She found one that had always perplexed her. “Why must a wife obey her husband without question?”
Torr could not help but laugh. “My mother certainly did not obey my father. She was strong-willed and kind-natured and my father loved her dearly. I think it depends on the husband and wife. My mum and da grew up together, and my da had once told me that he knew when he was only a lad that he loved my mum and they would someday wed. I think your brother Cree loved Dawn long before he ever admitted he did. He was just too stubborn to acknowledge it, though I see now that that runs in the family.”
She stuck her tongue out at him and damn if he didn’t want to kiss her and spar with the tempting little morsel. He ignored the thought and continued their discussion. “Then there are women who let their husbands think that they obey them when all the while they are the ones in charge. And then there are those who suffer badly at the hands of their husbands and can do nothing about it.”
The incident with Owen came rushing back at her, and she shivered at the thought of what life would have been like with him.
“Something disturbs you.”
It wasn’t a question. He was aware that something troubled her, and she wondered how he had sensed it.
He reached out as he did last night and rested his hand on hers. “Tell me.”
She glanced at the fish. “Isn’t the fish ready?”
“It can wait.”
“As can mine, until after we eat,” Wintra said.
“You will tell me then?”
Why not tell him? As he had reminded her, Cree would want to know, and she didn’t know if she could tell her brother what Owen had demanded of her. But she was beginning to believe that it would be easier to tell Torr.
“I will tell you,” she said.
“And I will take you at your word,” he said and turned to see to the fish.
At your word. Given one’s word meant one’s honor, so she would have no choice but to talk with him after they ate. Perhaps it would do her good to unload the burden she had felt since the incident with Owen. Unfortunately, she felt more burdened than ever since she had badly misjudged Owen. He had played her for a fool and that disturbed her even more.
The meal went faster than Wintra expected, though perhaps not. Perhaps she was simply anxious about talking with Torr. The more she talked with him and the more she watched him move around the room with such ease, the more comfortable she grew with him. The more she believed him a good man and the more she trusted him.
While Torr saw to cleaning his hands in the bucket, Wintra kept refreshed by the hearth, she hurried to get her bone needles from the hem of her cloak. Then she sat in the chair by the fireplace and carefully pulled a thread of wool from the hem of her dress to use to begin her stitching.
Torr thought of asking her what else she had hidden in her cloak, but thought better of it. It would take the conversation away from where he wanted it to go. Another time he would ask what secrets her cloak concealed. For now he moved his chair closer to hers, and waited.
Wintra stopped stitching when the silence grew too heavy for her to bear. She had given her word and he was waiting patiently—damn him—for her to honor it.
She finished a stitch and slipped the needle in the wool to keep it there until later when she could return and do more. She left the dress resting on her lap and looked up at him. Where did she begin? How did she explain? Color stained her cheeks as soon as she recalled Owen’s words.
“I will repeat it as many times as necessary,” Torr said. “You can tell me anything.”
Could she? There was only one way to find out. “Owen thought you had had your way with me and that I was now spoiled goods. He told me that when he returned I was to be naked on my knees and I was to—” She paused a moment at the image that played in her mind and spoke as fast as she could. “I was to take him in my mouth and pleasure him, and I was to do it at least twice a day from that day on.”
How Torr managed to maintain his anger, he didn’t know. If Owen was in front of him at that moment, he would have snapped his neck without an ounce of remorse. Someway, somehow, he intended to see the lecherous man pay for his actions.
“How could he expect me to do such a disgusting thing?”