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Rory looked into her eyes, no longer smiling. “You are magnificent, Freya. What happened just now . . . ’tis something I’ve guarded against for many years.”

“Giving a woman pleasure?” She could not look at his lips in the same way after what had just happened. How was it possible, what he’d done? With just his mouth and her finger.

“Taking more pleasure in the giving than the receiving.” With that, he stood up and replaced his seat across from her, where it had been earlier. Did he really mean to return to their ale as if that had not just happened?

She thought it was so, at first, when he picked up his mug and took a long swig. But then, Freya caught his eyes from across the table.

If she was overwrought, uncertain, unsteady . . . he was more so. The Rory she’d come to know, the confident, carefree one, was gone. He had never looked less certain than he did in this moment.

And for that reason alone, Freya did not regret what had just passed between them.

Chapter Seventeen

She was still wroth with him.

Rory understood why, of course. But what was he to do? Spending any time alone with Freya was impossible. Not after what had happened that night at Pucker’s Mark.

They rode toward the gates of Shenworth Castle, a formidable fortress built in the twelfth century by the first Baron of Shenworth, a man bitter that the king refused to name him earl. In retaliation, he’d devoted his life to building this castle. His son, as the story went, spent his life recruiting and training men. Their ancestors, including Freya’s grandmother, now reaped the rewards.

He refused to turn in his saddle. Doing so would only remind Rory of his folly. For more than a sennight, he’d held firm. She and Isaac got on well, thankfully. Rory had been able to avoid Freya on the road. But it was the evenings, when Rory had been forced closer to the woman—as they dined in the hall of a friend of Rory’s father, when he’d introduced Freya to an innkeeper he had known for many years, during meals where they made polite conversation—that had made him lose control.

That night, after settling Freya into her room and relieving himself with the memory of Freya’s expression as she experienced her first release, he’d been unable to sleep. The truth he’d offered her was precisely how he’d described it. After so many women, not one had made him wish to know more. Not since Alys.

His fists tightened on the reins as he thought of the treacherous bitch. How she’d stroked his cheek, whispering words of love and of a future that was not to be. Of the children they would someday have. Each and every word, hollow. Nothing more than empty promises meant to help him ignore the advice of his parents, and even his sister, who very much disliked Alys. To ignore those who loved him most, who had seen her cunning when he had not. He’d hated her for leaving him, but that hate was incomparable to the one he bore for himself for acting like such a blind, lovesick fool.

How was it possible, after so many years passed, that he could still resent every interaction he had with Alys? He knew now, had known for some time, losing her had been for the best. But even still, it angered Rory that he had given himself wholly to a woman who wanted nothing more than to be married into the family of an earl.

“’Tis as I remember it.”

Rory closed his eyes as Freya and Isaac rode up behind him. Inhaling the fresh October air, as if steeling for a battle, Rory opened them and looked at her.

He wished he hadn’t.

Freya’s fur-lined mantle covered her completely. Its thick material was swirled across her mount as if a maid had been traveling with her. Her hair, only once tied back in a braid, the day they met, also flowed freely. She looked upon Shenworth as if it were to be her salvation. The sense of dread that had settled on Rory yesterday, knowing they might reach her grandmother by nightfall today, threatened to choke him.

Rory wanted to be away from her. To complete this mission and return home. To train with his father, jest with his sister, make love to the widow whose bed he’d quite literally left when the council was called. He wanted to prepare for their next inevitable fights, ones that seemed to be more frequent these past three years with the instability of the Scottish throne. To help his cousin protect Wallace, who had become a symbol for his mother’s people, his people, as they looked ahead to a future out from under the English monarch’s thumb.

But that was precisely the problem. He wanted all of that, and none of it.

Freya’s eyes caught his. Rory had been staring. The sun had just set, all the more reason to ride ahead, through those gates. But the reckoning he’d been avoiding since that night was no longer days away. It was here. In the morn, he and Isaac would leave Shenworth, their mission complete. Freya would be safe here. Her grandmother may not go against the king, but she would protect her. Of that, from what Rory had learned, there was no doubt.

“Isaac, will you go ahead? Announce Freya’s presence? We will be along.”

“Of course, my lord.”

“Are you not worried,” Freya said, “that some ill will befall you if you are alone with me?”

It was the first time since that night that she’d commented on his admittedly rude behavior. Rory decided, once again, the truth would serve him best.

“I am,” he admitted.

Freya was clearly not prepared for that particular truth. “Will you leave tonight?”

The thought tightened his chest. Rory’s mouth, suddenly dry, could not form the words he’d been planning. They would be separated inside, their close sleeping quarters thus far being less than appropriate for an unmarried maiden. Knowing this may be the last private conversation they would have . . .

This was the precise reason he’d shunned her the morning after Pucker’s Mark. He’d guarded his heart for so long, only to allow Freya into it so damned quickly.

“In the morn,” he said. “I would ride tonight, but our mounts could use the rest. Mine is accustomed to such riding, but Isaac’s, less so. We’ve stayed close to Bristol this year past. Kenshire and Brockburg have been our longest journeys until this one.”