White Lion's Lady (28 page)

“I need to touch you, too,” he whispered roughly.

Isabel’s reply was little more than a breathless plea: “Yes.”

She felt a sudden, delicious shiver sweep up the length of her and realized somewhat dazedly that the hem of her habit was being lifted, baring her legs to the cool autumn breeze. Baring her skin to Griffin’s touch. He stroked the length of her leg, his battle-hardened fingers warm against her calf, tender against the sensitive length of her inner thigh. She could scarcely breathe as his hand traveled higher, his palm skidding along the curve of her hip, into the concave hollow and thatch of curls nestled low between the bones of her pelvis.

Although he moved slowly, his fingers wading gently into the moist cleft of her thighs, her body flinched with an instinctual urge to bar the sensual intrusion, her legs jerking suddenly, coming together. Everything that was prudent and sane in her warned that this was wrong, that she
should not crave something so wicked, that she should not invite this shameless brand of intimacy. But all it took was a soft brush of Griffin’s thumb, the vaguest pressure of his hand and her legs fell open to him, granting him entry to that sacred, most private place that burned for him.

If she thought herself lost to his kiss, if she thought herself mad with desire for his touch, it was nothing compared to the mindless bliss he stoked within her in that moment. His palm was hot, firm against her mons, his caress coaxing her to arch into him, her body weeping, yearning for something she needed desperately but could not name. In her rapture, she felt his fingers slip between the petals of her body; she writhed in anguished pleasure when he found the pearl of her womanhood and stroked it to a tight, quivering bead of raw sensation.

“Oh, Griffin,” she gasped, something strange and swelling starting to build deep inside of her with every brazen caress of his hand. She squeezed her eyes shut, raising her hips up off the blanket to meet the oncoming wave of fire, Griffin’s touch growing wilder, more demanding, his fingers blunt and questing between her thighs. Though she craved the wickedness of his touch, she was distracted by a sudden pinch as he pressed deeper, a surprising, sharp jolt of pain that stabbed through her veil of mounting pleasure. She clutched him tighter, but was unable to bite back her pained little whimper. Griffin stopped at once and broke away, his head rearing up, a curse raw in his throat.

“Isabel. God—I’m sorry.”

She shook her head. “It’s all right.”

“No,” he said tersely. “I swear to you, this wasn’t my intention.”

“It’s all right,” she repeated, flustered and embarrassed to have ruined what had been so special, so exquisite between them. “I didn’t mean to … please don’t stop.”

He turned his head out of her kiss when she raised up to him. “We’re not going to do this.”

Isabel reached for him, but he was already moving off of her, rolling onto his back on the blanket and leaving her lying cold and empty beside him. She shifted toward him, hating to think that her inexperience could be so disappointing, so displeasing to him. “Show me what you want,” she whispered, desperate to reclaim the moment, yet knowing in her heart that it was already lost. “Won’t you tell me what to do? Show me what you want, Griffin.”

He shook his head, his arm slung over his forehead. He closed his eyes as if he could not bear to look at her. His sigh was heavy, regretful. “I want … I want you to go, Isabel. Please … leave me now. Just take your things and go back to your chamber before someone finds us here.”

She didn’t know what to say. She didn’t know how to fix what she had done wrong, and so she simply did what he asked her, retrieving her gown and slippers and rushing out of the garden before she broke down and wept in front of him.

The monastery quieted as the brethren went to chapel for their evening mass. Their procession having passed his way some moments before, Griffin now stood in one of the openwork corridors that overlooked the gardens, staring into the encroaching night and contemplating the many mistakes he had made since embarking on his journey with Isabel. The mistakes he was making even now, in letting himself be near her, in not telling her about the message he had sent to Montborne.

Truth to tell, he would call the missive back if he could, but it would have easily reached its destination by now. It was much too late for second thoughts, and the sooner he delivered Isabel to her betrothed, the better. Their encounter in the garden that afternoon had been proof enough of that. Even now, some hours later, he still shook with his want for her. He filled his lungs with the crisp night air and he could smell her, the subtle perfume of her hair, her skin, her sweet essence. He closed his eyes and he could see her, her head thrown back in pleasure, her mouth open, lips flushed and glistening from his kiss.

