Knights of de Ware 01 - My Champion (19 page)

“I’m not a greedy man,” he told her with a magnanimous bow of his head. “What’s mine is yours.”

God help her, she tried to be patient. “We’re no longer aboard El Gallo’s ship. There’s no reason to continue the farce. I need my
own
room.”

“Oh. Have you more coin?” he asked innocently enough. But then he grinned, and she could see he’d manipulated this whole situation to his own advantage.

Of course she had no coin of her own. The reivers had seen to that. Even her medallion had been taken. She wanted to scream in frustration. Damn it all! She wasn’t helpless! How could she prove to the beggar she could take care of herself when she kept needing him?

She flounced down upon the bed and began peeling off one of the thick leather boots clinging to her ankles. She muttered to herself as she worked, calling him every name she could think of from “filthy cur” and “shandy knave” to “heartless brute.”

The last one he took issue with.

“I’m not heartless,” he told her, coming away from the door. For just a moment, he looked rather like a hurt little boy.

“All right,” she grumbled. “Perhaps not heartless.” She struggled with the other boot. “But you
are
a churl and a knave. And a brute.”

He smiled at that, infuriating her more. Her boot finally slid off with a sucking noise. She dropped it to the floor, wiggling her toes to make sure she could still feel them. Then she crossed the room and began wrestling with the screen.

“After all we’ve shared, you’re still shy?” he remarked.

She blushed. It was ignoble of him to remind her of all they’d
shared
. She muscled the screen of pauper’s lace up in front of the tub and deftly moved behind it. Then she proceeded to spend several long moments fumbling with the laces of her jerkin. The damned things were still soaking wet. The more she worked, the more snarled they became. Even brute force didn’t work. She cursed quietly.

“Trouble?” The beggar poked his head around the screen.

She nearly jumped from her skin.

One corner of his mouth lifted in a coy smile. “I’m fairly handy with garments.”

She glared at him. “No doubt.”

She had little choice. That luscious bath was growing colder by the moment, and she needed assistance. She’d just have to steel herself against the sensation of his callused fingertips against her skin…

“That’s quite a snarl you have here,” he said, carefully disentangling the knot beneath her chin, “almost as nasty as a certain weaver’s knot I recall.”

A reluctant smile slipped across her lips.

“I could cut the laces, but I fear this is your only garment,” he said.

She resisted the urge to remind him that that was his fault. If the fool hadn’t… But she couldn’t reprimand him now, not when he was helping her.

She stole several furtive glances at him as he labored. His brow furrowed as he picked at the knot, and his dark lashes fell thickly upon his swarthy cheek. His fingers were warm against her skin, tickling her throat while he worried the laces. She wished he would hurry. She didn’t know how much longer she could endure his proximity. She was having difficulty concentrating, as if his nearness somehow affected her senses. Perhaps, she dared to hope, it was only the wine.

“I apologize for the lack of privacy here, my lady,” he murmured in all sincerity, “but I don’t dare leave you alone.”

“Why not?” Her voice had grown curiously rough.

“Why not?” he repeated, finally freeing the laces and tugging gently at the front of the jerkin to loosen it.

He met her eyes then, and she could see in their smoky depths that he was hiding something. She grew instantly alert.

“El Gallo
is
in the hands of the authorities as you promised?” she demanded evenly.

He averted his glance for only an instant, but that gesture told her everything.

“What’s happened?” she asked, not entirely sure she wanted to know.

Duncan frowned, not entirely sure he wanted to tell her. He poked at the pauper’s lace in the screen with his thumb. “All did not quite go as planned.”

“You failed?”

That was the wrong word to use. He straightened to his full height and scowled down at her. “Nay, I did not fail,” he bit out. “I got us both off the ship. You have a roof over your head. Food in your belly. A warm bath.”

“If El Gallo is free, his pack of reivers is probably sniffing around for us.”

He compressed his lips. “As long as you stay by my side, we’ll be safe enough here.”

“In an inn? God spare me from halfwits,” Linet mumbled to the ceiling. “An inn is probably the first place he’ll look.”

