Page 66 of Bold Angel
“My lady, please—” Geoffrey began, but Caryn’s determined glance cut him off.
“And leave off the weeding in the garden, the shoveling of manure from the stables, and the cleaning of the pigpen.” She smiled. “In fact, you may tell the servants that until the end of the week, they are to rest and refresh themselves.” Caryn smiled with smug satisfaction. With a determined lift of her chin, she turned and walked away.
Her three friends stared after her in silence, knowing full well she was determined to ignore their warnings, though many of their dire predictions would certainly come to pass. She was also fairly certain that the others were facing no danger. Until Ral’s return, the lady of the castle was in charge. Her word was law and her husband would know it.
The price of her folly would be hers alone to bear.
Caryn shivered to think of the powerful dark Norman in one of his towering rages. Then she straightened her spine. The battle they were about to wage might be fearsome, but it was one she intended to win.
***
Eager to be returned to Braxston Keep and, if he were honest, the welcoming arms of his pretty little wife, Ral pushed his men somewhat harder than he should have. The march from Caanan took less than four days and though they were weary, they didn’t complain. The men looked forward to hearth and home nearly as much as he did.
“Is it your lands that draw you,” Odo asked, riding up beside him, “or thoughts of your little Saxon maid?”
“Do not plague me, Odo. That I crave a tumble with the lusty little wench should come as no surprise. I’ve been weeks without the comfort of a woman.”
“There were wenches in the village at Caanan. You could have had any that you wanted.”
“I’ve yet to have my fill of the one who awaits me at home.”
“Mayhap you never will.”
Ral grunted. “Do not be a fool.”
“You are saying the time will come when you will once more seek out Lynette or some other?”
“I will never fall victim to the power of a woman. You more than any should know me better than that.” He thought of Eliana, of how she had betrayed him, and knew Odo’s thoughts ran much the same.
The red-haired knight flashed a slightly bitter smile. “I am glad to hear it. It can only come to no good should you give your heart completely.”
“Especially to a Saxon. That is what you were thinking, was it not?”
Odo did not answer. But then he did not need to.
“You do not like her, do you?”
“She is a Saxon. I lost a father and a brother to a filthy Saxon traitor. ’Tis a lesson that is bound to make a man wary. But as you say, she is a lusty little baggage. I cannot blame you for wanting to bed her.”
Ral clamped hard on his jaw. He and Odo were lifelong friends, yet when he spoke that way of Caryn, it was all Ral could do to keep from dragging him down from his horse and pounding him into the dirt.
It was an odd sensation, one he did not completely understand. Still, he was not concerned. ’Twas true that he desired her, and that her company more than pleased him. But she was only a woman and he had known many. Odds were, he would know many more.
“Do you see it yet, my lord?” That from Aubrey, Ral’s squire.
“Braxston lies just around the bend,” he said. “If you glance to where the sun peeks through those trees, you can see a corner of the outerwall.”
Aubrey craned his neck until he saw the distant gray stone, then settled back in his saddle and smiled. “I will be glad to be home, my lord.”
A corner of Ral’s mouth curved up. “Aye.” He could easily imagine the welcome he would receive: his knights and squires dressed in their finest and waiting in the bailey to greet him, the sumptuous feast served by eager servants, the endless goblets of wine, the laughter and conversation.
Most of all, he could imagine his wife’s small arms around his neck, her soft sweet kisses, her building passions, then the tightness of her body as she surrounded his hardness and took the heavy length of him inside her.
Ral’s loins clenched at the thought and he worked to stifle a groan.
“Why hasn’t the drawbridge been lowered?” Aubrey asked as they drew near the entrance to the castle.
“I do not know. ’Tis certain they received my message.” Ral rode forward, called out to the guard at the top of the wall, and the drawbridge was lowered. He led his men across the moat and into the bailey, but stopped dead in his tracks at the sight that met his eyes.
