The Bride and the Brute(12)

“Are we to believe that?” he wondered.

“Morse, don’t bully her,” Nicole reprimanded, taking a seat beside Jayce.

Morse threw back his head and chortles of glee issued from his mouth. “The victimized Lady Nicole is the only one to come to your rescue!” He laughed again.

Jayce didn’t dare cast a glance at Reese. She knew his glowering visage and stern disapproval would shatter her already shaky resolve.

“Why throw yourself at a man? Desperate? Hungry for sex?”

“I didn’t know,” Jayce repeated, bowing her head, taking the comments one by one, outwardly showing no sign of distress, but inwardly dying with each lash of his tongue. Was this what Reese thought of her? Could she blame him if he did?

Reese wasn’t going to defend her. No one was. It was what they all believed. It was what Reese believed.

“And now, why stay? Unloved. Unwanted.”

“Morse,” Reese growled a warning.

But Jayce barely heard him. Her hands were shaking, and she clenched them so tight that her fingers turned purple.

Alone. Abandoned.

“Take back every single rude remark, sir. You have offended the lady.”

Jayce looked up to find Sir Dylan standing before the table, his hand at his sword. Relief, gratitude, and something akin to pride swept through her.

Morse leaned back in his chair, his dark eyes summing Dylan up in a sweeping glance. “But everything I’ve said is true.”

Dylan’s jaw clenched. “She is lady of this castle and Lord Reese’s rightful wife.”

“Then why doesn’t he defend her?”

Dylan cast Reese an angry glance, then turned his hot, youthful eyes onto the dark man. “Take back your words.”

One side of Morse’s mouth curved into a grin. “I don’t think so,” he said.

Anxiety tightened Jayce’s stomach.

“Then, I challenge you to a joust for Lady Jayce’s honor,” Dylan said.

Reese had come half out of his chair, but froze when the fighting words came from Dylan’s mouth.

The great hall reverberated with the challenge as the announcement was repeated throughout the room.

Suddenly, Morse erupted in laughter, a rich rolling guffaw trilling from his throat like a trumpet. As abruptly as it started, it ended. He leaned forward, his hands splayed over the table. “It would be my pleasure,” he said.

Jayce knew this man they called Morse would defeat young Dylan. He had a brutal dark look in his eyes that unnerved her. Dylan’s hot-headedness would be his downfall. She wanted to tell Dylan he didn’t have to defend her, but she didn’t want to embarrass the young knight.

Reese was the one who should be challenging the man.

Jayce swung her gaze to Reese. He stood, staring at Dylan with hard, unflinching eyes. But he didn’t say a word. Finally, he whirled and left the great hall.

Morse’s laughter echoed through the room, following Reese’s footsteps.

Jayce glanced at Nicole, who didn’t move. The color had drained from her face as she stared at Dylan. Then, Jayce stood and raced after Reese. She turned a corner in the hallway. “Reese!” she called.

He halted, his back as straight as a board. He didn’t turn to her, and Jayce clenched her fists, refusing to budge from her spot.

“You can’t let Dylan fight him,” she announced to his back.

Reese turned slowly, his blue eyes flashing with anger.

“You’re lord of this castle,” she snapped. “It’s your duty to protect those beneath you. Dylan---”

“Is young and foolish. You’ve won him over with your charm, and now it will cost him his honor and his dignity.”

“Then stop him,” Jayce ordered. “Order him not to fight.”

“I can’t,” Reese replied, moving toward her. “He would be humiliated and disgraced. You’re the one that has to do it. Tell him your honor is not worth fighting for.”

Jayce would do it in an instant, if she weren’t so afraid of hurting the young knight’s pride. But was his pride worth his life? Many knights had been wounded in such challenges and some even killed.

Dylan was impetuous and brash, and she admired him very much for coming to her defense, but she also knew she could not watch him face Morse.

“She will do no such thing,” a voice announced from behind her.

Jayce whirled to see Dylan storming from the great hall, his eyes blazing with anger. He marched past her toward Reese. He had to look up to stare Reese in the eye, but Dylan did so unflinchingly.

“Lady Jayce’s honor is worth all the gold in the land. It is worth all the stars in the sky. And it is most certainly worth my honor and my life,” Dylan told him.