Christmas At The Castle. Amanda McCabe

said.

      The tip of her tongue touched her lips—a tiny, nervous gesture that sent a bolt of pure fire straight to his groin. She shook her tangled fall of hair back from her shoulders and lifted her chin in a gesture he had become too familiar with by now. Her armour was closing around her again. He had to decipher how to tear it away.

      “So it is true,” she said softly.

      “You can pretend it was all a dream if you like,” he answered, keeping his voice cool and calm even as his heart ached. He did not want her to think it was a dream! He wanted her to remember every second, every touch and kiss, as vividly as he did. To want him as he had always wanted her.

      “I’m not as good at pretending as I once was,” she said, just as calmly.

      “Just as you like. You don’t have to cower there under the bedclothes. I’m not a starving wolf, set to devour you as soon as you move.”

      “Nay, the wolf is sated for now. And I do not cower,” she snapped. Then softer, as if she spoke to herself, “Not any more.”

      Her words made him look at her damaged shoulder and think of the fear that had flashed in her eyes when he’d pinned her to the bed. The fear that had only eased when he’d rolled her on top of him. He longed to go to her, to snatch her up in his arms and hold her against him until she knew only him. Only remembered him.

      But he had not been able to protect her from her villain of a husband. He had to protect her now.

      He made himself stay where he was, his fists braced to the table as he watched her reach for her crumpled chemise on the floor and pull it over her head. He had the briefest glimpse of her bare breasts before she was covered again.

      She walked to the table where he stood and reached for the pitcher of ale set there. She didn’t look at him as she poured out a gobletful and sipped at it. He tried not to stare hungrily at the soft movement of her throat as she swallowed, at her slender fingers wrapped around the goblet. Tried not to remember what she had done with them.

      “What are those?” she asked, gesturing with the goblet at the papers.

      “Messages from Marcus,” he said, forcing his attention back to the documents. “It seems there is trouble.”

      Celia gave a little snort of a laugh and took a deep sip of the ale. “Now, why am I not surprised to hear that? Is our presence required?”

      “Soon, I think. When you are strong enough to travel. I don’t want you to become ill again.”

      She shrugged and turned away to refill her goblet. “It was only a chill. I am perfectly able to travel. Today, if needs be.”

      “Celia …” That fierce protectiveness rose up in him again.

      “I said I can travel! I want to go,” she snapped.

      The words she left unspoken hung in the air, and John knew what she meant—she did not want to stay there with him. It was what she should feel, and yet he was angry. He wanted to change her mind.

      “I should send for a litter for you,” he said, pushing himself back from the table. From her.

      “That would take too long, and you know it,” she said. “I can ride.”

      “Nay, Celia.”

      She spun back to face him, her eyes sparkling. “Do you doubt my strength after earlier this morning?”

      He crossed his arms over his chest, his jaw set in a hard line as they stared at each other. The very air seemed to crackle around them.

      She turned away first, her shoulders slumped. “Just see to the horses,” she said, her voice small and quiet. “I will get dressed.”

      He did not want to leave her—not like this, with so much still between them. So much that could not be said. But her very stillness held him away. She looked as if she would crack if he touched her. He could bide his time. He had learned patience in the last few years.

      “Aye,” he said, and strode towards the door. He let it close softly behind him even as every instinct in him urged him to drive his fist into the wall.

      Or to grab her, slam his mouth down on hers as he stripped away her chemise and repeated what they had done earlier.

      Celia stabbed the pins into her upswept hair as she stared at her reflection in the window. Even in the fractured wavy glass she looked pale and gaunt, ghost-like. Haunted.

      She twisted her hair harder, glad of the sting on her scalp as it distracted her and brought her back to her task. She hadn’t been herself earlier this morning. Now she had to find herself again.

      She glanced over her shoulder at the rumpled empty bed. Earlier, in those tangled sheets, she had been wild and free. Everything she had held so tightly in check for so long had flown free. All because of John. His touch, his kiss—they had always unleashed something in her she didn’t understand. And earlier the pleasure of that wildness had been unfathomable.

      Now she wanted to scream with the anger and sadness of losing it all over again. When she’d woken up from delicious dreams and seen the distant, wary look in his eyes, the cool lack of expression on his face, she’d longed to fly at him. Slap his face, scratch at his golden skin until he reacted to her. Showed her something, anything, that told her he had been affected by their lovemaking. That, despite everything, he wanted her still.

      She’d managed to hold herself still, to match his distance with a chill of her own. She had become quite good at hiding her thoughts and emotions. Sometimes not reacting, keeping herself apart, had been all that saved her.

      And now, in the cold daylight, she saw that he was right to stay away. Perhaps their swiving had been inevitable—something that still lay between them from the past. Their bodies still knew each other, no matter what their minds said.

      But it was the past. This was the present, and a gulf wider than the English Channel lay between them.

      She finished pinning up her hair and turned from her reflection to put the final touches to her dress. Some of her clothes had been left for her, and she put on her warmest quilted petticoat and wool skirt, a high-necked black wool and velvet doublet. She wedged her feet into her riding boots and reached for her hat and gloves. She was ready to ride into any battle now.

      She hurried out of the chamber where so much had happened and down the stairs, as if she could flee John and what he had made her feel there at the same time. But he waited for her in the cold, empty foyer.

      He was also dressed to ride, in brown leather and wool, his hair brushed back from his face. She let her eyes linger on those strands, thinking of how they’d felt as they slid through her fingers, as she’d used them to pull him down to her.

      She turned sharply away to jerk on her gloves.

      “You still wear mourning,” he said, his voice flat.

      “I can’t afford new Court clothes,” she answered. “My black was the last thing I could get from my husband’s cheese-paring family. I couldn’t let it go to waste. Are we ready to depart, then?”

      John frowned as if he wanted to say something else, but he merely nodded. He swung open the door and a blast of cold wind curled around her.

      “Let us go, then,” he said.