Taming the Beast (13 page)

“Oh, but it is an inconvenience,” Roderick insisted quietly. “A grave, grave inconvenience to me, Tornfield.” Without looking away from the blond man, Roderick said, “Do you wish to go, Lady Michaela?”

From behind Tornfield, he heard her musical, if petulant, reply. “I most certainly do not! This man is married.”

Roderick let the visible part of his face relax into the closest proximity of a smile he could muster. “There you are, then. You have your answer.”

“No. No! I do not accept that answer!” Tornfield squeaked. “She is only cross with me! Given time—”

“The time you will be given is the time is takes me to count one to five,” Roderick said, letting the forced smile fall from his mouth. “If you are still here when ‘five' leaves my lips, I will fall upon you and teach you some of the exquisite pain that I was learned of in my recent travels. I do vow that the experience will stay with you a very, very long time.” And with that, Roderick turned his face fully toward Alan Tornfield, and delighted in the blanket of horrified fear that fell over the man's pale face.

“Oh my God!” Tornfield choked.

“One,” Roderick whispered.

“Surely you do not mean to—”

“Two…”

Hugh stepped forward and leaned between the two men. “I can assure you that he does not jest. Not even the slightest sense of humor, this one.”

Tornfield looked to Hugh, then to Roderick, and then let his eyes flick over his shoulder at the silent woman behind him still.

“Three…”

“Shall I throw you—pardon me—
show
you out?” Hugh offered courteously. “I would so hate for blood to spill on those fine, fine boots of yours. Wherever did you get them, Tornfield?”

“I—I—”

“Four…”

Alan Tornfield spun on his heel and skipped—walked—ran from the hall, Hugh following along leisurely and calling to him.

“Are they calfskin? The color is divine! I have a short pair in crimson, myself….”

And then Roderick turned to face the woman before him, remembering too late that his scars were no longer hidden by his hood.

Her clear blue eyes widened, she gasped, and her hands flew to cover her slack mouth.

Roderick waited for her scream.

Michaela was unsure what she had thought Roderick Cherbon would look like, but it wasn't the figure that stood before her now.

Instantly, memories of overheard rumors melded with the reality in front of her eyes, and the wild tales of his injuries were largely confirmed. He walked—putting to rest the false rumors that he could not—with the assistance of a long, black-polished, bentwood cane with a wide palm rest that he gripped with his left hand. But the large, square boots on his feet witnessed that his legs had indeed suffered the lion's share of injury in the Holy Land. Especially his left knee, which seemed to be turned outward, while the boot pointed straight ahead.

His right arm was also bent and held against his side, his fist clenched as if it were made that way, had never felt the freedom of fingers uncurled. He was dressed all in black and dark gray, as if he'd searched the land for clothing boasting the deepest absence of color in order to attire himself wholly in the shadows he was rumored to be part of. His tunic was ebony, his undershirt, pitch; only his face and the thick, corded column of his throat flashed in the dark recesses of his hood, the cloak of which was also black.

And within that diamond-shaped cave of raven wool was the fabled countenance of the Cherbon Devil. Hollow-cheeked and pale, square of jaw but with a jutting, clefted chin. His lips were full, a hairline scar diagonally breeching the curved seam, as if it had once been thought to stitch his mouth closed forever. His nose was longer than most men's, topped by a pair of bumps on the bridge, and Michaela knew it had experienced severe trauma. A thick, flat scar found its wellspring between the craggy peaks of his nose, and swept over Roderick Cherbon's right cheekbone just past the outer corner of his right eye. A clean wound made with a sharp blade, it seemed, but the scar it left was long and puckered and white, and ran off to God knew where on the rest of his head.

Above the high cheekbones—one scarred, one smooth—sunken eyes regarded her as a wary animal would appraise an unwelcome visitor to his lair. And it was there that Michaela became hopelessly mesmerized, fingertips pressing her lips almost painfully into her teeth while her heart pounded, pounded, pounded, until she thought she could hear its echo in the silent hall.

They were green, yes, but that humble word was not enough. His eyes were a spring leaf; the palest emerald; a tidal pool cupped by white sand in the morning sun. Sparkling, clear green, jeweled, dewed, glassy…

“Do I shock you?” he growled at her, and his tone held no little self-deprecation, aided by the slight lift of one corner of his mouth. It was as if he found her reaction amusing.

