Page 46 of Her Dark Seduction
“Would you prefer me if I was such a man?” he mocked. “All women are the same! Whores the lot of you—you would willingly open your legs for nobility, casting aside a respectable man to be ridden by one with a title.”
I had given him the warning that saved his life yet still he despised me.
“What do you know of respectability?” I cried. “No respectable man would do to any noblewoman what you have done to me.”
“Noblewoman no more, my dear. You’re now a peasant—worse, even, for without your husband you are nothing.”
“How dare—”
“Enough!” he roared. “Do as I say, woman, or I’ll leave you here to rot.”
He pulled me to the horse and helped me up. I dared not ask where we were going but he knew my thoughts.
“We ride to the next village. Ask me no more tonight.”
We had not ridden for very long before patches of light shone through the trees. Sawford guided the horse past a number of huts until we reached a small dwelling next to a smithy. He motioned for me to stay on the horse while he dismounted and tapped on the door. A sliver of light appeared, and I heard low voices before he led the horse to the building and held out his hand. Again, the notion of escape crossed my mind—I had only to snatch the reins and be gone. I fingered the rings on my hands—jewels which would pay for my passage and entry to the convent. But something prevented me; a small spark of concern in Sawford’s eyes as they met mine. My desire to be rid of him faltered until it drained from me as assuredly as the blood from Baldwin’s throat.
I took his hand and dismounted, leaning against his warm body to steady myself, my legs trembling. Wanting to draw strength from him yet afraid to show dependency I resisted when he tried to draw me closer. Shrugging his shoulders, he pushed me toward the door.
“Say nothing, do you hear?” he warned, “or ’twill be the worse for you.”
The smith’s home was split into two rooms, separated by a cloth hanging. The smell of stale sweat and human waste lingered in the front room. I wrinkled my nose but said nothing. The smith sat at a table in the center of the room and eyed me curiously. A woman lay asleep on a pallet. Three children huddled together under a blanket on another pallet beside her.
Sawford pushed me into the back room and threw the panniers at my feet.
“You’ll find dry clothes in there.”
He returned to the front room to speak to the smith. I hastily stripped off my clothes, pulling on a fresh kirtle and setting my wet clothes out to dry. I drew the hanging back to see Sawford holding the smith’s hand.
“My thanks,” he said.
“Be gone in the morning,” the smith grunted, giving me a pointed look before joining his wife on the pallet. She stirred and drew him to her, offering her lips in her sleep. As Sawford let the hanging fall, I heard her sighs of pleasure.
“Are we to stay here?” I asked.
“Just for the night,” Sawford replied. “Do not cause trouble. I had to pay him extra to let you stay.”
“Does he know who I am?”
“I told him you are my whore. You look the part.”
I turned my back, touching my chin which throbbed where he had struck me. I heard him rummaging in the bag.
“Come here,” he said. I turned to see him lying on the pallet, holding his hand out.
“You wish me to play the part of your whore?”
“I am in no mood for you tonight,” he sneered, “but I wish to keep you close. You belong to me now. Do I need to bind your hands?”
“No,” I said wearily. “I have nowhere to go.”
I sank onto the pallet beside him, exhausted in body and mind, barely noticing him curl his body around mine. The last thing I remember before sleep took me was the sound of lovemaking in the room next door.