Duncan clenched his jaw. Now she was calling him names again. “Faithless wench,” he muttered. “I’m not entirely a fool. I wouldn’t bring you to a place of danger.”

“But it’s so obvious. An inn?” She raised an incredulous brow.

“It’s not just any inn,” he declared triumphantly. “It’s a brothel.”

He hadn’t meant to blurt it out like that. The silence that met his revelation was so complete that he could hear the water dripping from Linet’s jerkin onto the floor.

“He’ll never think to look here,” the beggar explained. “The ladies who ply their trade at such places are quite discreet.”

Linet’s voice came out in a strangled whisper. “You brought me to a…” She couldn’t even say it.

She shouldered past him, plucked up her boots and stalked to the door. There, she turned to give him one final piece of her mind. But she could find no words to express her outrage. She flung the door wide and stepped out.

Nothing could have prepared her for what lay beyond the door. Down one end of a sloping hall stood a pair of plump, painted whores wearing nothing but what seemed to be a few bits of lace placed strategically about their anatomy. From the other end, a drunken, leering nobleman stumbled, a strumpet on each arm. Yet when the man saw Linet loitering in the doorway, he appeared to take a sudden amorous interest in her as well, indicating with a coarse gesture what he’d like to do with her.

Linet immediately ducked back inside the room, slamming the door with such force that she made herself jump.

“I can’t leave…just now,” she whispered in horror, dropping her boots to the floor.

Duncan suppressed a grin. He wondered what she’d seen.

“Of course, neither can I stay,” she said, pacing. “Do you know what goes on here?”

He lifted his brows.

“Of course you know,” she answered herself. “You probably frequent places like this every time you get a spare penny.”

Duncan mused briefly that he’d have no time for anything else if that were true, considering all his “spare pennies.”

“We’ll leave tomorrow,” he assured her.

“Tomorrow?”

“Until then, we must make the best of what we have—a tray of food, a warm bed—“

“Tomorrow?” Her eyes grew wide. “I won’t sleep in a place like this.”

“And I suppose you’ve also changed your mind about that bath?” he asked dryly.

She hesitated, clearly tempted by the thought of warm, soothing water. Then she reluctantly nodded. “Absolutely. I’m a de Montfort,” she said, as if that explained everything. “You must take me from here as soon as…”

While she rattled on, he sat down upon the bed and removed his boots.

“What are you doing?” she asked.

“You said you didn’t wish to bathe.”

“Aye. I wish you to take me away from… What are you
doing
?” she asked again, worry making her voice strident, as he began to unlace his jerkin.

“The water grows cold,” he explained.

“Surely you’re not—”

“I see no reason to waste a good bath.”

“But…” Linet was clearly in a quandary. She dared not go out into the hallway again. But she couldn’t very well remain, not while the beggar… Dear God, he was pulling the jerkin and shirt off over his head. Her breath caught in her throat. The brazen knave wasn’t even bothering to conceal himself behind the screen. Not that that magnificent chest should be hidden. His body was perfect—his shoulders were wide, his arms well-muscled, his belly flat and lightly furred with dark hair. She found it difficult to tear her eyes away.

“You could always turn around,” he teased, as if he’d read her mind.

She spun away immediately. Glancing, to her credit, only once or twice as he removed his hose, she was rewarded with a view of incredibly strong legs and a thick nest of black curls from which she recoiled just in time.

When she heard the splash of water from behind the screen, she deemed it safe to turn around. She began bustling about the chamber, creating imaginary duties to keep her mind off of the beggar.

“After you’ve finished your ablutions,” she said with shaky sarcasm, rearranging the daisies on the table, “I expect you to take me from here at once.”

“Do you?” he yawned, pulling the screen aside and out of his way so he could see her.

Linet froze. She wouldn’t look at him. She would not. No matter that his imposing dark form against the white plaster wall drew her gaze like a candle in a cellar. She’d keep her eyes averted and look anywhere but at the man in the tub.

Slowly, she sucked in her breath. She walked straight to the bed and began smoothing the coverlet. She could hear his small groans of pleasure as the water soothed his sore muscles, smell the sage as he lathered the scented soap over his head.