“Yes,” she whispered, the word muffled still by her hands. She felt not at all like herself, and the only thing she could compare her state to was when she was lost in a song. She let her hands slide slowly from her mouth. “You…”

“I?” he prompted, his tone turning slightly harsh. “Yes, Miss Fortune? What is it you want to say? That I am hideously crippled? Scarred? Yes. I am. But surely you'd heard the rumors before you came.”

She shook her head faintly. Why couldn't she seem to gather her wits? “No, you—”

He arched the eyebrow over his ruined cheek, seemed to turn his scars toward her more deliberately. “I'm not crippled?”

“Well, yes, you are, but—” Michaela squeezed her eyes shut for a moment and shook her head. When she looked at him once more, she felt only slightly more able to speak coherently.

“You have the most beautiful eyes I've ever seen,” she breathed, and then felt her face heat as his features grew even more hard, shuttered.

“What are you about?” he growled. “Is it your game to try to play me against Tornfield? Is that why you're here? For if it is, you may pack your things and be the hell gone from my sight. I do not engage in such sport, especially with those I find to be beneath me.”

Michaela felt her head draw back as if he'd struck her. Suddenly, his eyes weren't quite as beautiful as they had been only a moment ago.

“I beg your pardon?”

“You can beg all you damned well please, but I issued that missive for one purpose and one purpose only: to gain me Cherbon. If your presence engages some other itinerary of your own creation, you can bloody well take it elsewhere.”

“Why are you angry with me? I did not call Alan Tornfield to Cherbon. I've stayed longer than any other woman who had come here dared, and I've spent that time fulfilling my duties in a keep and with servants who have been left to run wild. I assure you, my lord, that if my motive was to return with Alan Tornfield as his mistress—”

“It was good enough a position for you before he married,” Roderick scoffed.

“You know nothing about my time at Tornfield!” Michaela insisted. “And I find your assumptions quite distasteful!”

“Oh, there are likely many things about Cherbon—both the man and the keep—that you will find distasteful, Miss Fortune.” Roderick almost chuckled. “Would that you accustom yourself to it now to save yourself any future insult.”

Michaela pressed her lips together as she struggled to regain hold over her temper. “Lord Cherbon, I requested your presence here because I have want to speak with you about our arrangement and the running of this hold. I thank you for coming, albeit quite tardily—”

Then he
did
laugh. “My appearance is not in answer to your summons, Miss Fortune. And our arrangement, as you call it, was set forth quite clearly by my missive and Sir Hugh Gilbert. There is nothing more for you to know.” His eyes flicked about the cavernous room. “You are fulfilling your duties satisfactorily, thus far. If there is aught you do that I do not agree with, rest assured that I will have it undone.” He took firm hold of his walking stick. “Now, if you'll excuse me, I was en route to other business before I stumbled upon your touching encounter with my cousin.”

He turned to lurch away.

“Lord Cherbon,
wait!
” Michaela stamped her foot on the last word. He paused but did not face her. “I find it most unusual that a man would be so disinterested in the woman who is not only to be his wife, but stepmother to his son! Especially a noble man who has kind intentions toward his future family. I—I must insist that we have regular communications if we are to both find success in your endeavor to hold Cherbon.”

The black-cloaked figure slowly turned, and when he looked at Michaela, his face was a stone mask of fury that caused her to back up a step.

“Mayhap it has escaped your notice, Miss Fortune, but I am not a
kind
man, not a
noble
man. You would do well to guard your person about me instead of worrying what I intend for my son, like some beggarly, weeping, useless nun. I care not one bloody shit for what you insist. If the way I run Cherbon does not please you”—he extended his cane past him—“
there
is the door. It works perfectly well as an exit as it does an entrance.” He clack-stumped his way from the hall, lurching like a black, mythical creature.

Michaela stood alone once more in the silence of the grand and somehow melancholy room and wondered what in the name of God she was doing at Cherbon Castle.

 

As soon as Roderick had passed through the doorway from the great hall and lurched into the bailey, he regretted his harsh words to Michaela Fortune. More than regretted them—he felt as if he'd just personally ended any chance he'd ever had of keeping Cherbon. He stopped at the well and braced his hand against the timber support.

And he could still see her cheeks pinkening in her otherwise creamy face, as if each hateful word he'd said to her—about her—had been a blow in itself.

Not that he cared that he had possibly hurt her feelings. It wasn't about that, of course. Only Cherbon. Only his obsession.

Roderick turned back toward the hall and recrossed the short span of dirt he'd already come over—what would have taken an able-bodied man only seconds, took Roderick more than a full minute. He flung the door wide in his self-fury and stomped inside.

