He ignored her message, moving nearer still.
Her heart thudded with dread and she snatched at the tunic.
He was so near, she could see the ripples of his muscles. Sweet Jesus! Like a snake striking, his arm reached out to take hold of her. Whirling, she drove the blade of her dagger into his shoulder.
Blood spurted.
“You fool,” he said through his teeth. His eyes blazed and he sucked in his breath as if in pain.
Writhing, she tried to pull her knife from his body so that she could wound him yet again, but he wrestled her to the bed, pinned her with his legs, and took hold of the dagger.
“God’s eyes, you are a witch.” He yanked the weapon from his shoulder and dropped the knife to the ground.
Blood flowed freely from his wound. His face was a hideous mask. Anger contorted his features as he twined his hands in her hair, pulled hard, twisting her, and exposing the back of her neck to the firelight.
Upon the pale skin of her neck was the birthmark—the kiss of the moon—that he’d heard about all his life. Old women in the scullery, seamstresses, and cooks, along with tanners and bakers, huntsmen, and peasants who tended the fields, had all spoken in whispered tones of the kiss of the moon, the birthmark coveted and revered by those who still believed that there was to be a Welsh savior for Prydd.
The girl had not lied. She was not Bliss, not a kitchen whore, but daughter of a baron with whom he had a fragile truce. A girl who would have given up her virginity to save her sister—but from what? His teeth ground hard together.
Guilt cut through his soul and he glanced down at her tiny body—naked and inviting—proof that he’d bartered with her to give up her virtue, and nearly raped her as well. Never in all his life had he taken a woman by force. In all the battles he’d fought, all the villages that had been plundered, he’d never lain with a woman who wasn’t more than willing to give herself to him. But this girl had been different; he’d wanted to mate with her to prove that she couldn’t thwart him, to best her, to conquer her arrogant spirit. Shame gouged deep in his soul.
“So you are the daughter of Eaton?” he said, his voice low with disgust.
“I told you who I was, and you chose not to listen.”
He rolled off her and cast a sorry look at her before turning his back. “Get dressed,” he commanded, tossing her the ripped tunic. “I will call for the guard to find something … more suitable.”
“Just give me my sister and her freedom.”
“Your sister is not here.” Tugging on his own clothes, he turned to find her struggling into the torn rags that were her disguise. She was a beautiful vixen, with her thick black hair, sculpted cheekbones, and eyes as blue as the Welsh sky in summer. God in heaven, he’d made a vast mistake, the likes of which he’d never seen. How could he not have recognized her? He remembered her as a girl, a mutinous little fox who had the gall to challenge him.
Now she was here, and he’d nearly forced himself on her. Eaton’s wrath would be boundless, and the delicate peace between the two castles would surely be ripped apart. How had he been so foolish? He strode to the door and barked an order to the guard—insisting that the man fetch some of his sister Anne’s clothes.
“The lady will not like to be awakened,” the guard said quietly.
Hagan let out a long, impatient sigh. “True, but I care not what Anne likes, Sir Peter. Tell her ’tis an order, that if she does not comply, I will come down to her chamber myself, strip her of whatever she is wearing, and gladly wring her beautiful neck in the bargain.”
He sent the guard hastening down the hall, then turned back to the bane of his existence, the savior of Prydd, the beautiful, stubborn woman who had tried to kill him in his sleep. The fact that she’d tried to slit his throat should have eased his conscience, but he still felt a blundering fool. Why had he thought her initial reaction to his seduction had been the act of a wily whore used to playing upon men’s fantasies?
“Where is my sister?” she demanded, still standing in the shadows near his bed. She’d pulled her clothes over her body, but still she trembled. Probably from pure hatred.
“I know not.”
“You won’t tell me.”
“I have no reason to believe that she is in the castle.”
“I would not lie, m’lord,” she said with a defiant toss of her head. “My sister is here, somewhere, held prisoner by these very walls. Leah was abducte
d by your men while riding to the village to pass out alms to the poor. The outlaws lay in wait in the forest and sprang upon Leah as she was going to the village. A serving maid and two of our most loyal knights were killed while trying to save my sister and me,” she added, changing the story just a little, her throat tightening as she thought of Keane, a man who had loved her, and the horrid arrow that killed him—an arrow from Erbyn.
“You lie,” he said, crossing his massive arms over his chest. Blood was seeping through the sleeve of his tunic.
“Why? Why would I dare come here if not for Leah?”
“Darton would not risk breaking the truce—”
“Then one of his men did. Someone bearing the Erbyn colors has started a war, Lord Hagan, and only you can stop it. Now, shall we find Leah?” she demanded as a knock resounded on the door.