The Lord's Right (14 page)

But when he was done, he knew she
ached for the same release he’d had, and, though she struggled
liked a pinned butterfly, he wouldn’t let her go until he felt her
attain the same sweet release, with an echoing cry of pure
ecstasy.

He was right. When they returned to
the fire, they were teased mercilessly, until King William put his
foot down, telling them that they were all just jealous, including
himself, who was missing his wife.

Piers and Amber spent the second night
of their marriage cuddled together on the ground, spooned with
Piers sword arm tight around Amber’s waist, just in case she
decided to wander during the night. He wouldn’t put anything past
her, especially the closer they got to her home
territory.

She brightened noticeably as they did,
and Piers found himself glad that they wouldn’t be too far from her
family once they settled into the castle. He assured her that she
would have time to see her family, but they would be going to the
site first and making camp there, which they did.

They hadn’t had much word as to the
condition of the construction, and it was worse than they thought
when they got there. Not much had been done at all, and there
weren’t very many men there, working on it, when they got there.
Piers was hard pressed to find the person in charge, and the man
he’d put in charge seemed to be gone altogether.

Amber could feel the scornful eyes of
her neighbors on her again, as she always had in the past. But this
time was different. She was their countess, not that they knew it
yet, since she had yet to be introduced to them as such.

But she had a feeling she could be of
assistance to Piers in this situation, since she knew most of the
people he would be dealing with. She didn’t want to interrupt his
discussion with the king, or cause him to lose face in any
way.

So she begged the king’s pardon in a
pretty way, asking if she might borrow her husband for a moment for
a woman’s matter. The king seemed to like her, and was feeling
indulgent, so he granted her that boon.

Piers, however, was not. They were
right in the middle of negotiations to get things back underway
when Amber had interrupted them. She began walking them over to a
small shop, well away from the rest of them and the construction
site.

“
This had better be
something very important, wife, or I’m going to be extremely
unhappy, and so is your backside this evening, or as soon as I can
attend to it.”

Amber looked up at him and smiled. “I
want to help. I know these people and I can be of assistance to
you. You shouldn’t be working with John Smith. He’ll do exactly
what he’s already done to you—take your money and do nothing once
you’re out of sight. Cut him off before you lose any more money and
go with Robert Squires and his family. He has nine boys, and
they’re all hard workers. You’ll get your money’s worth. Give them
half the price up front, and half when it’s done. Promise them a
good bonus if it’s done a year ahead of time, and I bet you they’ll
meet it. Throw in that I’ll come once a month to see to the workers
health, if you like.”

He considered her idea for a moment.
She had several salient points, and she did know the people and the
area. He wish he’d known her when he’d first come here.

As answer, Piers leaned down and
captured her mouth with his in an infinitely gentle kiss, one that
he was happy to note she returned wholeheartedly. “You, my wife,
are a wonder. The king is right to praise you, and I need to take a
page from his book and begin to do more of that. Although I think
I’ll definitely continue the discipline, too.”

She was smiling at him as if he’d set
the sun to rising this morning, and, at that point, he didn’t care
whether the damned castle ever got built, as long as she continued
to look at him like that.

“
Ahoy, lovebirds, we have
a castle to build yet. Save your sweetings for this evening,” the
king teased, approaching them with a wide smile on his
face.

Amber curtsied deep and prepared to
leave, but her husband surprised her and reached out for her hand.
“As you know, my liege, my wife was raised in this area, and she
has some very good ideas I would like to discuss with you.” He
kissed her gently, then released her.

“
My lord, is it all right
if I visit my family?” she asked, surprised and amazed that he had
told the king that the ideas that he was going to broach with him
were hers.

He was very proud of her for asking,
as he knew it didn’t come naturally to her, and in front of the
king, as well. “Of course. Would you like some coin to bring them
each something special?” Piers handed her a drawstring purse with
several gold coins. Sunder wasn’t a thriving metropolis, but there
were things to be had there that couldn’t be found in the woods
where she grew up.

“
Thank you, husband!”
Amber kissed him warmly on the cheek and, after executing another
blushing curtsey to the king, fairly ran off to see what small
trinkets she might secure for her sisters, and what tools she might
find for her father that would help him with his daily
chores.

She settled on a small doll for Faine,
although she wasn’t even sure if she was still playing with them,
really, and a new knife for her father that she knew he’d love.
Starr was harder to buy for, mostly because she knew her middle
sister the least, but she settled on a small gold pin.

She desperately wanted to but didn’t
dare to change into her boy clothes to walk to her father’s house.
It was funny to think that it was no longer her house, but it
wasn’t. Fordwick was her home now and eventually, the new castle
would be.

She wasn’t sure whether her family
even knew she was still alive. She breathed deeply every step of
the way through her woods, pulling in every single remembered scent
that brought her back to her childhood. Soon she was in the
clearing where their small shack stood, and she could see her Da in
the front yard, sharpening his scythe, and she could walk no
longer.

Something—or, more accurately,
someone—hit Lawson Cooper like a boulder, and it turned out to be
the person he was missing the most, after his wife. “Amber! You’ve
come back!” he cried, hugging his eldest tight against him, then
standing back and gazing on her with a precise paternal eye.
“How’ve you been? What’s happened? We’d heard you ended up at
Fordwick and pushed some toff into a fountain!”

Faine appeared in the doorway, looking
more and more the young woman and less and less the little girl,
and finally Starr, her least favorite sister, peering over her
shoulder, then, upon seeing who it was, ducking back into the
cottage with a sour look.

