face an air of solemnity, further accentuated by her lips tightly pressed into a thin line. If she had been a more welcoming companion he’d have tugged the band free to allow the wind to tease the pale locks loose.

He could scarcely credit the fact that not half an hour ago he had been kissing her, his fingers tangling in the mass of hair, his hands upon the body that was now shrouded in the thick wool cloak.

‘But if you hadn’t arrived...’ Joanna continued.

She placed a hand hesitantly on Hal’s wrist and looked into his eyes. Her fingers were cold on his skin. Hal’s pulse quickened as his body recalled her earlier touch, reminding him treacherously that it still wanted her.

Their coupling had been silent and brief. He had expected nothing more of his first time with Joanna. His release when it came had been muted and the act had lacked the true pleasure that an hour or two spent with a more enthusiastic, good-humoured bedfellow gave him. He had not expected the laughing, fumbling urgent joining of two people who had craved each other’s bodies for so long, but afterwards she had given that traitorous sigh and Hal had realised that all the time she had been picturing Roger in his place. It was a revelation more sobering than a bucket of seawater across his body, and one that sickened him to his stomach when he thought of it.

‘You thanked me well enough this morning,’ Hal snapped.

Her eyebrows shot up in shock. ‘Do you think that is why I lay with you?’ she gasped.

‘Wasn’t it?’ Hal asked. He tightened the grip on the reins as the cart began to climb the hill. ‘You could have thanked me any number of ways, Joanna. You didn’t have to repay the debt with your body!’

‘Is that what you think?’ Joanna’s voice trembled.

‘You’ve shied away from my touch ever since our wedding so you’ll have to forgive my suspicion at your timing,’ Hal said grimly. ‘Would you have invited me into your bed last night if that hadn’t happened?’

‘No. But that wasn’t why I did it,’ Joanna protested. She lowered her voice. ‘I knew I would have to eventually. After what you did for me last night I was feeling fond of you.’

Hal snorted.

‘Fond!’ he remarked archly. The resentment that had been gnawing at his heart bubbled to the surface. He’d sensed again the undercurrent of passion in her he had touched when he first kissed her and it pained him to know it had been thoughts of Roger that ignited it.

‘And of course you were able to bear my touch by conjuring the man you wanted to be with,’ he sneered.

The slap came out of nowhere. There was surprising strength behind it and Hal’s cheek stung. Joanna’s hand was still raised and she was shaking visibly. Her face was contorted with anger as she spat out a word Hal was surprised she even knew. She leapt to her feet, causing the cart to rock alarmingly. For one moment Hal though she was about to hurl herself from it. Her cloak billowed in the wind, rising up behind her. He grabbed hold of her wrist firmly with one hand while with the other he pulled sharply on the reins until the horse stopped.

‘Are you trying to kill yourself?’ he raged. ‘If you had fallen you could have broken your neck or been crushed by the wheels!’

Joanna struggled under his grasp. Hal loosened his grip and she wrenched herself free and jumped down from the cart. She stumbled as she landed on the rough stones but caught her balance and stalked away.

By now they were far from any settlement. Distant bleating of sheep and the lonely cries of crows were the only sounds of life. Hal watched Joanna’s retreating figure. She found a clump of moss and sat down with her back to Hal, curling herself into a tight knot and wrapping her arms around her knees. When he was sure she did not intend to go any further Hal put his elbows on his knees and rested his head in his hands with a sigh, waiting for her to return once her anger had burned away.

When he looked round again she was gone. He leapt to his feet and searched in every direction. She was heading across the moors. Hal leapt from the cart and raced after her.

‘What do you think you’re doing?’ he yelled. She turned back to him.

‘I’m walking,’ she said angrily.

‘Were you planning to run away back to York?’ Hal asked.

‘I’m not running away. I like to walk when I’m angry.’

Joanna’s face was tearstained but her expression was defiant. Hal recognised the same set of her jaw as when she had faced her attacker last night: a mixture of apprehension and determination not to let her opponent see it. That she could ever view him in the same light made Hal’s heart split in two. He lowered his voice, trying to speak calmly.

‘You don’t know where you are, or what the land is like here.’

She shrugged. He crossed the ground towards her, the peat spongy beneath his tread.

‘Look,’ he said, gesturing around him. ‘The twisted boughs are heather, but the brown and yellow are moss. Tread on the wrong patch and you’ll find yourself sinking into a bog up to your knees. If you’re fortunate.’ He eyed her darkly. ‘Further than that if you aren’t.’

He took a few steps to the side, where the moss was thick and yellow and put his hand down, pressing until brown water oozed between his fingers. Joanna’s gaze followed his hand, her eyes wide.

‘I didn’t know,’ she said.

Hal held his hand out in a gesture of peace, thought twice and wiped it on his tunic, then held it out again. Joanna regarded it suspiciously but took it.

‘You wouldn’t know. How could you?’ he said. ‘But you’ll learn once you’ve lived here for a time.’

It was the wrong thing to say because Joanna gave another muffled sigh. Hal had been mistaken to think the anger she had felt had subsided. Once more he found himself wishing he had never agreed to marry her. No guild membership was worth living with this for.

