Forever His(42)

“Saints’ blood.” Gaston’s expression was getting stormier by the second. He flicked a glance at Etienne. “Is this how you repay my confidence, lad? I appointed you to guard her—and you have all but handed her my chateau and all I own.”

“Nay, sir! I have watched her most carefully. This afternoon is the first that she has been alone for even a moment. She has done naught that could be considered at all threatening, milord. In fact—”

“Of course she has not. It is all part of her plan. I am gone but four days and everyone here has forgotten who and what this woman is! She is Tourelle’s ward! Sent here to ease us into unwatchfulness, that she may better carry out her lord’s plans.”

“Excuse me!” Celine finally managed to interject. Stunned by his overblown anger, she could only attribute it to the fact that he must be in great pain. He was roaring at them like a wounded lion. “Could we please argue about me later? You need to have that injury looked at.”

Gaston speared her with an icy glare. “You have no need to act the attentive wife. You may have woven some spell over my people—but you will find me a better adversary.” He thrust himself to his feet, though the movement obviously caused him pain.

Celine bit back the urge to respond in kind. He was furious enough without her provoking him further. His every move must hurt. “I am not—”

She broke off abruptly.

I am not acting. That was what she had been about to say.

“I ... I ...” She gazed up at him, feeling desperately confused. He was standing there snarling at her, his weapons gleaming at his waist, his hair ruffled from the wind, four days’ growth of beard on his cheeks, blood soaking his clothes, more angry and dangerous-looking than she had ever seen him—and she wasn’t the least bit afraid. All she could feel was concern. For him. It didn’t make any sense, yet it was the truth.

But he wouldn’t believe that. “I’m ... I’m merely curious about what happened,” she said at last. “Were you gored by a boar?”

The captain of his guards, the man everyone called Royce, spoke from behind Gaston. “Nay, milady, naught so dire as that. It was an injury suffered when we stopped at a tavern.”

The murmurs of conversation around them died down, as if everyone knew what Royce meant by that.

Celine didn’t get it. “A tavern?”

“Aye,” Gaston said. “To celebrate our successful hunt with a bit of drinking—and a bit of wenching.”

His answer landed a cold punch to the pit of Celine’s stomach. She was sorry she had asked. Gaston’s blunt comment told her more than she wanted to know, but he kept right on explaining.

“I suffered the injury while falling out of a lady’s bed. I was in a hurry to enjoy myself, and undressed so quickly that I was less than careful about where I left my weapons. When I rose from the bed—”

“He tripped in the dark,” Royce continued for him. “It became quite a melee after that—he had to call for assistance, and the lady in question was so stricken that she insisted on helping, and then we arrived on the scene. It was more difficult peeling her off him than binding the wound ...”

The men in the room were chuckling by now, but Celine’s cheeks were burning, her insides knotting up, three words spiraling through her mind: How could he? He had been married less than a week, and he had already—

But why was she even thinking of it that way?

What was wrong with her?

The vows they had spoken hadn’t meant anything. To either one of them. This marriage wasn’t real. It was a colossal mistake, a trick of time. She was going to catch the first moonbeam out of here, back to 1993. What did she care if he slept with another woman or a dozen other women?

She told herself it was just the way he was boasting of it so publicly. Gaston had every reason to hate her: he believed she was Tourelle’s ward, an enemy, a threat to his life, to his people. But this was a new low, even for him—and she didn’t understand why he was doing it.

Anger and jealousy and hurt and a tumult of other emotions squeezed into her throat, choking off both voice and air. It was ridiculous to feel this way! He had never been anything but honest: he felt nothing for her and he had no intention of curtailing his lusty ways. He had told her so when they said their vows. She didn’t care about him. Why should she feel hurt?

She could have faced him and everyone in the hall without flinching—except for the looks she was getting from the women.

The men were too busy guffawing over their lord’s escapade to notice, but the women were looking at Celine with expressions of sympathy, even pity.