The Concubine (Unexpected Circumstances 5)

“This will kill me,” he whispered against my skin. “I wanted to…to pretend I had done it…but then she would never have a child. By summer I would be pushed again to denounce you and marry Whitney.”

“You must have an heir,” I said. “I cannot give you one.”

“You still may,” he insisted.

I shook my head.

Branford wrapped his arms around my shoulders and brought my body as close to his as possible. His lips touched my jaw, and he moved as if to trail kisses along my face, but he only moved up close to my ear, where his whispered words were just barely audible.

“I need more time, my wife,” Branford said as his lips brushed my ear. “The situation here is far more dire than I have allowed you to know. I have some…possibilities, but we are too weak, our forces still far inferior to Hadebrand’s. I have to move very slowly, or those who are watching will understand what I am doing. There are far too many here now who side with Edgar, and six months is not enough. I need more time—a year, at least. For now…trust no one, Alexandra. No one!”

He pulled back and looked into my eyes as his fingers traced my cheekbone, brushing the stray tears from my skin. Again as if he were to kiss me, he leaned over to my other ear and whispered low to me.

“There is a word, Alexandra…a word known only to Sterlings. It is our family’s secret word. If the word is said, you know the person with you is trusted. Nod if you understand.”

I swallowed hard as the tension in my shoulders increased. I nodded once.

“Twilight,” he whispered to me. “Did you hear me clearly?”

“Yes,” I said as I turned my head to him.

“Do not repeat it,” he instructed as he pulled away from my ear. There was still so much pain in his eyes, and I was more confused than I had been before. His thumbs caressed my cheekbones as he looked into my eyes.

I wrapped my arms more fully around him and pressed my cheek into his chest. He wrapped his hands around my shoulders and held me against him.

“I wish our lives were our own,” he told me. “It would be…so very different. I fear when I become king, it will be worse, not better. Unless…”

My husband’s eyes closed, and he shook his head slowly.

“Still, I cannot bring myself to wish I had never brought you here,” he said as he looked at me. He moved in and tentatively touched his lips to mine. “It is horribly selfish of me, I know, but you are the only good thing in my life.”

“Branford, your family…”

“Yes, yes,” he said, but his tone was dismissive. “But it is not the same. I love them, of course. I care for them. But you…I never wanted to do anything to…to hurt you…and now…now…”

I could not deny the look in his eyes, for I knew I felt the same way. His emotions flared, and he moved quickly from love to determination to fear and anguish. Branford dropped to his knees in front of me, reaching out his arms to wrap around my waist.

“Please,” he begged of me, “take these thoughts from me. Make them disappear.”

I wrapped my arms around his shoulders, and he collapsed into me. With his head against my breast and his arms wrapped so tightly around me I could barely breathe, I held him. We stayed like that, wrapped together in the straw, throughout the night. Though I held him tightly, I could not stop the tears from falling. I cried for Hadley, for my husband, and for myself. Lying on the floor of the kennel in the middle of the winter night, I cried for Silverhelm and for the child we seemed destined to never have with each other.

*****

I woke, still on the ground in the kennel with the morning sun shining through the windows and my cold muscles aching. Looking around me, I immediately saw Michael near the entrance, holding Branford’s helmet in his hands, rubbing vigorously at the scuffs and marks until it shined.

Branford was nowhere to be seen.

I gathered my stiff legs underneath my body and stood. I glanced at Michael, who had stopped his polishing and was watching me.

“Good morning, Lady Alexandra,” he said.

“Good morning, Michael.” I felt myself blush as I realized what a state I must be in. “Where is Sir Branford?”

“On the practice field, Lady Alexandra,” he stated. “I was to stay here with you until you awoke and then escort you back to the castle.”

“I will go to see him first,” I informed the page. “Then you may take me back.”

Michael hesitated, and he had my sympathy. Though it was not his decision to make, I was going against his instructions from Branford, and he would hear of it later. Normally I would not put him in a position to feel Branford’s wrath, but I was not going back until I knew my husband was all right.