When Laura had looked questioningly at Lothaire, he had murmured, “For Clarice. And you.”
Minutes later, the door opened and Lothaire entered. His feet were bare and body covered in a tunic that fell just below his knees to reveal muscular calves, but what made her stare was his dark blond hair around his shoulders. She was accustomed to it slipping free of its thong, but never had she seen it entirely loosed, not even when they were younger. And how it shone, as if his squire had persuaded him to remain seated long enough to comb it through many a time. It made her fingers long to feel it.
She was so captivated she did not realize he might be similarly affected by her appearance until he halted before her and she looked up. And saw there the young man who, done with watching the clouds pass, levered onto an elbow and blotted out the sky as he gazed upon her below him. Then kissed her.
She was certain he wanted to kiss her now. But it would have to wait until the priest withdrew.
“My lady wife,” Lothaire said low.
“My lord husband.”
Father Atticus cleared his throat. “Methinks it time the bride and groom were abed.”
Wondering what she had revealed of herself, not only to Lothaire but this man of God who believed she had betrayed his lord with another man, Laura dropped her chin.
A hand cupped her elbow, but it was not her husband’s.
“Come, Daughter.” The priest guided her to the side of the bed farthest from the door, the same she had stretched upon last eve until Clarice and Tina slept.
As she lowered to the mattress amid rose petals and settled into the pillows stacked against the headboard, Lothaire did the same on the opposite side.
Father Atticus pulled the top sheet from where it had been folded at the foot of the bed, covering Laura up to her waist, then strode to the other side and covered her husband. “Let us pray.”
Laura bowed her head. To her surprise and gratitude, the priest did not ask the Lord to remove from the bride any taint of promiscuity. And much too soon the blessing of the bed was done.
“My lady.” Father Atticus dipped his head. “My lord.” He turned, extinguished the candles save the two on the bedside tables, and exited.
Alarmed by how dim it was, though not so much she would be unable to see Lothaire clearly once she resolved to look at him, Laura held her gaze to the door. And nearly snatched her hand from beneath her husband’s when he covered it.
“Laura?”
It sounded like a question, but surely not, for what had he to ask? In the eyes of God, Church, and all those present for the ceremony, she was his to do with as he pleased. And she was to be meek and obedient.
Only when he gently pried open her fingers did she become aware of having made a fist of them.
“Three weeks,” he murmured as he slid his fingers between hers and settled their calloused pads against the heel off her palm. “They passed too slowly. But not for you, hmm?”
She looked sidelong at him, wished what must be done this night did not have to be done, that she could curl against his side and fall asleep with the beat of his heart in her ear.
“This is not as once I imagined,” she said. “Not that I expected it to be.”
He sighed. “Though it was not to have been this way, there is naught for it but to go forward.”
She jerked her chin. “Then let us.”
Keeping hold of her hand atop the sheet, he turned onto his side and set his face above hers.
She closed her eyes, but when he did not kiss her, she raised her lids. “What is it, Lothaire?”
“I like looking at you. Ever I have.” He leaned closer, and his wine-warmed breath made her shudder, then he brushed his lower lip up hers. “Kiss me, Laura love.”
She stopped breathing. Ten years. Ten lonely, aching years since he had called her that. Though it could not mean the same as it had then and never would in so great a measure, it gave hope there would be enough crumbs of love in the years to come that she might gain a piece of the whole.
She leaned up, set her lips on his, and holding tight to his one hand, slid her other hand around his neck.
“Laura,” he rasped and pressed his mouth so hungrily to hers that what she had felt when they kissed in the chapel seemed but a shadow of this. Here in their bed, this exciting, dizzying, wondrous kiss was just the beginning. And she would not fear the end of it.
This was Lothaire. Her Lothaire. Forever and ever and—
His hand was sliding up her calf as it raised the hem of her chemise, stroking the back of her knee, splaying her inner thigh.
Too soon! She was not ready for this nor the weight of his chest upon hers. Though not so heavy she could not draw breath, still she could not breathe—would surely suffocate if she did not get him off her.
She pressed back into the pillows, cried, “Pray, cease!”
He stilled. “Laura?”
She opened her eyes, found his—not Simon’s—face above her. She yet felt the prey, but there was little of the predator about him. Indeed, though his breath was fast and shallow and color high, it was not anger upon his brow. It seemed concern.
If only that were enough, for her to lie back and be the dutiful wife as she had vowed to be and needed to be for Clarice, Lothaire, and Laura Soames.
“I am sorry,” she gasped. “’Tis just…”
The concern on his face drifted away, and as he raised himself and removed his hand from her thigh, anger moved in. “Do you think me still the boy who thought himself a man? That I cannot please you as well as your lover—or ought I say lovers?”
The first of his question broke the skin, the second cut to the bone, and the hurt of it found shelter in her own anger. “I have been with one man only, and he did not please me—was not even half the man you were ten years past.”
Though Lothaire no longer touched her, he remained above her, supported by hands pressed to the mattress on either side. Thus, by swaying candlelight she saw the effect of her declaration—the easing of his jaw, the gathering of eyebrows that told she had thrown open doors to questions best saved for another time and place, and the narrowing of eyes that searched hers for answers.
Still, she was unprepared when he said, “Who was it?”
Oh tongue, she silently bemoaned, what have you done?
“Tell me and let us be done with it, Laura.”
She set a hand on his jaw. “I will, but this night of all nights let us not speak of it. I did not mean you to stop. Truly I did not. I but wish you to go slow.”
“I would know his name.”
“On the morrow I will tell it.”
He closed a hand over hers, drew it from his face, and pressed it to the mattress. “I will not make love to my wife whilst there is another man with us.”
“There is no one here but us. I see only you.”
She heard the grind of his teeth, then he growled, “Tell me.”
The return of his anger relighting hers, she said, “Your bride is meek and obedient as called to be. Now do what you must and be done with it.”