“Ah, nay, he willnae. Nor would Walter allow it.”
Ilsabeth listened as the men talked over ideas for getting their hands on David. She did not wish to know how they would get the information they hoped to get from the man. All she wanted to accomplish was to lift the cloud of suspicion off her and her family. David was part of the plot that had sent her and her family into hiding, and he was one of the ones plotting against the king, so he deserved whatever he had to suffer.
“Weel, I think that gives us enough ideas to mull over,” said Tormand as he stood up. “I must needs get back to my wife. She doesnae like me coming so close to the court although she kens it is necessary.” He kissed Ilsabeth on the forehead. “Dinnae worry so hard, lass. Your father will keep your family safe and Simon will keep ye safe. We will soon drag the real traitors before the king. Next time I come, I will try to be in time to meet these children ye have taken in.”
The moment Tormand was gone Ilsabeth picked up her sewing and stared at it blindly. She wanted to believe Tormand’s assurances, but her fear for her family would not allow her to do so. There was so much that could still go wrong. She should not even be here, but with her family. She ached to be with them as they fought this battle.
A battle they faced because she had been blind to the man she had chosen to be her husband. Ilsabeth took a deep breath as she fought the strong urge to cry. She suffered no pain at the loss of her betrothed but she did hurt over the loss of her dream of a home of her own and children. She also grieved over what that dream was now costing her loved ones.
“Ilsabeth?”
She could not look at Simon, knowing that her eyes would show her sorrow. “Nay, I shall be fine.”
There was no mistaking that waver in her soft, husky voice and Simon would swear that he could feel her sorrow. He moved to sit beside her and put his arm around her. It was a dangerous thing to do but he could not smother his need to offer her comfort. When she leaned into him, her soft body pressing against him, everything inside him tightened with need. The clothing they wore was suddenly a painful, unwanted barrier between them. Even the scent of her had him aching to taste her skin. Sympathy, he sternly told himself. Only sympathy. A particularly insistent part of his body paid no attention.
“ ‘Tis all my fault,” she murmured, resting her cheek against his chest.
“Nay, the fault lies with Hepbourn,” said Simon. “He is the one who plots against the king, used ye, and now uses and defames your family to protect himself.”
“Ah, so now ye believe me?”
He sighed and gave in to the temptation to rest his cheek against her soft hair. “Aye. I still need proof, however, and that shall nay be easy to get. Traitors ken what fate awaits them and ‘tis nay a simple hanging.”
“I dinnae think a hanging is so verra simple but I ken what ye mean. Compared to the horrific punishments dealt out to traitors, a hanging would seem preferable. That makes them verra cautious.
“I should be with my family,” she abruptly said in a quiet voice. “I should be standing with them at such a time.”
“Nay. They sent ye here. This is where they wish ye to be. Dinnae forget what Tormand said. The soldiers arenae even hunting them much any longer. They willnae, either, unless the king sends someone to push them to it. That gives us time.”
Ilsabeth wondered if he was aware that he was rubbing his cheek against her hair and caressing her arm with his hand. She was no longer on the verge of tears but decided to stay right where she was. Being held close to Simon not only made her blood run hot, it made her feel safe. She could sense the strength in him and it was as if it shielded her.
A quick glance down was enough to tell her that he also desired her. It was heady knowledge but she was not sure how to act upon it. In the short time she had known him, she had learned that Simon was an intensely honorable man. Whatever else might hold him back from satisfying the desire he felt for her, the fact that she had been put under his protection would be a strong part of that. Ilsabeth did not know whether she could or even should try to surmount that particular wall.
But how she wanted to, she thought, and sighed. The idea of giving her chastity over to a man she was not married to did not bother her. She was a Murray woman, after all, and when a Murray woman found the man she wanted, she gave him everything. What troubled her was how badly it would hurt her if all he felt for her was desire. If, when this all ended and she was free, he sent her home with no word of love or promise of a future, Ilsabeth feared she would know a pain that time would never heal. It would be a big risk to give him everything she had to give with nothing but the hope that he would return her feelings and Ilsabeth was not sure she was brave enough to do that.
“Hey, lass, have ye gone to sleep?”
The hint of amusement in his voice caused her to lift her head and smile at him. Ilsabeth saw the way his eyes abruptly darkened. Her body responded to that look with a heat that nearly made her gasp. Suddenly she understood why some of her married kinswomen would blush when their men looked at them. They were seeing that look in their men’s eyes.
Simon softly cursed even as he pulled her face closer to his, unable to resist the urge to kiss her, to taste that lush mouth that tempted him every time he looked at it. When Ilsabeth smiled at him, her eyes all soft and warm, his will crumbled. All he could think of was how much he wanted her to keep looking at him like that. It was madness.
She was his weakness, he thought with a touch of alarm. He had spent years hardening himself in heart, body, and mind, yet this small woman with big blue eyes easily cut through his armor with a smile. Simon knew he ought to run far and fast but then his lips touched hers, and all his fears were burned away by the heat that flooded his body.
Ilsabeth wrapped her arms around his neck and held on tight. She parted her lips with no urging from him, eager to taste him. When she tentatively parried the strokes of his tongue with her own, he groaned and the sound made the fire inside her burn even hotter. She could stir his passion and, at the moment, that was enough.
He pushed her down onto the settee and Ilsabeth welcomed the weight of his body as he covered her. She was surrounded by the heat and scent of him and it made her desire rise so quickly and fiercely that she had no thought but of him, of his taste, of his touch. She wanted his clothes gone; hers as well. She needed to feel his skin beneath her hands. When he began to kiss his way down her throat she realized he had tugged her gown down to free her breasts. Ilsabeth knew she was blushing but she did not stop him. Her breasts ached for his touch.
When he kissed her there, she shivered, despite the fire the caress ignited inside her. A small part of her gasped in shock that she was allowing a man who was not her husband, not even her betrothed, to touch her and kiss her so intimately, but need smothered that spark of embarrassment. She threaded her fingers through his thick hair and held him close, silently urging him to continue, and reveled in the way his hands and mouth worked such magic upon her skin.
A little voice in Simon’s mind whispered that he had gone too far, but the sight of Ilsabeth’s full breasts, her nipples taut and begging for his kiss, made it easy to ignore the warning. He filled his hand with the soft weight of one as he feasted on the other. The soft cries escaping her and the way her lithe body arched against his completely silenced that warning. The only thought remaining in his head was that he had to be inside her soon.
“Mama?”
At the sound of a child’s voice, Simon tensed so quickly it hurt. Elen was in the room. Simon stared down at the woman sprawled beneath him and slowly came to his senses. Her breasts were bare, the hard tips wet and glistening from his greedy attentions. He could even see a touch of redness from his emerging beard. His hand was under her skirts. Simon knew he had been within a heartbeat of taking her on the settee. He met her gaze and the warmth there, still visible despite her blushes, told him that she would have let him.
Shielding her with his body as best he could, he eased up from her enough so that she could quickly fix her bodice. The moment she was decent again, he leapt off her as if she were on fire. There was no hiding the way his body still ached for her, but, fortunately, Elen was too young to recognize what ailed him.
“Best ye see what the child needs,” he said, and strode out of the room certain he heard her whispercoward.
