The Velvet Promise (Montgomery/Taggert 2)

Gavin turned to set her aside.

“Your wife is here.”

He turned to see Ela standing in the doorway.

“The woman is kept here, safe now, but she won’t be so safe if you spurn my Lady Alice.”

Gavin was next to the fat woman in seconds. “Do you threaten me, old hag?” He turned back to Alice. “Where is she?” he demanded.

Alice’s eyes spilled over with great, lovely tears. She didn’t speak.

“You waste time!” Alan said. “We’ll tear this place apart t

o find her.”

Gavin took a step toward the manor house.

“You won’t find her!”

Gavin whirled. The voice was a distorted version of Alice’s—high and screeching. Her little mouth was pulled back in a snarl, and he saw that her teeth were badly crooked. Why hadn’t he seen that before?

“She is where you nor any man will find her,” Alice continued, for the first time dropping her facade of sweetness before Gavin. “Do you think I would give that whore my best room? She deserves only the bottom of the moat!”

Gavin took a step toward her, disbelieving the drastic change in Alice. She didn’t seem even remotely kin to the woman he once loved.

“You didn’t know she gave herself to many men, did you? Did you know the child she lost was not even yours, but Demari’s?” Alice put her hand on his arm. “I could give you sons,” she leered, her face and voice a caricature of the woman he thought he knew.

“This is what you have neglected Judith for,” Alan said quietly. “Can you see now what everyone else does?”

“Yes, I see it,” Gavin said in disgust.

Alice backed away from the men, her eyes wild. She picked up her skirts and turned and ran, Ela following her.

When Alan started in pursuit, Gavin said, “Leave her. I would rather have my wife back than punish Alice.”

Alice ran from one building to the next, hiding, skulking, furtively looking about. Gavin had looked at her as if she repulsed him. Somewhere in her mind she knew Ela followed her, but her mind didn’t seem to be able to think of more than one thing at a time. Right now all she could think of was the fact that another woman had taken her lover from her. Quickly, she climbed the tower steps making sure no one was after her.

Judith looked up at Alice as she stood in the doorway. The woman’s hair was disarranged, her veil askew.

“So!” Alice said, her eyes glinting wildly. “You think you will get him back?”

Judith cringed against the ropes, her throat raw from calling out. But the walls were too thick for her to be heard.

Alice swept across the room grabbing a pot of hot oil from the brazier. A wick floated on top of the oil, ready to be lit. Alice held the oil carefully as she walked toward her prisoner. “He won’t think you are lovely once this eats away half of your face.”

“No!” Judith whispered and drew back as far as she could.

“Do I frighten you? Do I make your life hell as you have made mine? I was a happy woman before I knew of you. My life hasn’t been the same since I first heard your name. I had a father who loved me. Gavin worshiped me. A rich earl asked to marry me. Yet you have taken them all away from me. My father hardly recognizes me now. Gavin hates me. My rich husband is dead. And all because of you.”

She moved away from Judith and buried the pot of oil deeper into the coals. “It must be hot, very hot. What do you think will happen when your beauty is gone?”

Judith knew it was impossible to reason with the woman, but she still tried. “What you do to me won’t bring back your husband, and I don’t even know your father.”

“My husband!” Alice sneered. “Do you think I want him back? He was a swine of a man. Yet he once loved me. He changed after he went to your wedding. You made him believe I wasn’t worthy of him.”

Judith couldn’t speak. Her eyes stared at the heating oil.

“My lord,” Ela said nervously. “You must come. I’m afraid.”