The knock on the door was loud, peremptory. His call of “Lady Rose!” was a demand for entry.
With trembling hands, Rose lifted the bar, and then he was pushing open the door and striding in. As if he already owned Somerford Manor, she thought angrily, and the anger helped to steady her. Rose turned to face him.
Jesu, he was big!
He made the solar seem tiny. Her composure wavered but she held on to it with both hands.
Forget what has happened between us thus far. Forget how he made me feel when he held me in his arms. That is over and done.
This was the real Gunnar Olafson before her now, his face impassive, his eyes empty of any feeling. This was the man who had kissed her in the stable and a moment later looked at her as if she were no more than a tasty hunk of meat on a hook, who spoke of taking Somerford, and her, for his own, as if it mattered not that they were not his to take.
I have already plowed the lady…
When he said it, the image had been so sharp, Rose had not known whether to weep for what might have been, or to scream her outrage. He wanted her to swell with his seed. It had been there in his eyes, in the way they shone so hot. He wanted to take Somerford from her, but he wanted her as well. Like the ghostly warrior of her dreams, he would snatch her up and carry her away as his prisoner.
Only this time she would not be able to wake up.
“Captain,” Rose said, and was glad to hear her own voice so unwaveringly authoritative—the voice she had learned to assume in moments of trouble. This was not a time for begging or pleading, as her mother would have done. It had not worked on Rose’s father and it would not move a man like Gunnar Olafson. How could it? This creature would not be shamed into penitence by a few tears.
“Aye, lady? I am waiting to hear what you have to say.”
He was impatient to be gone, pacing across to the window and back. His hand was closing and unclosing on his sword hilt, as if he might draw it out at any moment. His glance flicked to her and away again. Such restlessness was unusual for Gunnar—even in the short time Rose had known him, he had seemed amazingly unruffled. The still center of a storm. And yet here he was, behaving more like Ivo. Aye, clearly he was a man with much on his mind. Mayhap that, too, would work in Rose’s favor.
“I have heard that you have moved Harold the miller.”
He stopped. “So?”
“I do not want him hurt. Him or his children. I know Lord Fitzmorton wants justice for his man Gilbert, but killing Harold in cold blood is not justice.”
He was watching her. “Do you think I will hurt him?”
She searched his handsome face, but where was the point in trying to find feelings where there were none? It was easy to pretend to herself that there was a hint of hurt in his blue eyes or a touch of self-mockery in the curl of his firm lips. But Rose had discovered she was adept at attributing emotions to Gunnar that were not real. He was a cold-blooded monster that she had endowed with all the virtues she so longed to see in a man, and she had been silly enough to think him real.
“Please do not hurt Harold and his children,” she said quietly.
He frowned and opened his mouth to reply. Thinking he meant to tell her bad news, Rose went on hastily, frankly.
“I am willing to bargain for their lives.”
“Bargain?” He eyed her warily—they were on opposing sides, after all. “What do you have that I could want, lady?”
But he knew. She read it in the sudden blaze of his eyes, saw it in the abrupt tightening of his mouth. Mayhap he wouldn’t make her say it aloud.
He wanted her, he had wanted her since the first moment their eyes met in the bailey. Just as she had then, Rose sensed desire’s heady presence in the room, and—God help her!—felt her body begin to soften and ache. Rose turned away, so that he could not see her humiliation.
He was going to make her say it after all.
“There is me, Captain,” Rose informed him in a cold little voice.
He said nothing for a long time, but she could not turn and face him. She did not dare. Not because she was afraid of him, but because something had happened to her. For although she knew full well what he was and what he had done, her body didn’t care. His mere presence was enough, just being close to him. Was this what her mother had fought against? Rose asked herself. The bitter realization that, no matter what promises she made to herself, they would inevitably be broken?
His step was soft behind her. He was so close now that she could feel the heat of his body. His arms came around her, forcing her back against him, so that she had the urge to gasp for breath. Then she felt him, already fully aroused, hard against her. She realized then that this was a test. He had done this on purpose. He wanted to know whether she was really willing.
Gunnar’s hands slid up her body, cupping her breasts impertinently through her gown, pressing her soft flesh into his callused palms. Rose stood rigid, refusing to weaken against his touch. Her mind was stronger than her body, she told herself. She could overcome the weakness. She could!
He found her nipples, hard as buds. His fingers were delicate as he caressed them, sending arrows of sheer pleasure into her treacherous body. Rose heard herself gasp, and wanted to scream in despair as her resolve began to crumble.
He did not laugh, as she had thought he might. Instead he bent his head, his mouth hot against her neck, sending more shivers of want through her. Rose’s head fell back against his shoulder, and she closed her eyes. One of his hands slid down over her belly, seeking the hot core of her, his fingers sliding into the apex of her thighs. Even through the stuff of her clothing, she sensed the pleasure to be gained, longed to give herself over to it. Want pooled between her legs, and she trembled with the effort of not pressing against him. In another moment Rose knew she would be totally lost.