“It seems that there is only one room left,” he said. “The inn is full because of the nasty weather so I took what they had, and the only way the old woman would rent the room to me is if we were married, so… you are my wife.”
Allaston scowled. “I’ll not sleep in the same bed with you if that is what you are hoping for.”
“Then sleep on the floor. I will be most comfortable on the bed.”
She made a face at him. “Will youpleaseget out?”
He cocked his head. “Why?” he asked. “I have seen a naked woman before.”
Allaston was furious. “You have not seenme…,” she stopped herself, thinking of that frightening and embarrassing moment when Bretton had nearly taken advantage of her, and re-thought her statement. “Let me rephrase that… you have not seen me naked when I was a willing participant!”
He grinned. “Your modesty is admirable but unnecessary,” he said. “I am staying in here because the innkeeper’s wife suggested I wash up as well since my wife was. She thought mayhap that two clean bodies in the same bed would be more pleasant.”
Allaston groaned and rolled her eyes. “This has all played into your master scheme, hasn’t it?” she asked somewhat sarcastically. “You had this planned all along.”
Bretton was enjoying her embarrassment. “For once, I had no plan,” he said, watching her frown. “I am not entirely sure why you are upset about this. Did you not offer yourself to me in marriage earlier today?”
She looked at him, eyes narrowed. “You maynottry the merchandise before we wed,” she said firmly. “There are no samples to be given or a foretaste of what is to come.”
“Who says I need your permission?”
He was serious. Or, at least, he was pretending to be. She couldn’t really tell. Allaston glared at him, emphasizing she would not be a willing party to whatever he was planning. Still hunched into a ball, still trying to cover herself up, she awkwardly stuck out her right foot and scrubbed at her toes.
“My marriage proposal came with certain conditions,” she said. “If I marry you, then it would be to shift your focus to me and our family. You must forget about your vengeance against my father.”
His good humor faded. “You seem to think that you can dictate my life to me, lady,” he said reproachfully. “I will never forget my vengeance against your father.”
In a split second, the mood between them had gone from one with some levity to one of grim reality. The atmosphere no longer saw them jesting but once again reminded them both of the seriousness of the situation. Allaston was still looking at her toes, scrubbing the dirt from them, feeling her disappointment and frustration rise. She also felt tears, close to the surface.
“I am willing to give you everything I have, including myself, but that is not good enough for you,” she complained. “I have tried to reason with you, to argue with you, and everything else in between, but still, you will not be deterred. Do you not understand? I do not want you to kill my father. I love him, as you loved your father. I know you can understand the love from a child to a parent because you had it once. Because of what my father did, that love turned to hate, and that hatred is eating your soul away like a tumor. If you will not accept my marriage proposal, then hear me now– if you kill my father, I will hate you for the rest of my life just as you hate the very name deVelt. The hatred you have towards my father will be nothing compared to the hatred I will have for you. I know you do not care if I love you or hate you, so I am sure this conversation is pointless. But I speak it just the same so you understand how things will be should you follow through with your threat.”
Bretton understood hatred very well. He knew how much he hated de Velt for what he had done, so he understood clearly what Allaston was saying. He didn’t want her hatred and the very thought made him feel both very sad and very angry.Why did the woman have to be so bloody difficult?
“By what right do you believe you can dictate what I feel or how I live my life?” he wanted to know. “You presume too much, lady.”
She looked at him, then. “This is a conversation we have over and over,” she said. “I grow weary of discussing the same subject, your hatred of my father and me trying to talk you out of such a thing. You have my offer. It is your choice to take it or not.”
He thought on that. “I have decided to take it,” he said. “I will take you and your castle and your dowry. But my vengeance against your father is my own.”
She returned her attention to her toes. “Then you will have a wife who hates you,” she said simply. “I hope you can live with that.”
Bretton could see that she meant every word. That was not what he wanted. He wanted a wife who was pleasant to talk to, someone to keep his house, bear his children, and someone he could even grow fond of. He realized, as he looked at her, that he was already fond of her. God help him, he was. The feeling both frightened and uplifted him. But to know that she would hate him if he carried out his revenge against her father… he wasn’t sure he wanted to live with that. He was fairly certain he couldn’t. He cleared his throat softly.
“When I came to Alberbury to find you, it was with one goal in mind,” he said gently. “I wanted to capture the daughter of my mortal enemy and use her as bait to lure her father to me. I kept her in the vault for the first three weeks of our association before a comrade pointed out that a living prisoner was of more use to me than a dead one. That is the only reason I permitted you to be released from the vault, you know. Had you remained there, you were going to die.”
Allaston kept fussing with her toes and Bretton, not receiving a reaction, continued. “I tried to stay away from you in the beginning because the very name of de Velt was like acid upon my tongue,” he said. “Every time I looked at you, I saw your father. But I eventually realized that you werenotyour father. You have traits I have not seen in a very long time. You have compassion and understanding, and the comprehension of those traits are buried deep in my memory. My mother and father had them, but thinking of them brings me back to that five year old boy who had his parents brutally torn away from him. Seeing you, coming to understand you as I have, takes me back to the time in my life when I was the happiest. I am not sure I want to go back there, knowing how badly it can end.”
Allaston was looking at him by the time he was finished, surprised by his admission. She thought seriously on her reply because she didn’t want him to think she was mocking him, or worse, taunting his show of emotion.
“What you say is very deep and thoughtful,” she said, eyeing him a moment before grunting with both confusion and hesitation, as if she were at her wit’s end. “You have moments, like now, where I can see a man of feeling, but then you have moments when I truly believe you are a barbaric beast. You are a paradox, de Llion. I do not believe you are this ruthless mercenary because you want to be. I think you became him because you have had no choice. That soft, tender boy is still inthere, somewhere, and he wants to become a man who shares in the same happiness as the boy did. You must not be afraid to love or feel emotion. You had it once and you can have it again.”
He shook his head, hanging it. “I do not know how,” he said quietly. “I am not sure I can let go of what I have become.”
“I will help you if you will let me.”
He looked up at her, feeling an ache in his heart that he couldn’t begin to describe as his eyes locked with hers. The ache spread out from his chest, into his limbs. He very much wanted her to help him but he truly didn’t know where to begin. The only love or affection he had ever received had been long ago, or post-de Velt, if he had paid for it. Was it really possible that affection, even love, would cost him nothing if it was with the right woman?
“Do you…,” he began, swallowed, then started again. “Do you think… that is, as my wife, that you could feel something for me? Mayhap even become fond of me?”
