“Because in a twisted way, I think he cares for her. He would not want to mar her beauty, at any rate, when the wedding was to take place as soon as they reached Kirkburough. But he had no difficulty beating me, nor would he have stopped until he had her agreement to marry Lyons. But I thought surely she would balk again once they were away from me. She is stubborn, after all, and not above wanting to ruin Gilbert’s plans after what he did to me. But he bragged to me, when he came to Ambray for those few days, that he had completely cowed her, that she would do whatever he required, because he had warned her he would kill me if she did not. I am not sure he would have. He is not as inherently cruel as his father was. Yet would she have believed him. And she would have hated him for—what is wrong?” she gasped when he turned so ashen.
Warrick shook his head, but a groan escaped him as other words came at him from memory, when Rowena had stood over his chained body and explained what she would do. “I like this no better than you, but I have no choice—and neither do you.” No choice. She had been trying to save her mother’s life. She had not wanted to rape him. And she had been so sorry for it that she had accepted his revenge as her due.
“Ahhh!” he roared in anguish, the pain ripping at his chest unbearable.
Anne became alarmed. “Wait, I will get—”
“Nay…there is naught wrong with me that a whip would not cure,” Warrick said with self-loathing. “You were right to revile me, lady. I am the veriest…ah, God, what have I done!”
He ran past her and into the hall. When he passed Sheldon, he told him only, “Keep your wife here,” then was running up the stairs.
Rowena was not alone when he found her in the sewing room. Mildred was with her, and three others. They took one look at him and hurried out. Mildred was slower to go. She gave him one of the frigid looks she had been giving him for weeks that he had not noticed. He did not notice now, either, for he was staring only at Rowena.
She stood up and tossed aside the cloth from her lap, her demeanor what it had been for several weeks, sheer disgruntlement. “Now that you have interrupted our work,” she said crossly, “what do you want?”
“I have just spoken with your mother.”
Rowena’s expression changed to surprised delight. “She is here?”
“Aye, and you can see her anon, but I needs speak with you first.”
“Notnow, Warrick!” she said impatiently. “I have not been with my mother for three years. I saw her only once some months ago, when…”
Her words trailed off with a frown, causing him to prompt her. “When what?”
“It does not matter.”
“It does. When d’Ambray beat her?”
“Shetoldyou that?”
“Aye—and more. Why didyounever tell me he had threatened her life?”
Her eyes flared wide, then lit with a glittering blue fire. “You dare to ask me that? You would not listen to reasons! ‘Never mention to me again an excuse for what you did.’Thosewere your words, my lord.”
He winced. “I know. At that time, ’tis like to have made no difference if I knew. I was that angry. Butnowit matters.” He hesitated then, but he had to know. “Did he also force you to spy on me?”
“I told you, he never thought of that. He was too busy thinking of how he could use against you the army he had just gained.”
Warrick leaned back against the closed door, his expression bleak. “Then I erred even more than I had first thought? My God, you were innocent of it all, even the deceit I most recently accused you of.”
Rowena stared at him incredulously. “Innocent of it all? Irapedyou. Are you forgetting that?”
“Nay, I forgave you that. But—”
“Whendid you forgive me?” she demanded. “I heard no words to that effect.”
He scowled at the interruption,andat her obtuseness. “You know exactly when, wench. ’Twas the day you asked me for a boon—the night you had no sleep.”
Color came hotly to her cheeks. “You could have mentioned it,” she grumbled, only to add as she recalled these past weeks, “Not that it matters now.”
“You are correct. That matters not at all when there was naught for me to forgive. But there is everything foryouto forgive. Can you?”
She stared hard at him for a long moment, then shrugged indifferently. “Certainly. You are forgiven. Now may I see my mother?”
Warrick frowned. “You cannot absolve me of my guilt that easily.”
“Can I not? Why not? Or has it not occurred to you that I simply do not care if you are sorry?”
