The Wagered Wench (7 page)

“Why do you flinch at my scar then?” There was a flash of hurt in his eyes. She caught it just before it disappeared behind his shield again.

She hesitated, felt her pulse slow. “I do not.”

“I tire of arguing with your mouth.” Now he snapped at her, churlish. And—if her ears did not deceive her—defensive. How quickly his temper changed. “Don’t open it again until I ask for it to suck my cock.”

Oh, that did it. She swung a hard slap across his unscarred cheek. His eyes barely registered the impact, but he caught her wrist, closing his thumb and fingers around it like a manacle, squeezing her pulse. “You are a crude, arrogant, uncivil beast,” she spat. “But Bertha tells me I must accept my lot as other women must. So marry me or leave. The choice is yours. Hurry and make it.” The only option she shrewdly left out was for him to stay there and marry another woman, make someone else mistress in her place. That choice she took off the negotiating table.

“That prize is mine now,” he said, pointing to the mark of her blood on his chest. The tiny hairs on her arms prickled; her pores hummed. “
You
are mine now. Pixie.”

“
Elsinora
!”

It was her father, up at last from his bed and calling for her. A few minutes earlier and he would have seen the Norman with his hand betwixt her thighs, his fingers probing to steal the pearl from her virgin oyster. And he would have seen her allowing it, needily thrusting her hips against him like a wanton.

Dominic spun around and released her wrist, just as she pulled hard in the other direction. Elsinora lost her balance and tumbled backward over the wall, into the dung.

* * * *

Now that, he mused, was a close one. A lifetime spent dodging flaming arrowheads and violently swung blades had primed him well, however. Swiftly leaning back on the wall, he reached behind with both hands and held the woman down out of her father’s sight, one hand on her legs the other on her lips. She squirmed, trying to bite the fingers with which he muzzled her.

“There you are, Gudderth,” he shouted, before the other man had a chance to cross the yard. “I was looking for you. I wish to discuss your sour-faced daughter.”

He heard her growl of frustration, felt her thrashing about in the dung, but he pinned her easily. She was too skinny to fight his strength. He must feed her up if she was the only woman he’d have to keep him adequately warm on chilly winter evenings.

“I am not certain she is a desirable wife for me,” he shouted. “She has a vicious temper and the tongue of a bitter scold.”

Gudderth wore a long robe today with a tattered hem and a wide fox fur collar. It was evidently pulled on in haste over his shoulders before he stumbled out to look for his daughter. He appeared slightly dazed, greying hair drifting around his head. He squinted across the yard into that shadowy corner where Dominic perched on the wall. “Ah, yes, you are here. Still. I was not certain if I remembered…”

Would the old man try to deny the wager now? Perhaps this was no time to fool around.

“But I like everything else about this place, Gudderth, therefore I will take the wench, since she is your only daughter and I have no choice.”

Ouch
, she had sharp teeth. He jumped but kept his yelped curse in check.

“Ah…good…” Gudderth was skirting a wide puddle, making slow progress across the yard. “Glad I am that you stay Coeur-du-Loup. What happened? You cut yourself?”

The old man, drawing closer, had seen the blood on his chest.

“Just an accident,” Dominic replied, feeling the woman under his hands go still. Was she remembering how it felt to have his fingers taking her like that? Should the old man come any closer he might see over the wall. “If you seek your daughter, she walks there in the meadow by the orchard.” He jerked his head. “I saw her not half an hour ago.”

The old man looked over in the direction of the orchard. “Did you indeed?” He wound his hands together and laughed sheepishly. “Is she in a good temper today?”

Dominic was amused. The man was evidently wary of his own daughter’s spit and scratch. She’d got away with her behavior for too long, no one daring to put her in her proper place—not even her own father. “Is your daughter ever in a good temper?”

Again the woman behind him squirmed and heaved, but he pressed her down more firmly into the dung, bearing another savage bite of her teeth. How dare she lead him on like that, encourage his exploration of her body and then slap his face? The wench was evidently confused and didn’t know what she wanted.

He’d have to show her.

“Oh, Elsinora can be very sweet when she wishes to be,” the old man exclaimed worriedly.

Hmmm, apparently she didn’t wish to be so with him, thought Dominic. But her body had betrayed her just now and promised more delights than he’d previously anticipated.

“She is just…startled…by this turn of events, I suppose,” her father added. “Although I did warn her that this would come to pass if she did not settle her mind to Stryker Bloodaxe, our neighbor across the moor.” Suddenly the old man’s face changed, as if he’d just fully woken up. He shuddered, crossed his arms and hunched his shoulders. “Stryker will have something to say, no doubt, but he should not have been gone so long. What else was I to do? A man can’t wait forever to get his daughter married.”

Until now, Dominic had not known of any other claimant. This discovery caused a stillness to invade his body, a chill that hardened his resolve and tightened his muscles, ready to fight. But this other man—this Bloodaxe—was probably some old fool, or the pixie would have wed him by now. He’d seen for himself how full of yearning she was. Clearly no other man here had tempted her enough to relinquish her maidenhead. Bloodaxe could be no serious competition.

“I’m certain, Gudderth, that she will come to her senses and realize this is for the best,” he muttered.

The old fellow nodded in an absent-minded manner and trundled off for the orchard, his feet weaving a haphazard course through more puddles than he managed to avoid, his crooked hem trailing in the dirt. Once he was out of sight, Dominic released the woman behind him. Scrambling up on her knees, gasping for breath, she peppered him with curses and then reached behind her. He saw she had a large ball of dung in her hand. It sailed over his head and smacked into the side of the barn.

