“Ye’ll stay in my home until nightfall,” Gwenda said, drawing Rhiannon into the shelter of the nearest dwelling. “Ye don’ want to be attracting notice.”
Rhiannon shook her head. “Ye’ve done enough, Gwenda. I’ll not be putting your family in danger. I’ll be gone at once.”
“The lookouts atop the wall might be seeing ye.”
“They’ll be thinking nothing of a village woman entering the forest.” She thrust her bundle of laundry at Gwenda.
The laundress hesitated, then took the bundle and nodded. “Keep my cloak, then, and go swiftly. May Briga go with ye.”
Rhiannon whispered a final word of thanks and slipped through the alley into the barley field beyond. The young plants, ankle-high and drooping with rain, soaked her skirt as she passed. Though every instinct screamed for haste, she forced herself to go slowly. She could not afford to attract attention.
The path between the planting rows ended at the tree line, quite near a patch of ground strewn with high markers and encircled by a stone wall. A cemetery?
A dark shadow moved just beyond, in the trees. A shiver of dread went up Rhiannon’s spine. Changing course, she picked her way across the rows and entered the forest by a separate path, head bent against the rain. She’d taken but two steps into the blessed shadows when a man stepped from behind an elm and clamped his fingers around her wrist.
Lucius wanted Rhiannon’s terror.
Instead, he received her disdain. Her chin lifted and her spine stiffened. The hood of her checkered cloak fell to her shoulders. She looked past him, into the forest, as if his hand restraining her arm was but a momentary inconvenience.
He caught her chin with his free hand and forced her to meet his gaze. Her golden eyes, usually so expressive, showed not a trace of emotion. Neither fear, nor anger, nor even regret. Had she played him for a fool? Was it so easy for her to walk away after she’d opened her thighs to him?
His own emotions, in contrast, churned in a cauldron of conflict. He snatched the one closest to the surface—anger—and clung to it.
“Lucius. Why are you here?”
His grip tightened on her wrist and the flare of pain he saw in her eyes brought satisfaction as well as guilt. “I might ask the same of you,” he said, keeping his voice carefully neutral.
She wrenched her chin from his grasp. “I am going home.”
“Your home is with me.”
“No. I am a free Celt, not a Roman slave. You have no right to keep me here.”
“By Pollux, I have every right. I claimed you from the field of battle.” He bent his head low and let his breath brush her temple. “You are mine.” He released her wrist and trailed his fingers up the inside of her arm, under her cloak. He brushed the outside curve of her breast.
He felt rather than heard her sharp intake of breath. With it rose the scent of her need.
His rod hardened.
She must have known, for her eyes went dark and when she spoke, her voice trembled. “How did you find me? Did you follow from the fort?”
“No. I was in the cemetery. Digging.”
Her eyes widened as she took in his mud-slicked armor. “Why?”
“Aulus is not in his grave.”
The tip of her tongue darted forward to wet her lips. “He is not?”
“No. An interesting turn of events, don’t you agree?”
“Indeed.”
“My brother watched my labors, of course. Then, as I finished refilling the pit, he vanished.”
Understanding dawned in her eyes. “You knew I was near.”
His fingers drifted across the swell of her breast and stroked through the fabric of her tunic. “Yes.” He teased her nipple into a tight nub, then flicked his thumb roughly across the hardened peak. “But I hardly need my brother to lead me to you. I scented you like the buck scents the doe.”
She gasped and arched into his touch, though he suspected she would have much preferred to remain unmoved. “Lucius …”
“I knew you were near,” he repeated, “but I didn’t know why, or how.” He plucked one nipple, then brought his left hand up to pinch the other, taking no care to be gentle. “You had help.”
“How did you—”
“Your cloak. Who was she? No, don’t answer. It will be easy enough to discover.”
Rhiannon tried to move away. “Nay! She did only as I asked.”
“No doubt.” His hands stole upward, encircling the delicate column of her neck. His thumbs covered the pulse at her throat. “Where is the amber necklace, Rhiannon?” His voice was deadly calm, but his fury crouched like a wildcat behind it. “Will I find it in your bedchamber? Or around the neck of the deceiving wench who gave you this cloak?” He made a disapproving sound. “What punishment should I mete out to such a woman?”