She would have given her golden tresses to have that bath. But she wasn’t about to admit it to him.

This was amusing, Duncan decided, thoroughly enjoying himself. The little bit of a wool merchant was more delightfully complicated than anyone he’d ever met. God’s wounds—he’d nearly bedded the woman, and yet she was afraid to look at him. He could tell she ached for a bath. She no doubt itched from salt water, and long days on a grimy ship had taken their toll on her hair, which hung in dull strings. Still, he knew pride kept her from accepting his hospitality. He’d have to force it on her.

Linet fluffed the bolster on the bed and bit her lip. If she heard just one more contented sigh out of that wretched peasant…

“Ah!” he suddenly cried out.

She immediately looked his way. He was seated modestly enough in the tub, bent forward, scrubbing at his eye. Before she could think, her instincts came to the fore. She crossed to him. “Did you soap your eye?” she demanded, bending down to him. Her father had done the same thing countless times.

He nodded, grimacing.

“Let me see,” she insisted. She brushed his hands away, muttering, “The French put so much ash in their soap.”

He looked up at her and blinked a few times, but she didn’t notice the spark in his eyes until it was too late. Before she could do anything, he firmly grabbed her arm.

“There’s no soap in your eye,” she stated, realizing her error.

His smile was grim and full of promise. “You need a bath.”

She gasped. “What?”

“You stink. I refuse to share my room with anyone smelling of seaweed and wet wool.”

She gave him a satisfied glare. “Good. Then I shall
never
bathe.”

The glint in his eye told her otherwise. Without warning, he rose like Neptune from the sea, the water sluicing down his body. Before she had time to be shocked by his boldness, he stepped out, caught her by the waist, and bent her over his thigh into the tub. Water splashed up over the edge and onto the floor.

“Y-you!” she sputtered, struggling and splashing more.

He laughed, pulling her wet jerkin and tunic off in a matter of moments. While she howled, desperately trying to cover her top half, he tugged off her hose as well, leaving her completely naked.

Duncan tossed the dripping garments onto the floor. Then he wrapped a linen towel around his hips, crossed his arms, and stepped back to admire his handiwork.

His breath stilled in his chest, and his mouth went dry. His grin melted away, and his arms relaxed out of their fold. Before, he’d seen her only partially unclothed in the dim shadows of the hold. He’d only imagined by the feel of her what she must look like. But now the gold light of day left nothing to his imagination.

She was Venus bathing in the sea. The fair crescents of her breasts skimmed the top of the water like twin moons, the nipples shielded from his eyes by one modest arm. Her hair floated like a storm cloud in the swirling water around her body. Her long legs glistened with water drops, and beneath the water, peeping out from between her concealing fingers, he could see the darkened curls of her womanhood waving gently in the subsiding current. Only the crackle of her eyes destroyed the angelic illusion.

He thanked God he’d wound the towel around him, for he was about to show the effects of her beauty upon him in a most blatant fashion.

Linet felt a giddy flush stain her cheeks, the kind that came when she’d drunk too much wine. Her body tingled beneath his gaze. No one had ever looked at her like the beggar did. She knew she should be indignant. She tried desperately to act so. But the truth was, it was oddly pleasing to be looked at this way. It gave her a peculiar feeling of power to note the heaviness of his eyelids, the deepening of his breath.

Without meaning to, she watched him as well, enthralled, as a drop of water fell from a lock of his dark hair onto the broad swell of his shoulder. It trickled slowly over his wide, smooth chest and down his lean stomach. She had the strangest longing to reach out and retrace its path with her fingers. Then she realized she was staring. Briskly, she tore her gaze away.

“You’ve got me in the tub then,” she mumbled breathlessly. “At least have the decency to let me bathe in peace.”

“As you wish,” he replied with a mockery of a bow.

Only when he’d gone to the far side of the room did she settle back against the damp wood of the tub. The warm water began to work its magic instantly, easing her muscles, soothing her temper and melting her inhibitions.

Before long, she began to feel positively remorseful about the way she’d treated the beggar. Aye, he’d offended her propriety. And he’d taken unspeakable liberties with her person. He’d flung her off a ship and brought her to a brothel.