Page 62 of Retribution

He could feel himself already growing attached.

Gerard had tried to warn him. The man had opened up about a similar incident where he had nearly destroyed his career because of a woman and Aidric had been dismissive of his experience, convinced that it would not be his own. It was strange because in the beginning, he had asked Gerard for his honesty in helping him identify his behavior were it to become destructive. He remembered very clearly asking Gerard for that help, but when Gerard actually tried to help him, Aidric had been defensive.

He had to admit that he felt guilty about that.

“Are you awake?”

The question was muffled in his chest because Cleodora’s face was pressed into his flesh. He grinned, looking down at her.

“I have been awake the entire time,” he said. “But you, madam, have not.”

She lifted her head, her hair delightfully mussed as she smiled sleepily at him. “Nay, I have not,” she said. “My apologies. I suppose I was more exhausted than I realized.”

He had a big arm tucked behind his head while the other arm held her against him. His hand began to caress her nude shoulder gently.

“I think it has been a trying few days for us both,” Aidric said. “But I must be honest when I say that this situation—as we lie here in bed—was never my intention.”

Her smile faded. “What do you mean?”

He gestured to the bed. “I am still not entirely sure how we ended up here,” he said. “It was never my intention to take advantage of you.”

Her smile was gone. “You did not,” she said. “What happened… I wanted it to happen. If you did not, then my apologies. I hope you do not feel that I forced you.”

“Nay,” he insisted softly, reaching up to sweep some hair out of her face. “Of course you did not force me. But this may be a… problem.”

“Why?”

“Because I am not a man to bed women on a whim,” he said. “I tend to get attached. I spend so much of my time guarding my emotions that in a situation like this, it is difficult for me to control them.”

She regarded him for a moment. “Then this has happened to you before?” she said. “Getting attached, I mean.”

He debated whether or not to tell her, but saw no real harm in it. He was human. He’d made human mistakes in the past. “Aye,” he said. “Long ago to a young lady who was the daughter of my father’s ally.”

“Was it serious?”

He shrugged. “For me, it was,” he said. “I was young. And foolish. And hadn’t yet learned to guard my emotions.”

“She did not return your feelings?”

A smile rippled across his lips, perhaps an embarrassed one. “She was a very ambitious young woman,” he said. “She thought she could make me ambitious, too. She was a great manipulator and others could see it, but I could not. When I did not achieve what she wanted me to achieve, she found a man who had more wealth and a greater station than I. My father was furious about it.”

“At her?”

“At me.”

“But why?”

“Because I could not hold on to her,” he said. “My father very much wanted an alliance by marriage with that particular family and when it did not happen, he was disappointed.”

She thought on that for a moment. “Are you his only son, then?”

He shook his head. “I have two younger brothers,” he said. “And a sister, all of them married and with families.”

“Yet you have not.”

He looked at her, grinning. “Not yet,” he said. “I have been busy serving the king, something which has finally made my father proud. He likes to tell everyone that I have a royal appointment and personally serve the king.”

“But you do.”