‘If you think a grovelling apology will see you forgiven, you are wrong,’ she spat.
‘What about this?’ he said, raising her skirt with one hand and letting the other slide up her rough wool stockings until he encountered the creamy smoothness of her thighs. Cecily let out a little gasp, which he hoped was pleasure.
‘I want no one but you, lass, and you know it.’
Peyton stroked his fingers down her centre, and she sank her hands into his hair. When he put his mouth where his fingers had been, Cecily gasped again, but she did not stop him. And when he put his cock where his mouth had been and took her passionately up against the door, she cried his name and held him close, and Peyton knew he was forgiven.
His own release came soon after, and Peyton decided he liked making love to his wife when she was in a fit of jealousy. It made her surrender that much sweeter.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
The weak sun on Cecily’s face warmed her as she strolled around the yard. She had donned her plaid dress of green and gold. It was a little drab, but it was best not to draw Peyton’s attention as she was a little sore from it. Not that she was complaining.
‘Are you well this morning?’ said Peyton with a smile. He was leading two horses.
‘I am very well indeed after what you just did to me,’ she said lightly, for Peyton had continued to earn his forgiveness, once in the dead of night and again at dawn.
He heaved a great sigh. ‘I liked it too, but we must go on a journey.’
‘Where?’
It is a surprise,’ he said. From his tone, it was not a good one.
‘Tell me.’
‘No. You must let me have some secrets.’ Peyton frowned. ‘Though perhaps there have been too many secrets, things we have not shared. Go and dress in your warmest clothes and that fur I gave you that makes you look so very beautiful, and come back to me.’
‘Very well. It will be nice to be out of Fellscarp for a while.’
Sadness crossed Peyton’s face like a cloud. ‘Hurry, my love, and come back to me as soon as may be,’ he said, turning away.
Cecily ran up the stairs two at a time.
***
The ride was quiet and cold, as if the land waited with bated breath for spring under its covering of white frost. Peyton’s demeanour was as stiff as the frozen branches of the trees, but Cecily did not mind. As hours passed, she was just elated to be in the open, looking up at the vast sky, slowly shedding its grey pallor for blue. She delighted in the pale rolling hills instead of the damp, dark walls and grey water of Fellscarp.
Peyton glanced at her now and again with a longing she hoped was affection, but his secrecy was unsettling. They finally came to a path through thick woodland, everything hushed, save for the crunch of their horses’ hooves through frozen puddles. The trees thinned, and Cecily gasped. A fearsome sight lay before her.
‘Where are we?’ she said.
‘Kransmuir. The home of Jasper Glendenning. It is now your sister’s home.’
‘I don’t understand.’
‘I am bringing you here so that you may see her.’
‘But we cannot be here. It is dangerous. Jasper Glendenning will kill you on sight. He hates you, Peyton.’
‘Aye, most likely he still does, but I don’t think he will kill me this day. I have recently done him a good turn.’
‘And what is that?’
‘I will tell you everything, Cecily, but first, we should announce ourselves, and you should be reunited with Rowenna.’
Cecily’s heart pounded. Her head was muddled. ‘I want to see Rowenna with all my heart, but will he let me see her?’ she cried. ‘Can we trust Jasper?’
‘Aye, a little. But do not trust him with everything. Do not tell him that we are wed.’