‘You don’t want me—’ he sighed ‘—I understand that but here we are. If it comes to it I hoped for a wife who cared for me. Not one who bears my touch under sufferance and longs for another man every time she’s in my arms.’

Joanna pulled her hand free from Hal’s. She rounded on him and put her hands on her hips.

‘If I was thinking of Sir Roger—and I wasn’t, as I have already tried to explain—then what does that matter to you?’ she shouted. ‘You don’t love me! You say you wanted a wife who cares for you, but it wasn’t
me
you wanted to marry. It was Simon Vernon’s niece.’

The wind had whipped Joanna’s cloak from round her body. It billowed out behind her to reveal the dress she wore beneath. Her breath came hard and with each inhalation her breasts rose, pushing up against the tight bodice. They were standing close and an overwhelming urge to kiss her washed over Hal.

He wondered how different her lips would feel if he was the man she wanted to be with. She had the capacity for passion, he had seen hints enough of that. When he had bedded her this morning he had sensed the need within her, but she had fought against it.

‘It was never my intention to hurt you,’ he said gently. ‘I believed marrying was of benefit to both of us.’

‘What was the benefit to me?’ Joanna asked, laughing incredulously.

Hal folded his arms. ‘I hope that despite everything I’m more agreeable than the old widowed Welshman I believe was your alternative,’ he said drily.

Maybe he wasn’t. Would her feelings die quicker if she had not married someone so similar to Roger? Hal honestly did not know. He stepped closer, but Joanna’s hands shot up between them.

‘That’s an easy justification to salve your conscience,’ she cried. ‘You took me from my home, from everything and everyone I know because it suited your purposes to make my uncle happy and further your interests.’

She was raging now, her ferocity unexpected and alarming. The words were nothing new to Hal, but before she had shown a quiet resignation: sad at times, but accepting, and he had genuinely believed she would become accustomed to him before long. Now her emotions were spilling out uncontrollably as she gave vent to the feelings she kept inside, and for the first time he grasped the enormity of her pain.

‘When you bedded me were you thinking of me or only the admission to the guild it was buying you?’ she finished.

‘It was you!’ Hal insisted, though in truth he could not remember what had gone through his mind at the time. He had been filled only with the need to quench his desire for his wife. Afterwards he had lain beside her in a contented, fog-headed mood, daydreaming of the joys he would introduce her to next time.

‘Do you intend to spend the rest of your life pining for my brother?’ Hal asked sullenly. He found himself curiously reluctant to speak Roger’s name to her.

Joanna waved her arms in exasperation. ‘Do you expect my heart to change promptly just to suit you? That isn’t the way love works!’

‘And does dwelling on that make you happy or sad?’ Hal shot back.

Joanna wrapped her arms around herself and turned to stare across the moorland. Hal wondered if she was even seeing it. Witnessing her sorrow now felt like an intrusion.

‘I’ll wait by the cart,’ he murmured. ‘Take care to walk back exactly the way you came.’

* * *

Joanna rubbed her burning eyes. Hal’s words had knocked the fight out of her, as quickly as it had risen up, leaving her exhausted. Her palm stung and she swallowed a knot of self-reproach at the memory of hitting Hal. It was deplorable to have done it, but Hal’s insinuation had been unacceptable. The idea that he thought her capable of such infidelity had been too much of a slur to tolerate, especially when she was innocent of the fault he accused her of.

What right did Hal have to command her thoughts? He had known her feelings for Roger when he married her.

She walked back to the cart, making sure to follow the route Hal had taken. Part of her doubted his caution was genuine, but now was not the time to provoke another argument.

Hal kept his attention focused on the horse as she drew near, stroking the velvety nose and muttering in the animal’s ear. Joanna spoke his name. He looked up and gave a thin smile, making no mention of the bitter words that had passed between them. She eyed him suspiciously.

‘Roger may have given me up, but that doesn’t mean he didn’t love me. He felt he had no choice and couldn’t give me what he wanted me to have. That shows he loved me more, not less.’

Hal eyed her for a long time before speaking slowly. ‘That can be the case,’ he agreed. ‘What matters now is what you will do with the knowledge. Are you determined to spend the rest of your life being miserable or will you at least try to be happy with me?’

Tears began to prickle her eyes again and she bit her lip. ‘I only had one chance of happiness and it’s gone forever.’

Hal ran a hand through his hair and sighed in exasperation. ‘That’s your affair, but if that’s the case you’re more foolish than I thought!’

‘I promised to be your wife and I will. I’ll keep your house and aid you in your work. I’ll... I’ll lie with you and bear your children—’

‘Children!’ Hal interjected. ‘I think we’re getting far ahead of ourselves there! Don’t worry, there are ways to prevent that sort of occurrence.’

‘Oh.’ Joanna blushed. Perhaps Hal had no intention of repeating the morning’s incident. Her spirits lifted slightly.

‘But please, carry on’ Hal prompted.

Joanna folded her arms and lifted her head defiantly. ‘I’ll do all you ask of me and in return you don’t expect me to pretend I love you and you don’t condemn me for not doing. You can have my body, but my thoughts and my heart are not yours to lay claim to.’