“So that is why you did not return here? But there was no hurry to return here, was there? You sent your orders. That was sufficient.”
“God’s blood, do you dare—!”
He stopped when she looked away from him to stare out the window, deliberately ignoring him. She was not frightened or contrite. Her expression was calmness itself. He had not expected that, but then, he had not given what he did expect much thought, for he had forced her from his mind to concentrate solely on finding d’Ambray. But he found now that he didnotlike her undertone of resentment. And the anger he had felt that night he met her mother was starting to rekindle.
He sat down on the opposite bench to face her. “Such an innocent demeanor to hide such deceit,” he remarked coldly.
She glanced at him with raised brows to ask quietly, “When was I deceitful? At Kirkburough when I knew not who you were? Or at Kirkburough when you came with your army to kill my stepbrother, knowing not who he really was? But I thought you were there for Gilbert d’Ambray, your avowed enemy, so aye, I should have told you then, when I was sure you would kill me as well if you knew he was my stepbrother. Or mayhap I should have told you when you took me out of your dungeon the first time to explain to me how you were going to have your revenge. Was I to tell you then, Warrick, to add to what you had already planned for me?”
“YouknewI would not kill you!”
“NotthenI did not!”
They glared at each other. Rowena was in no wise calm now. There were twenty-five days of repressed anger glittering in her eyes. His had turned to silver ice.
“What excuse do you offer for your later silence, wench, when you escaped, only to have d’Ambray return you? Did he send you back to spy on me?”
“I am sure he would have asked me to if he had thought of it. But until you arrived, he thought he had won the day, that he would have the means to bring you to your knees. When you did arrive, he had no time to think of aught but escaping himself. But I did not tell you then that he was d’Ambray, for the same reason I did not tell you when you summoned me to his castle. I did not want to face your anger again—orthis.” She waved a hand to indicate her imprisonment.
“And I am to believe that, when ’tis more likely that you and d’Ambray go hand in hand in this deceit? He left you at Kirkburough for me to find,” he reminded her harshly. “Was I to become smitten with you and tell you all my plans?”
“He assumed you would make terms with me. But I was left there because he panicked. You were approaching with five hundred men, while he had only a handful remaining. He intended to come back with Lyons’ army, which had been sent to retake Tures from you. Possibly he hoped I would distract you long enough for him to get away. More like he thought I would slow him down if he took me along. Whatever ran through his mind that day besides fear and rage, I know not. But I do know ’twas not his intention to leave me with you any longer than it would take him to return. And he did return. When he found me that day in the woods, he told me he thought you had killed me.”
Warrick snorted. “Very cleverly said, wench, but I do not believe a word of it.”
“Think you I care anymore what you believe? Last month I would have, but now I do not.”
“Your circumstance depends on what I believe, wench,” he reminded her.
“Mycircumstancecannot be any more wretched.”
“Can it not?” he replied with quiet menace. “I ought to punish you properly, not just curtail your freedom.”
That brought her to her feet in a burst of wrath. “Go ahead, damn you! Do it! It will not make me despise you more than I do now.”
“Sit down,” he growled low.
She did not, not by him. She stalked around the fireplace to the other window and took a bench there, her stiff back half turned away from the room. She stared blindly out the window, seething so much her hands trembled in her lap. She hated him. Despised him. She wished he…she hated him!
She heard him behind her, come to block the opening of the other window embrasure so she could not leave it without pushing him out of the way. As if she could, and she resented that fact, too.
“You have not acquitted yourself, wench. Verily, I am not like to believe aught you say ever again. What you did was akin to betrayal. Had you told me it was d’Ambray on my land, I would have run him to ground despite the blackness of the night. Had you told me you were Rowena of Tures, I could have secured your remaining properties the sooner, thereby—”
“The sooner?” she cut in scathingly. “You do not think I will help you to secure them now, do you? I would not help you were you—”
“Be quiet!” he snapped. “Your resentment is misplaced, wench. I could not leave you free to communicate with that devil’s spawn, and I doubt it not that he has secreted someone here to carry your messages to him. I needs now interrogate my own people to be rid of any who were not here ere you came, be they innocent or not. Be grateful I did not leave you in the dungeon.”
“Grateful for this tomb, where I have had no one to speak to since I was shut in here? Aye, I am grateful,” she sneered derisively.
Silence greeted that. She did not turn to see if he showed any contrition, if he had even realized what he was sentencing her to when he had ordered her confined. In his rage he had condemned her without trial, without even asking if she was guilty. That damn pain she had thought would have gone numb by now was becoming more acute, twisting in her chest, tightening in her throat.
Finally she heard him sigh. “You will return to your duties, those first given to you. But you will be watched, doubt it not. And never again will you be trusted.”
“When was I ever trusted?” she asked in a small, bitter voice, the pain nigh choking her.
“When you shared my bed, wench, I trusted you not to betray me.”
“Nor did I. What I did is called self-preservation.”
