“Let me do this,” Jamie said. “I know what assurances must be given, what pressures can be brought to bear. Your upbringing was… irregular. I understand these things better.”
“Think about what you are saying, Jamie,” she said, raising her hands in exasperation. “I am a bastard and a merchant’s granddaughter. I was not raised to live the kind of life you want.”
“You are of noble birth,” Jamie said in a firm voice. “Everything is changed now that your father has claimed you.”
“I am not changed,” she said. “What you need is a dull English noblewoman who will be happy to share the boring life you are looking forward to.”
“Linnet, you cannot—”
She lifted her hand to stop him. “I know how it will be. Each summer, you will come to France to fight with your glorious king. Then, each winter, you will return home to get your wife with yet another child, settle disputes among your peasants, and spend the evenings telling tiresome stories of your victories by the hearth in your hall.”
“It is a good life,” he said, laughing. “It only seems dull to you because you do not know it.”
She took his face in her hands. “You will be furious with me, but there is something I must tell you.”
“First you must promise not to speak to your father of our marriage before I do,” Jamie said.
He leaned forward to kiss her but froze at the sound of voices just outside the door. As the door scraped open, he threw the bedclothes over Linnet and turned his body to block the view of her from the door.
She scooted up next to him and called out, “Good day, Alain. How fortunate you brought Sir Guy with you; he’s told me many times he wished to see me naked in bed.”
Both men stared at them slack-jawed for a long moment. Then her father roared, “God’s blood, Linnet, what have you done?”
“Surely,” she said, widening her eyes, “I need not explain it to you?”
“You said she was a virgin,” Sir Guy spat out, then slapped Alain hard across the face. “I should have known a whore would beget a whore.”
Sir Guy was a powerfully built man, and his violence startled her. When he turned to Jamie with murder in his eyes, she put her hand on Jamie’s shoulder.
“I won’t forget this,” Sir Guy said in a voice so full of menace Linnet’s stomach tightened. “You shall pay dearly for this one day, James Rayburn.”
Jamie threw her hand off his shoulder. For the first time since the others entered the room, she looked at him. Jamie’s eyes were fixed on her, wild and accusing. She heard, but did not see, Sir Guy slam the door. Sir Guy and her father did not matter anymore.
“You planned this. You wanted them to find us,” Jamie said, his voice cracking. “You only went to bed with me to make your father angry. I thought… I thought you loved me.”
The air went out of her, and she could not speak. God have mercy, what had she done?
“You’ve ripped my heart from my chest,” Jamie said in a harsh whisper. “I am the world’s biggest fool.”
Jamie slid down from the bed, swept up his clothes from the floor in one arm, and started toward the door.
“I shall whip you within an inch of your life, girl,” Alain shouted. His face was purple, his fists clenched.
Jamie grabbed Alain by the front of his tunic and lifted him off his feet. “I am tempted to murder her myself, but I will kill you if you lay a hand on her for this,” he said, the threat in his voice as sharp as the edge of a dagger.
Heaven above, Jamie was magnificent, stark naked and furious.
“If you were not such a horse’s arse, she would not have done it.”
Jamie was defending her, which meant he was already halfway to forgiving her. She would explain it all to him. Then they could go on as before.
Jamie picked up his clothes again and walked to the door. He opened it and turned. “Send word if there is a child,” he said to Alain. “I shall be in England.”
Chapter One
London
October 30, 1425
