his head turned away from Louve, though he could feel his former friend’s gaze. ‘Let’s take the horses to the manor,’ Nicholas said.
* * *
Matilda should have heard their voices or the extra commotion in the yard. She should have heard his voice. But she couldn’t seem to hear anything through the roaring in her head. Not even her own thoughts were clear to her.
She realised that Bess, who walked beside her, hadn’t been as affected as her. Bess had understood that Nicholas was within a few paces on their path and hadn’t steered them in another direction.
But it was too late for her, because Nicholas was suddenly there before her. Already handing his reins to a boy, with whom he shared a few words.
He faced away from her, and his back afforded her a few moments to watch him while he exchanged greetings and soothed one of his horses, who stamped his hooves as the satchels were removed.
Nicholas. How had she forgotten how formidable he was? His brown hair was much longer, and tied back in a queue which emphasised his shoulders, so much broader than when he’d left six years ago. From being a mercenary; from swinging his sword and killing.
Such a dangerous and unscrupulous profession had given him the strength she saw in his arms, in the tapering of his waist to the defined legs that had walked the many lands he’d once written to her about.
The horses he’d chosen were huge, but they didn’t disguise what a giant of a man he was. How had she forgotten the immensity of him?
Bess went still at her side, neither pushing her forward nor turning her away, while others offered shouts and greetings. Not all the voices held joy. There was a tenor of dismay that she couldn’t understand.
Surely sounds of distress had no meaning when the prodigal lord of the manor had returned. Now was a time for joy and much celebration. If Nicholas had returned, it meant he’d fulfilled his vow to his people. It meant he had enough funds to make Mei Solis all he’d envisaged and promised.
Or perhaps he had simply returned without coin. How was she to know? He had once been so honourable in his vows...and then he had broken the vow he’d made to her. To make her his wife.
He turned then, deliberately, as if her accusations had struck his back. When he fully faced her, even Bess’s hand at her elbow didn’t steady her.
She swallowed a gasp as she noticed his left eye was covered by a brown leather patch. But otherwise, how could she have forgotten how he looked? The angles of his jaw softened only by the fullness of his lower lip. The broadness of the nose he’d boasted no one could ever break? How his steady brown gaze had riveted her?
She remembered their kisses. The way he’d smelled and felt when he’d held her. And his gaze...the way he’d looked at her. But she’d forgotten the feeling of breathlessness from just his look. It was this that had captured her when they’d been only friends. It was his gaze that had made him see into her soul and she into his as they fell in love.
What did he see in her right now? Almost eight months pregnant, her skirts saturated with mud, wheat stuck in her hair. Shock in her eyes, trembling in her limbs, and her breath coming short.
Shorter yet as she comprehended why her heart pounded so desperately until her breath wouldn’t come. Why her nerves jarred her inside as if trying to wake her.
Nicholas had a scar across his face. A thin slice that went from his left temple across his left eye, and down his cheek. Then there was a gap at his neck, before a broader gash revealed itself on his collarbone and disappeared under his loose tunic. He’d tried to cover his eye with brown leather, but she could see it. As if in a nightmare, she could see all of it.
All these years she’d imagined the swing of a sword gutting him. Imagined him spilling his life’s blood in a field too far away for her to reach him. He was here—alive—but he had lost his eye. What he must have suffered...
And she hadn’t known. He’d never told her. Hot rage roared through her, until her first and only instinct was to hit and rail at him and never stop. How could he have done this to himself? How could he have done this to her?
His brows drew in and his mouth grew fierce. His gaze, as open as hers must have been, grew cold. What did he see in her eyes?
Too much. She had purposely forgotten how he could see too much. How he knew her. And she’d thought she’d known him. Until the day he’d left Mei Solis. Until the moment he’d stopped writing to her and forgotten her completely.
She’d held on until her mother’s death, when she had realised how fleeting life was and that she should not wait a moment longer. So she’d agreed to marry Roger, and now she carried their baby. A daughter who was now more important than ever.
She briefly closed her eyes to Nicholas. Heard the horses being led away and Louve’s chatter regarding the weather. She focused on Bess’s clenching grip on her elbow, on the calls of children and animals, the smell of freshly cut wheat.
She was here on Mei Solis, the home that had remained her home because she had stayed, and she drew strength from it.
Nicholas was standing, waiting. It seemed the whole courtyard was waiting.
For her to throw something at him? To yell? To burst into hysterics or give a cutting remark because she was a woman scorned?
In their youth she had been mischievous and he reckless. They’d appeared a perfect match in every way. They’d shown no caution in their courtship because they’d seen no need to. And then he’d left because of his restlessness and his ideas of grandeur, even as she had begged for him to stay.
Six years. And now not only her but the entire courtyard held its breath for this reunion.
But she wouldn’t rail or hit out—though that had been her first response. Between that breath and now she had found strength from her home. She had purposely changed herself over these last few years and was no longer the woman he had left. No longer the girl he’d grown up with, when they had been friends.
Friends. They had been friends first—before they’d held hands, kissed and promised to marry each other. Before she’d given him her heart and almost her body. Before he’d left and broken her trust.
Friends since childhood. And he had meant the world to her as they’d run and raced and jumped and laughed.
If that boy stood before her now, what would she do?
Striding over, she lifted herself on her toes and gave him a brief embrace before stepping back beside Bess. ‘Welcome home, Nicholas,’ she said, pleased that her voice did not break on his name. That her gaze stayed steady with his. ‘Are you hungry?’
He stood as still as the manor behind him, while she placed her hands on her belly as if to comfort her baby. Only she knew the truth of who truly needed comfort.
His gaze took in her movement and held there for only a moment. Her gown was heavy, and hid most of her pregnancy, but the protective cupping of her hands and their weight against her gown showed to anyone how far along she was.
‘It’s wonderful to be here again,’ he said, just as evenly. ‘And I am famished. But even I know this isn’t the time for food, and I don’t
