and closed the door softly, her mouth a hard, grim line.
Roger removed Hilda’s hands from his shoulders. “No,” he said quietly but firmly. “It’s finished between us.”
Hilda gasped, and even in the darkness he could see the panic in her eyes.
He suspected she had been waiting for him, to see where she stood now that he was to be married. He had no intention of punishing a woman who had pleased him by sending her away from her home. “You need have no fear,” he said. “You may remain as a servant in the hall.”
“I can’t, my lord!” Hilda protested, starting to weep and covering her face with her hands. “She’ll not allow it! She hates me already, I think. The looks she gives me! She knows about us, or guesses—and rightly, too, as you well know. I’ll have to leave here!”
Roger grasped Hilda’s upper arms and waited until she uncovered her tear-streaked face. He spoke slowly and deliberately, so that she would hear his sincerity. “I say that you may remain in this castle. You are a good woman, Hilda, and a fine servant. No one may force you to leave. Do you understand?” He thought of the stern condemnation he himself had received from Mina Chilcott’s censorious eyes. He let go of Hilda and stepped away. “Nevertheless, you had best keep your distance from me in the future.”
Hilda nodded and smiled tremulously. “I...I will, my lord. Thank you, my lord.” A little of Hilda’s usually seductive manner asserted itself. “We had some good times, didn’t we, Sir Roger? If she don’t treat you right—”
“I will be faithful to my wife, Hilda.”
“Yes, my lord. I should have known.” She sighed again as she turned to walk away. “I hope you’ll be happy, my lord.”
Roger didn’t answer. What was there to say?
“Would you be so kind as to order an escort for me?” Mina asked Sir Roger as she joined the men at the high table the next morning to break the fast. The mass had been mercifully brief, yet something of a trial, for Father Damien mumbled and even fell asleep at one point.
A seat had been left vacant for her beside Sir Roger, she noted, which was an improvement from the previous evening. Sir Albert sat beside the empty chair, and again she was warmed by his pleasant countenance and kind smile. Reginald sat to Sir Roger’s left, and seemed rather overwhelmed by his host, to judge by the constant ingratiating grin on his face.
As for Sir Roger, she did not really know what his expression might be, because she did not deign to look at him after the first glimpse, which had made her blush and remember all too well the last time she had seen him, when he’d been enjoying his lustful rendezvous with the serving wench. Apparently she was more ashamed of his conduct than he.
The unbridled arrogance of the man, to practically make love with another woman right outside his betrothed’s bedchamber door! She would be relieved to be away from him.
“I wish to ride out today,” she announced, “since the storm has ceased. We were unable to see the land around the castle last night in the rain and the dark.”
“I cannot waste my time riding about the countryside,” Sir Roger said brusquely and not unexpectedly. “I have business to attend to.”
Mina was glad the hall was not as crowded as last night. She didn’t particularly want everyone to see the curt manner with which Sir Roger treated her. “Of course,” she answered with seeming affability. Truly, she didn’t desire any company. She wanted to get away by herself, as she often did when she was dispirited, which had to be because of the tiring journey in yesterday’s rain and the unfamiliar bed, nothing else. “You must oversee the repairs to the bridge,” she continued just as pleasantly, “as well as any other edifices that may have crumbled in the storm.”
Hilda sauntered by the table and set a platter of bread and fruit in front of her. “And perhaps you are tired,” Mina added innocently.
Sir Roger gave her a black and questioning look, and Hilda scurried away. Mina kept a sly, triumphant smile from her face as she took an apple and bit into it, enjoying the sweetness and juiciness of it.
“I will be happy to—” Sir Albert started to offer.
“I need you,” Sir Roger interrupted.
“I thank you for your concern, Sir Albert,” Mina said with a smile, “but I am quite comfortable going out alone.” She daintily dipped her fingers in a bowl of scented water beside Sir Roger and delicately wiped them on her napkin before rising. “Good day, gentlemen. I shall look forward to your gracious company at the evening meal, when I have returned from my ride.”
“I will not provide an escort,” Sir Roger reiterated.
“I understood you the first time, sir,” she replied evenly. She caught sight of Reginald, who was desperately shaking his head and winking as he tried to warn her to acquiesce to Sir Roger’s wishes.
She could easily ignore her half brother.
Sir Roger shot a glance at Reginald, who flushed bright red and cleared his throat awkwardly. “Mina, perhaps it would be better if you were to stay here today. It was a long and difficult journey, and the rest will do you good.”
“How kind of you to think of my well-being, Reginald. I appreciate it all the more for its rarity. Now I bid you a good day,” she replied, curtsying with maidenly modesty.
Roger wasn’t deceived. He saw her slightly stubborn smile and the hard gleam of determination in her eyes.
He recognized that look on her face. The best knights had it, for it revealed an unyielding desire to win in any situation. Inflexible fortitude was an admirable quality in a nobleman—but certainly not in a woman. There was only one kind of desire he wanted in a woman.
Then Mina Chilcott swept out of the hall without so much as a backward glance. God’s blessed blood, she was like no woman he had ever met before. Thank God.
Reginald cleared his throat again. “There, you see, my lord,” he said eagerly. “She can be reasonable.”
“Good,” Roger replied, but he was far from convinced that Mina Chilcott had any intention of obeying either him or Reginald. That smile, that superior little smile—the man who had trained him in the arts of war had always smiled like that when he expected Roger to fail, and that smile had too often proved prophetic. He had come to hate that smile of Fitzroy’s very much.
“If you excuse me, my lord,” Reginald said, “I have not much of an appetite this morning.” He got up and wandered in the general direction of the outer door, then into the courtyard.
“If he consumes that much when he has little appetite, I fear for the contents of my larder,” Roger said sarcastically.
Albert shifted in his chair. “Your betrothed has spirit, my lord,” he offered. “Very stimulating, and surely suggestive of a passionate nature, too.”
Roger looked at his friend with some surprise. “What’s this, Albert? I haven’t heard you comment on a woman in years.”
“And you seem to be going to great effort to be
