Once a Bride by Shari Anton Page B

wasn’t permissible. Not when he had to make her understand she must submit to his authority. Not when the vision of Eloise entwined with Hugh remained too fresh in his vivid imagination.
    He stepped back. “Perhaps you will find the situation more easily tolerated on the morn.”
    “Will you still be here? And the earl?”
    “Aye.”
    “Then the situation will still be intolerable. Pray send Isolde in when you leave.”
    A regal dismissal. He should take umbrage, but couldn’t think of a good reason to argue, and hated that she was probably right about tomorrow, especially if Sir John continued to elude capture.
    “Do you think they found a dry place in which to shelter, milady?”
    From her cross-legged position in the middle of her bed, Eloise glanced over at where Isolde was tucked into her pallet. The only light in the room came from glowing coals in the elegant brass brazier they’d lit against the chill of a stormy night.
    “Likely.” The weak assurance didn’t ease her worry over her father and undoubtedly wouldn’t satisfy Isolde’s concern for her brother.
    “Sir John did right to take Edgar with him,” Isolde stated. “My brother knows these lands and the castle nigh as well as his lordship.”
    Eloise heard both fear and pride. Whatever fate awaited Sir John, Edgar would share in it. When this was over, the squire would either be rewarded handsomely or hang beside the lord he served.
    She shivered, blaming the thinness of her white linen nightrail, and glanced down at the parchment in her lap. Somehow, she’d concluded, Edgar must have snuck into Lelleford and placed the message on her bed. How, she didn’t know, but ’twas the only reasonable explanation.
    “Both Father and Edgar are resourceful. I just wish I knew how to alert them to what goes on here.”
    Especially to Roland St. Marten’s role in the affair. Even if, as her father seemed to believe, Kenworth would leave soon, Father shouldn’t return only to be caught unaware of Roland’s presence.
    She’d certainly been caught unaware earlier.
    After managing to ignore him all through supper, she’d been forced to deal with Roland in her chamber, a place she never dreamed to encounter him. She might have successfully hidden the message from him, but not her unruly emotions.
    Eloise couldn’t remember when she’d last allowed her tears to surface in anyone’s presence. Always, if tears threatened too hard, she sought privacy. Too, crying inevitably left her weak and drained, and she so detested losing control she’d learned how to ruthlessly maintain her composure.
    She had
not
been overset. The tears had surfaced, but not flowed. But it had been damn hard to withhold them when Roland’s deeply timbered voice rumbled through her with a surprising offer of comfort.
    Damn the man. She neither wanted nor appreciated his attempt at courtesy. He was the enemy, the invader. The despicable toad who’d tried to convince his half brother not to marry her.
    One brief and oddly tender encounter didn’t absolve him of his sins against her. Nor did the few happier moments they’d shared before he’d proved false count in his favor.
    She’d been so sure of his good opinion. On one occasion in particular. Roland had come into the stable while she was there, and at the time she fancied he’d sought her out apurpose. They’d spent a long time companionably admiring each other’s horses.
    He’d appreciated the grace and heart of her elderly mare; she’d admired the elegance and power of his stallion. He’d impressed her with his charm and wit, and she’d basked in his gallantry. ’Twas a shame, she’d thought then, that Roland was the youngest of his bevy of siblings, still a squire with hardly a copper to his name, and not the immediate heir to his father’s barony.
    Her disloyalty to Hugh had caused her a twinge of guilt, which worsened when she overheard how little Roland thought of her, then nearly became unbearable with Hugh’s