God help him, but he could still feel her, could still feel the silky dew of her body and the tremors of her waking passion, the innocent surrender that had so unmanned him, turning him into a beast that would have stolen her virtue in the middle of a monastery courtyard. Would still, he knew, because though the hunger he felt for her was
banked, it was burning nonetheless. He swore an oath into the darkness, hoping to shove the unwanted temptation from his head like the puff of misting breath he expelled into the cold moonlit night.

His harsh sigh was answered by a small sound behind him in the arcade. An unsure footstep, a shift in the air. He knew without turning around that it was her. He had come to know her presence the way he knew his own thoughts, and he had to steel himself from turning around to face her.

“You shouldn’t be out here, Isabel.” She did not heed the warning in his tone; she said nothing, but he heard her take a small step toward him. His scowled deepened. “It’s cold tonight, my lady. And it’s late.”

“I … I wanted to see you.”

He squeezed his eyes shut to hear the note of fear in her voice, knowing that he had put it there. Jaw clenched, he stood unmoving, listening as she drew nearer. A breeze swept along the cobbled stones of the passageway, sifting through her skirts as it eddied by. He could almost feel the shudder that passed over her. Could imagine her breasts awash in gooseflesh, her nipples puckered and erect beneath the fabric that covered them …

He exhaled sharply, then bit off a curse as Isabel took another step forward. From the monastery chapel cradled in the heart of the labyrinthine compound came the low hum of the monks in prayer, their chants drifting softly into the night, the woody tang of incense and candle smoke streaming on the wind. Griffin kept his gaze fixed on the shadowy courtyard, his shoulder propped against a supporting wall of ancient, arched stone. He crossed his arms over his chest, hands fisted to keep from reaching out to her. “You should be in your chamber, my lady.”

“No, my lord. Not until you hear what I have to say.”

He waited for her to lash out at him for his behavior in the garden that day; surely she had every right to be offended, appalled. He waited for her to demand repairs to
her honor, half hoping she would tell him that she wished him gone from the monastery at once. Half expecting she would tell him how she despised him, how she wished him gone from her life forever.

He would understand, of course. Griffin heard her draw a shaky breath behind him, and he waited for the words that were going to shatter his heart.

“I was barely twelve years old when I was sent to live at the abbey,” she said quietly. “My father, whom I adored, had been accused of treason—a word I didn’t fully understand, save that the very mention of it seemed to shake our house to its foundation. My father had betrayed his king some years before, you see, allying himself with men who would place the crown on the head of another.”

“Richard,” Griff supplied, well aware of the familial struggles for power that had occurred while Henry Plantagenet ruled England. Ironically, those struggles continued even now, with Lionheart on the throne and his younger brother already scheming to see him ousted.

“It was an old crime,” Isabel said. “The failed rebellion was no longer as relevant with Henry near his death, but when the king heard rumors of his vassal’s part in the betrayal, he demanded an answer. He sent his soldiers to Lamere to question my father and obtain either his confession or denial.” Isabel gave a sad little laugh. “He could have said it wasn’t true. Henry was fond of him; he would have taken my father at his word. My mother pleaded with him to deny the accusations, warning him what it would cost if he did not refute the allegations. Everything would be forfeit: his title, his holdings, quite possibly his life … but he would not listen. It was as if none of that—none of us—mattered. When the sheriff and royal guards arrived to read the charges, my father calmly listened, and when the last of it was said, he simply stood up and let the soldiers take him away.”

Griffin swore under his breath, unable to imagine the weight of that day, the hurt it must have caused the child who had to watch as her family was rent asunder.

“I hated him for it,” Isabel whispered. “I hated that he could be so selfish, that he could care so little for me, or for my mother and Maura. I couldn’t comprehend how he could throw all of us away. And when my mother wept over his traitor’s grave, sick in her heart and soon in her mind, I swore I would make it right if I could.”

