She ignored him and kept working.
He moved behind her and wrapped his arms around her waist. “Enough,” he murmured in her ear. “You’ll ruin your pretty hands.”
* * *
Daisy spread her palms to examine them. They were raw and swollen. What did Sir Barrett’s look like, then? He had been hauling enormous stones all morning with a bite wound. She picked his palm off her belly and opened it. He had hard callouses to protect his skin, but the wound looked swollen and bruised with angry red outlines on the dirt-filled punctures.
“Don’t worry, I can still spank with this hand,” he murmured in her ear, his words sounding less like a warning than a seduction.
The unnerving fluttering sensation started in her stomach again. Did Sir Barrettenjoyspanking her? She thought again about his words that morning when she’d pleaded he spank with his hand instead.
I would love to.
Did he mean he would love to accommodate her request? Or he really loved to spank? The muscles between her legs clenched at the memory of being upended over his lap, her bottom jiggling at the slaps from his bare hand. Those very same muscles had been affected—each stinging blow had spoken directly to her core, stimulating and vibrating. Her bottom, still throbbing from her whipping that morning, tingled as if his hand was still upon it.
“You men need a bit of refreshment?” a female voice called out from behind them. A serving wench stood behind them, one hand on her hip, the other carrying a bucket of fresh water and a dipper.
“Over here, Margrite,” Barrett summoned.
The girl sauntered over, looking Sir Barrett’s body up and down and licking her lips. “It’s so honorable to see the master works as hard as the men,” she said, her voice a sultry purr.
Daisy took an instant disliking to the girl. Why did she speak so intimately to Barrett?
He ignored it, and filled the dipper, holding it up to Daisy’s lips. She started to refuse, but he ordered, “Drink.” Even without her wrists bound, he served her.
She hardly knew what to think about that. She drank from the dipper, daintily at first, then deeply as she realized her thirst.
“That’s it,” Barrett encouraged.
When she finished, he drank from it himself and handed it back to the wench, who curtsied low enough to show her cleavage.
“They say it’s the reason you make such a good commander,” Margrite said, continuing her flirtation.
“Go on, Margrite, the other men are thirsty, too,” he said, giving her backside a slap.
She giggled and looked at him coquettishly over her shoulder as she scampered away.
Daisy’s jaw clenched. “Are you in the habit of slapping the backsides of all the women of the castle?”
To her great satisfaction, Sir Barrett froze and looked like a guilty boy. “Forgive me. I am not accustomed to answering to a wife. I suppose you do not take kindly to such a thing?”
She folded her arms across her chest. “I most certainly do not.”
The moment of looking chastened passed. He stepped closer. “I was just trying to get rid of her. But you can punish me later if I gave offense,” he said with a wolfish grin.
Her neck and chest grew warm as a ridiculous vision of him offering his bare, muscled bottom up for her small hand rose in her mind. Her eyes dropped below his waist, peeking at the way his strong legs filled out his leggings. When they returned to his face, she found him smirking.
“Do you not have work to do?” she snapped, flustered.
He chuckled. “Aye, my lady. I will return to work.”
She watched him, admiring the huge bulging muscles under his shirt. She considered what Margrite had said. He probably did make an excellent commander. She rested a while, but had no inclination to sit, since her bottom still hurt too much, and standing around watching grew tiresome. Eventually she began to work again. Her muscles ached and her hands hadbeen scraped raw, but she enjoyed being outdoors and exercising her body.
She had never been the sort of lady who relished sitting inside and spinning with the ladies. She had certainly done her fair share of weaving, but Prince Frederick, Princess Susanna’s father, had given her a fair amount of freedom. They’d pitied her, she supposed. When she’d come to their castle, she’d scarcely eaten or spoken for weeks. It had been a traveling minstrel with a harp who finally coaxed her out of her trauma. Prince Frederick had been kind enough to buy the harp from the minstrel, who gave her lessons over the course of a month before he left, rich enough to buy himself a new instrument.
After that, she’d learned every song she could from the traveling bards and provided music and song for the king’s table. It kept her apart from the others. Made her strange enough that no man should seek to wed her. That, and her longbow practice. She taught herself, at the tender age of twelve. Perhaps it had been foresight, because even then, she feared their castle would be sacked. Much more so after Eberhard, Princess Susanna’s uncle took over as commander of their troops.
She practiced on a target, day after day, until the squires stopped teasing her. Later, when she grew older, she took up hunting and trapping—always alone, though many a squire offered to accompany her.
