Page 86 of The Bodyguard Who Came in from the Cold
There was really only one choice. Peter had threatened to tell everyone her sins, knowing that she couldn’t embarrass her family that way. She was trapped.
Everything was made worse by the fact that Gareth was avoiding her. At night he assigned a guard to her door, and came no more to protect her himself.
Her bedchamber was no longer a haven. In her mind she saw Gareth before the hearth, behind the draperies, above her in bed. None of it could ever again be real.
The loneliness of her life was overwhelming—all because she loved Gareth.
With bittersweet irony, she could finally admit it to herself. Her marriage proposal hadn’t been about helping each other; she had been desperate not to lose the one person in life who made her happy, made her feel whole.
Gareth.
Even his name made her bury her face in her pillow and cry. How would she get through her days without him? He was drawing farther away from her, and she didn’t know what to do to stop it.
~oOo~
As the days sped by Margery abandoned her list of suitors. She had no choice but to marry Peter, or cause a huge scandal.
Other men still continued to appear at the castle to court her, but she didn’t turn them away. What did it matter anymore?
She sat before the hearth in the great hall, her embroidery untouched in her lap. Gareth sat at a nearby table, a book opened before him. She tried not to look at him, for the pain was nearly unbearable. Yet she glanced at him occasionally, and he never seemed to turn the page. What thoughts moved through his mind? Was he anxious to leave? Even glad that the king’s celebration was almost upon them?
Her latest suitor, Sir Bradley Palmer, had arrived just that afternoon. He must have barely twenty years, and seemed so young to her. Sir Bradley was eager to face life, while she felt only old and tired.
Sir Bradley came into the hall, walking by Gareth, who looked up. When their gazes met, Margery watched in amazement as Sir Bradley stumbled back, fear widening his eyes. Gareth calmly closed the book, waiting in what seemed like resignation.
Was this yet another man Gareth had defeated in tournaments?
Sir Bradley approached her with haste, looking over his shoulder repeatedly at Gareth. “Mistress Margery, I am sorry to be so bold, but do you not realize what man lies hidden here?”
“Hidden?” she asked with incomprehension.
“That man!” He turned and pointed at Gareth. His voice was loud, and soon he had the attention of the entire hall. “Surely you do not know his true identity.”
Gareth watched Sir Bradley with an impassive gaze.
“He is Sir Gareth Beaumont,” she said, knowing she’d done all this before.
The man’s eyebrows rose. “He does not even change his name. His gall astounds me. I am from Sussex, mistress, and there we all know who he is. Beaumont acquired another name when we squired together—Warfield’s Wizard.”
25
All eyes turned to Gareth, and Margery felt panic take hold of her. “Warfield’s Wizard? Surely you must have the wrong?—”
“No!” The young man’s voice rose through the hall. “I worked my way from page to squire at his side—always, he was different. He knew things others didn’t. Beaumont made Lord Warfield’s son ill, and foretold it with a vision. We knew to run in fear when his eyes would look far away, and his face darkened with a frown.”
A chill of recognition moved through Margery. She met Gareth’s calm eyes, remembering his blank gaze, his frown of pain. Always, he knew when she needed help, even knew where she’d been taken by Sir Humphrey. She wanted Gareth to deny it all, but he said nothing, just watched her with grim resignation.
She suddenly understood everything: from his unexplained knowledge of events to his belief in the Beaumont Curse. He thought himself some kind of monster, and by his silence, he invited the crowd’s condemnation. In fact, he seemed to want it.
Margery felt suddenly as if a great weight had been lifted from her soul. Gareth didn’t think he deserved her hand in marriage! She closed her eyes to hide her tears of relief. She hadn’t been wrong about him—the way they enjoyed each other’s nearness, his gentleness and passion in lovemaking. He had been hiding a secret he thought too terrible for her to hear.
Instead, it only made her love him more. How horrible to feel so different from everyone, to be condemned and hated for something he had no control over. Yet he had gone on with his life, and kept his burden private.
She couldn’t look at him, for worry that her admiration and love would shine from her eyes. Now was the moment she had trained her whole life for: to keep her people calm and secure in the knowledge that she was the ultimate authority at Hawksbury Castle.
The hall buzzed with whispered voices and a dangerous undercurrent. Everywhere Margery looked, servants and soldiers moved away, as if they’d never seen Gareth before. She had to stop this now, before the cry of “witch” ruined his life forever.
She did the first thing she could think of—she laughed. It was so easy to let peals of her laughter ring through the hall. She laughed at her mistakes, at her foolish pride, at the ignorance that allowed her to believe Gareth’s words instead of his heart.