 

The hall was empty. Of course.

He thought for a moment of following her to her chamber but quickly dismissed the idea. She was likely packing her things now, and by the time he made the long and arduous journey to his boyhood room, she would be gone. He couldn't very well chase her, as Alan Tornfield had done. And besides, he could not think what he would apologize for. He was what he was now, for good or for ill, forever and ever, amen, if you would. His time in the Holy Land had sealed that covenant.

Roderick made his way back outdoors and up the twenty or so meters along the south wall to come around the corner of the keep. Across the eastern expanse of bailey, between bustling serfs who never once glanced his way—as they had been warned against—Roderick saw Hugh coming through the north-east gate of the outer wall, riding one horse and leading another.

Roderick would be worsened physically by the ride, he knew, but mayhap it would clear his mind.

Any matter, he would take any chance he could to ride over the lands that would now likely fall from his possession very soon.

 

Michaela slammed the chamber door so hard that it bounced in its frame and swung back open to crash against the wall. She attacked the slab of wood, marched it back into its proper place, and slid the bolt so forcefully, she scraped blood from three of her knuckles.

“Oh—
dammit!
” She yelled the never-before-used expletive and brought her fingers to her mouth. She decided then and there that she should curse more often. In all her life, she had obeyed her mother's instructions on a proper, chaste manner of living. What a lady did and did not do. And where had it gotten her? No one had ever
treated
her like a lady. Where were her riches, her due respect? She had been laughed at, ridiculed, reviled in her home village, whispered about at Tornfield. Now she was in the company of a man she at last realized was the beast he was rumored to be, and she had no choice but to stay and put up with it.

Cursing had felt good. And so she would continue. Often. And she would strive to learn even more vile words to add to her vocabulary. Surely Lord Cherbon would prove useful for something other than a heavy coffer, after all. What did it matter if she cursed and blasphemed? Who would hear her?

“Bloody shit,” she tested on a whisper, borrowing the phrase from her surly intended.

No bolt of lightning struck her dead in the dismal room. No thunderous reprimand from Heaven caused her to fall prostrate to the floor. So, emboldened, she thought to raise her voice a bit.

“Damn bollocks, then!”

Again no fiery pit opened beneath her slippers, but a little giggle from behind her did cause Michaela to shriek and jump.

Leo Cherbon sat cross-legged in the middle of her bed, his hands over his mouth and his eyes laughing louder than his chirp.

“Leo, what are you doing in here?” she demanded, her face heating like a fired iron.

Immediately, the little boy's forehead creased into concern and his eyes shone as if an unseen tap had been set free behind the thick, black lashes.

“Aid-ee Mike-lah cross wif Ee-oh?”

“Oh, no, no!” Michaela rushed to the bedside and climbed upon it to kneel before the boy. “I'm not cross with you. You just surprised me. Are you supposed to be in here?”

This brought the mischievous smile back to his face and he shook his head slyly. “Ee-oh no lie-down today. Hoo gone!” He held up his hands and his eyes widened as if it was a grand mystery where Sir Hugh could have possibly vanished to.

“Hugh's gone, eh?” Michaela looked sideways at him, but couldn't help but grin. He was irresistible.

Leo nodded. “Ee-oh have his lie-down wif you.” And the boy flopped down on his side and snuggled into Michaela's pillows.

“Oh, why not?” Michaela sighed, and climbed up to the head of the bed. Immediately, Leo inched closer to her and reached out a little hand to grasp hers. He slid his head back to look at her and smiled as if she had just given him a pony covered in cakes.

“Why cross?”

“Why am I cross?” The little boy nodded and snuggled in even further, as if he expected a wonderful story. Michaela sighed. “Well, that is a very good question, Leo. Why am I cross? Let's see. Well, I suppose I am cross with your father.”

“Wif Wod-wick?”

“Yes, Roderick.” Michaela frowned. “Is that what you call him—Roderick?”

Leo nodded again. “Wod-wick big.”

Michaela thought there were several words she could add to the boy's description of the Lord of Cherbon, but she refrained, once again falling back on her mother's lessons of propriety. He was only three, after all.

“Yes, he is. Leo, do you not ever call Roderick Father or Papa?”

Leo shook his head. “Wod-wick.”

“Why?” Michaela could not understand this strange habit between a father and his very young son. Mayhap if Leo were ten or twelve, but not three.