And so was born a young woman’s sense of honor and noble duty, Griffin realized with a pang of regret. If he had not understood her conviction to family before, he well did now. His chest ached for the pain she had endured at so young an age, the pain she bore even now. It was all he could do to keep from turning around to catch her in his arms. But it wasn’t his place to console her; he would not assume she wanted his sympathy.

“I didn’t think I would ever be willing to turn my back on my commitments,” she said after a long, thoughtful pause. “I didn’t think anything could ever matter more to me than the promises I made that day.”

Every particle of Griffin’s being stilled as the words tumbled off her tongue. He did not draw breath, could only stand there, staring into the dark, listening to the heavy thud of his heart and Isabel’s soft voice a few short paces at his back.

“I know now what my father must have been going through. How he must have struggled with the decision of doing the honorable thing. I thought him selfish and a coward, but in these past few days, I have begun to recognize the same faults in me.”

“Not you,” Griffin said, knowing himself more by both unfavorable descriptions.

Isabel stood closer to him now; he could feel the heat of her against his spine, their bodies not touching but sharing
the same space, warming the air between them, charging it with a tension that coiled tighter each second they remained apart.

“Although it would condemn him, my father had to do what he felt in his heart was right. He couldn’t have lived with himself pretending to support a king he did not believe in, knowing he was living a lie, and so he gave it up. All of it. All of us. Now here I am, about to enter a marriage I don’t believe in—a relationship that will never be true. If I had a fraction of my father’s honor, his courage, I would do the same as he did—”

“No,” Griff told her, taking a step away from her, hoping to stop her before she said anything more. He could not let her tell him what she would be willing to give up for him. He couldn’t trust himself to deny her. “It would be a mistake, my lady. One I won’t let you make.”

“Nor would I ever ask you to give up your future,” she whispered. “But I feel as if I have this one chance—that I am holding something precious in my hands, something I will never have again. Something that’s going to slip away unless I hold it fast, even if just for a moment. If just for one night.”

“Isabel,” he said, and turned to face her at last. His breath abandoned him on a humbled, ragged sigh. “Ah, God … Isabel.”

She stood in a moonbeam’s slim column, wearing the dress he had given her that afternoon. Without the chainse to line it, the filmy gown was rendered nearly transparent, the pale blue silk skimming her form like a gossamer veil, the skirts wafting around her legs like mist. He knew she would be a vision in the dress, but what he looked upon now was a goddess, an enchanting angel much too lovely for his mortal eyes. And much too sweet for the tears that began to stream down her cheeks.

“My lady,” he said as he closed the space between them.
“What you are suggesting … I am not worth the price you would pay.”

She turned her face into his caress, her voice very small when she finally managed to speak. “I promised myself that I would not beg you, that if you didn’t want me—”

“Never,” he told her fiercely, tipping her chin up and forcing her to meet his gaze. “Never have I wanted anything more in my life …”

Her smile was sad, unsteady. “Then, please … Griffin … my lord … I need you.”

Griffin held her face in his hands, searching those glistening topaz eyes for any sign of trepidation, any hint of doubt. There was no uncertainty, rather a wealth of fierce emotion swimming in the tears that swelled and spilled down her cheeks. He swept them away with his thumbs, pressing a tender kiss to her brow, her nose, her mouth. Her arms came up around him in a tentative, needful embrace.

“Please,” she sighed against his ear.

Overwhelmed, his throat too constricted for speech, Griffin bent to place his arm under her knees and scooped her off her feet. She clung to him, her face buried in the curve of his neck as he navigated the maze of walkways and corridors that led to her chamber at the infirmary. The climbing voices of the monks at mass surrounded them, the chanted Latin prayers echoing in the high arches of the halls, infusing the night with a sense of reverence. An atmosphere of mystery and sacredness.

“This night is yours,” he vowed to Isabel as he opened the door to her small room. He shut it with his boot heel, then carried her to the thin straw pallet, the bedside candle flickering as he placed her atop the humble mattress. He glanced to the pool of tallow with its wobbly flame, then down into Isabel’s glowing eyes. “I wish I could give you more,” he said, kissing her. “This room should be a palace, this bed fat with feathers and plush with furs.”