Da ushered her into the house and they
all sat around the table like they used to—except Starr, who kept
popping up for one reason or another, because she still preferred
to avoid Amber as much as possible—and Amber almost teared up at
how much she’d missed just this simple thing.

“
So, what are you waitin’
for, girl? Tell us what happened?”

She did just that, leaving out the
parts she knew her father really didn’t want to hear, or that she
thought would hurt him. And when she got to the point that she was
going to reveal the fact that she was now married to Cruel Piers,
the eagle eyed Starr came up behind her and grabbed her left
hand.

“
You’re married!” she
crowed, jumping around as if she’d discovered how to turn lead into
gold. Now, she could finally get married herself, if Bertram, the
smithy’s son, hadn’t lost interest by now.

Amber blushed. “Yes, I am.”

Her father wasn’t any too happy to
hear about that. “To a man who didn’t even bother to ask your
father’s permission? What sort of guttersnipe is he, this husband
of yours?”

Piers ducked through the small door to
the cabin at that point, barely able to wedge himself through it.
Everyone either bowed or curtsied, then Amber rose to join him at
the door as he looped his arm around her waist.

“
Da, this is my husband,
Piers de Montforte.”

Piers came forward and shook hands
with her father, who was quite literally bug eyed. “Y–your husband?
Why didn’t you tell me that, girl?”

Amber laughed. “Because you hadn’t
given me a chance.”

Then Piers said something that
endeared him to Amber’s heart forever. “I’m sorry for not asking
your permission for your daughter’s hand in marriage, Mr. Cooper,
but the king bade us marry, and we were joined within the hour, so
there was no chance. I had intended to meet you with Amber, but the
king and I got involved in straightening out the building of the
castle.”

Lawson accepted the younger man’s
apology with aplomb. “Why, that means that you’ll be livin’ close
to us, then, not so far away at Fordwick forever?”

“
That’s right. We’ll be
not too far away, and we’d be glad for you all to come stay with
us. I lost my family to plague years ago, God rest their souls, and
I would be very happy to have family around me again,” he looked
down at his wife, “including, of course, our own
children.”

Amber swallowed hard. She hadn’t
thought of children.

Faine tugged on Amber’s dress, and she
squatted down instantly to be on her level. “Yes,
poppet?”

“
B’fore you left, you tole
me you were gonna teach me to hunt.”

The entire family laughed, but Faine
looked quite indignant.

“
No more hunting females
in this family,” Lawson proclaimed, swinging his youngest around in
his arms.

Amber frowned at her father. “It
didn’t serve me too badly, Da, did it?” she asked, patting Piers’
shoulder.

“
You were dead lucky,
girl, and you know it.” Both Lawson and Piers shuddered, and Amber
sensed that they were going to start with the “what ifs”, which
never ended well for her. “When I think of the times that you could
have–”

“
Don’t we need to go,
husband?” she asked, smiling sweetly up at him.

But Piers was intrigued by what his
father-in-law was saying. “I believe I will need to confer with you
on a few things, Mr. Cooper, about my wife’s upbringing. The first
time we met, I had to spank her, but someone had already done quite
a remarkable job.”

“
Say no more.” Lawson had
already turned to go to the place beside the door where he hung the
belt he used only on Amber. He presented it to Piers as if he was
giving him a prized calf. “This is yours. Don’t spare it. I wasn’t
strong enough to give her the discipline she truly needs. I’m glad
she’s found a man who can do that for her. Don’t ever hesitate, no
matter what she says or does. She needs it, as did my wife before
her. They’re very much alike, in looks and deed.”

As much as she wished the ground would
simply swallow her up at the humiliating conversation that was
going on between her husband and her father, Amber had never heard
her father say that about her mother and how much like her she was.
It made her want to cry.

To say nothing of the fact that he’d
just told her husband not to spare the rod with her—as if he
already did. He didn’t need any encouragement.

Trying desperately to bring their
conversation to an end, Amber opened the door, saying, “I think I
hear the king calling.”

She wandered into the yard to the
sound of her family laughing behind her. She knew she was going to
have to do her level best to keep her father and her husband well
away from each other, or they were going to prove to be quite
dangerous to the health of her backside.

Her father offered his
hospitality—such as it was—for them to stay as long as they would
like, but they politely declined. They had to stay with His
Majesty, anyway. They set up a camp not far from the building site,
where they could keep an eye on things. It was decided that a
better guard contingency would be left there, to make sure that
work continued apace, although Amber assured them that it
would.

There was a seamstress in town, and
Piers had Amber fitted for several new gowns. Not an entire
wardrobe, but enough to replace the ones she was currently wearing
with ones that better befitted her current station. Amber had never
had clothing of such fine make or fashion, and she knew she would
almost be afraid to wear them. They made the same arrangement with
the seamstress as they had with the builders; they ordered five
dresses, and were going to be here for four days. If she could get
them done before they left so that Amber could have them to take
home, then she would earn a bonus. She was required to complete at
least two of them before they left so that she would have some new
dresses to wear once they arrived back at Fordwick.

Not only did he buy her gowns, but
belts, hose, shoes, everything else a woman could want, plus one
beautiful ruby broach that would go with almost everything they’d
bought. He’d seen her looking at it and had surprised her with it
later that evening.

While the men were busy trying to get
the construction back on track, she kept herself busy seeing
patients that had been neglected while she was gone, glad that
she’d brought as much in the way of potions as she had.