He shook his head. “Bad aim.”

The second one came closer; the third required he duck hastily. The woman was fast on the re-load, he mused. He wouldn’t want to see her at the operating end of a trebuchet if he was under siege behind fortress walls. But there was something even more beautiful and enticing about her while she stood in the dung heap, cursing the air until it was as blue as her eyes.

Instead of retreating, he surprised her by ducking low and rushing forward. She had nowhere to go and could not climb over the wall in time. He grabbed her around the hips and lifted her easily over his shoulder.

“Don’t fear, pixie,” he muttered, breathless. “I’ll marry you. Stop fretting. No need for this temper tantrum.”

“You swine! Put me down at once.” She slapped at his buttocks now, which was all she could reach as he carried her across the yard to the water trough.

As he lowered her feet first into the trough, she hissed at him, “Stop saying that. I am not your property. I am not some chattel.”

“You will be my wife, Elzinora. Chattel is exactly what a wife is.”

“Argh! Why have I agreed to this? I must be mad.”

So she
had
agreed? Dominic hadn’t realized until that moment. She’d seemed torn between her wants, needs, and what she thought she should say. She’d welcomed his hand between her thighs, climaxed so hard on him that she almost took his fingers off—and then she’d slapped his face. He hoped she would not always be so difficult to understand, but she was a woman, of course. She might never make sense to him.

While his bride-to-be stood in the water, cursing at her misfortunes, Dominic lifted her gown to her knees and splashed her legs with water, washing away the streak of blood. He stroked higher under her gown and along her soft thighs with a lingering caress, scooping up curved palms full of the sun-warmed water to cleanse her body intimately. She stopped complaining. His own arousal had not subsided. It ached, tormented. But he would save that for their wedding night. Now he took care of her, suffering a spur of guilt at what he’d done, even though it was purely accidental.

How could he not marry her now that he’d taken her maidenhead? The decision was out of his hands and hers. Dominic Coeur-du-Loup would have a wife whether he wanted one or not. Whether it was convenient or not. His conscience would allow him no other choice. It was purely a practical decision.

Chapter Six

She watched the newborn lambs stumbling about on their trembling legs. The base rumble of the ewes filled the field of pens, a sound both sad and yet full of pride. She’d spent nineteen springs listening to that sound, waking early to it, while the sky was still dark, dashing out with a lantern to help the shepherd. Alric had no wife or sons to work at his side and he needed every hand he could get. Sometimes Elsinora was out in the field of sheep until late in the morning, by which time she staggered home, hungry and thirsty, bone cold, glad to have been of some use. But today the Norman had also joined the shepherd and he was there even before she arrived. He did not speak a word to her, but chatted occasionally with Alric, the two quiet men soon forming a bond of comradeship.

In Elsinora’s mind the warrior was evidently out to usurp not just her father’s land but every friend she’d ever had. Watching him with the newborn lambs however, the gentle way he held them, wiped them clean and led them to their mother’s teats for their first meal, she could find nothing else to be angry about. Nothing else to disdain. He was tireless and seemed to feel no cold. Only when they finally walked back to the great hall did she see the frost that lined his nostrils and tipped his dark brows. His hands were chapped raw and his boots crackled as he walked. Still he made no complaint, although he accepted the mug of warm cider from Bertha’s hands with a deep, resonating “thank you” that told of his internal and external pains.

The flock birthed a record number of healthy lambs and Gudderth, hearing this, was elated, declaring this would be a good year for Lyndower. “In more ways than one,” he added, glancing at his daughter with a wary smile.

It was a matter of pride now that she should purse her lips and turn her head when anyone spoke of the impending wedding. There was a chance the Norman might change his mind and leave. She kept telling herself that and, as a consequence, was astonished each day to see him still walking about the place. He slept in the hayloft with the grooms, refusing a pallet in the hall, despite continued pressing from her father. He was more at home with the horses it seemed. She could not understand why he stayed, when he’d admitted he had no need for a wife—had never wanted or sought one—and thought her a shrew. He had not sent for any belongings to be brought to Lyndower, had sent no messages anywhere. It was almost as if he did not exist until he walked into that tavern and accepted her father’s wager.

“Do you have no family?” she asked him as they sat warming their feet by the fire and he sank his lips into Bertha’s cup of hot cider.

He shook his head.

She squinted. “You must have someone somewhere.”

“No.” She thought he looked guilty when he said it. For all she knew he could have a wife and children somewhere. How could she possibly believe his talk about mating for life? No man she’d ever heard of would do that. He could have said that to lull her into a false sense of security. Well, it wouldn’t work. She did not trust a curl on his head or a prick of stubble on his chin. He was a foreigner, a stranger, and a man who had a habit of overwhelming her more sensible thoughts until she became a weak-boned hussy. The other women of the manor were falling over themselves for his notice. She would not be one of them.

In which case, she’d better stop asking questions and showing her curiosity.

“How were you scarred?”
Oops!
There she went again. She bit her lip and stared at the flickering flames in the fire pit. What was wrong with her that she could not hold her tongue? First her body betrayed her with him and now her mouth.

Elsinora took herself off to the cookhouse, a good place to eavesdrop on gossip. This, she’d already decided, was the best way to find things out about the Norman without having to let anyone know she was interested. In fact, as soon as she’d heard enough, she could chide them all for spreading rumors and come out of it looking like the smartest woman there.

On this day however no one was talking of the Norman. For once. The gossip was of the blacksmith’s unwed daughter giving birth to her bastard child. The only other news was of the ongoing family feud between the two Godwin brothers who argued over the curiously moving fence that divided the property their father had left between them.