LITMIR.BIZ

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a smile she did not feel. Over the years she had learned that even a forced display of contentment did much to help dismiss agitation within herself.

      “I would caution you again not to move too quickly in taking up your duties as lord, lest you overtire,” she said. “But I can see that you must feel better since you have dressed yourself. Would you take your meals in the hall with our folk come the morrow? We could speak more then of gathering the men and planning our strategy.”

      “Um,” he answered, still lost in other thoughts, troubling ones by the look on his face.

      “You might sit in the pleasuance a while and take the sun, if there is any to be had. What think you?”

      “What?” he asked, finally abandoning his distraction, whatever it had been.

      Sara laughed a little. “My, but you do turn a woman’s head with all of this attention!”

      He attended her than, surveying her head to toe and back again. Only when his gaze held hers once more did he speak. “You seek attention, do you? Of what sort?”

      Sara sat down again and smoothed her gown flat over her knees. “Whatever you wish to give, Richard. I demand nothing of you.”

      He rested his head against the back of the chair and regarded her through narrowed eyes. His long fingers tapped rhythmically against the armrests. “Then let us clearly mark what I demand of you.”

      Sara bristled, but she thought she hid it well. Was this a test of some kind, or did he mean to order her life as though she were a servant? Many noble women lived as such, she knew. Her own mother would have been one of those had not her father been disposed to kindness.

      “Make your list of dictates, then. Are they in such number as I would need to write them down?” she asked, idly twisting the end of her corded belt.

      One corner of his mouth rose in a half grin. “You have a sharp tongue, Sara of Fernstowe. Rather cutting when you wish it to be. Unfortunately, that is too often. You might keep it behind your teeth, for a start.”

      “I might,” she said, not committing to it.

      He raked her clothing once more with a look of disdain. “And I should not like you garbed in rags again now that I see you possess better.”

      “As you wish,” she agreed. “However, ’tis not thrift in any measure to ruin good clothing. I only dress so modestly when I am about those tasks as require hard work.”

      One eyebrow rose in question. “Tasks? Such as?”

      She smiled sweetly. “Tending the wounded, for an instance.”

      He did have the grace to show chagrin at that, assuring her he did have a conscience. “Point well-taken. I have not yet thanked you properly for tending me. Be assured, you shall have a gift.”

      “The king gave me one,” she replied with a lift of her chin. “You.”

      With a quick exhalation of what seemed disgust, he turned his gaze away, blinked hard, and then looked back again. “I repeat, I would you attire yourself appropriately whenever possible.”

      “Of course.” Sara had not thought Sir Richard a man of vanity, but she supposed most men would not like to have their wives give cause for embarrassment should they have unexpected company. What would he have thought if he had seen her dressed for their wedding? A grin escaped her at the imagining.

      “What amuses you so?” he demanded, his voice brusque with offense, as though she were laughing at him. Sara supposed she was in a way, but also at herself.

      “Life becomes unbearable if you overlook the ridiculous,” she advised him with a knowing look. “I would have leaped from the tower years ago had my good humor deserted me. Why so glum?”

      Richard scoffed and shook his head. “You need ask?”

      “Oh, come now. You say you have property, wealth. Now you have added mine to it. You have children, a great king to serve. Your health improves by the day. A homely wife is not the end of the world, you know,” she admonished, still grinning. “I might not set any hearts athump with passion, but I can converse as well as any man. What say we strike a companionship here instead of suffering over your dented pride?”

      He watched her for a time as he sat there all unmoving. “You are sadly misinformed as to your appeal, madam. And a bit mad, I believe,” he finally stated.

      She laughed outright and let it die to a chuckle. “Aye, with that dour disposition of yours, you would think me daft. What has made you as you are, I wonder? Tell me, have you never a cause for levity?”

      Those dark eyebrows made a V over his eyes. “Now and again, but not since I came here.”

      With a long sigh and a shake of her head, Sara rose from the stool and approached him. “Then we must find you one, for I would see you smile.” She reached out and dared to touch his brow, brushing away the lock of dark auburn that had fallen out of place. “Can you not?”

      With a move quick as lightning, he grabbed her wrist. “Do not touch me.”

      While his grip did not hurt, it was quite firm. “Very well,” she whispered, not missing the unexpected flare of hunger in his eyes. It gave her hope enough to persist. “But how are we to manage a marriage between us if we never touch?”

      Carefully he moved the wrist he held so that it rested against her own body, near her hip. Then he released her, his fingers unclenching slowly and closing in upon themselves as his hand retreated.

      In a measured tone, his desire now well concealed, he replied, “I shall fulfill the king’s wishes on the matter of the Scots. And I will see to your estates as if they were my own, so long as I remain here.”

      “But we are not to cohabit as man and wife, is that what you are saying?”

      He nodded once, his hands gripping the chair so tightly his knuckles turned white. “You wish me to be blunt? Very well, I shall be. You made a bad move wedding a man who wants no wife.”

      “What of children?” she offered hopefully.

      “Another excellent reason to abstain. I already have some.”

      She lowered her eyes. “And I do not.”

      “So be it. You’ll have no cause to bemoan the state of your ruined body or your lost hours of idleness.”

      Sara placed her hand over his, the one that had gripped hers only moments ago. “That wife of yours must have wronged you foully, Richard. I would not.”

      “Leave me,” he ordered, and jerked his hand away. “And do not broach this matter again, for I would not speak of it further.”

      Sara shrugged. “As you will. But, be that as it may, we could be friends, could we not?”

      He did laugh then, bitterly. “Good God in heaven, you are the strangest woman I have ever met! And the most determined. Have you no pride at all? Here I have said that I will not bed you! I have denied you children! And still you want to be my friend?”

      “I do,” she admitted. “It makes more sense than not.”

      He blew out a huff of frustration, or perhaps disbelief. “You ask for a man’s death in one breath and laugh in jest the next. You leap from slayings to beddings without pause to breathe. What am I to think of you?”

      “So long as you do think of me,” Sara declared. “Your anger will fade eventually. I would be a wife in truth, Richard. One who will love you if you let me. Your children, those you have and those we might make, would provide great joy for me, not cause for complaint. Think me mad for that, if you will,” she said reasonably, “but do think of me.”

      She watched his face as he took in all that she had said. When his expression offered her no hope of succeeding in her mission today, she quietly turned and left him alone.

      He would come

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