The Mistress Of Normandy by Susan Wiggs

Author:Susan Wiggs [Susan Wiggs]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Romance, Historical Romance, Medieval Romance, Love Story, Medieval France, Medieval England, Knights, Warriors
ISBN: 9780778316367
Google: p5j_AwAAQBAJ
Amazon: 077831636X
Barnesnoble: 077831636X
Goodreads: 18812410
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2014-07-31T14:00:00+00:00

Fourteen

The keening whistle of an ascending rocket sliced the silence and struck a flash of light in Lianna’s solar. She shivered, wrapped her robe more tightly around her. Flames from a pair of candles caused her shadow to dance nervously on the painted gesso wall.

She studied the mural. Familiar images, a frieze of life from another age. The young mother laughed with her infant; the knight on bended knee paid reverence to his lady.

Now she looked upon the scene with new eyes. Rand the Gascon had made her believe that the painting spoke of real feelings, of dreams answered. Enguerrand the Englishman had shown her that such fancies were the stuff of fools.

Perhaps that was what she regretted above all. Though she could fight for her home, the loss of her dreams was permanent, irrevocable. Or was it? She had a future with him; she’d have a baby with blond hair and leaf-green eyes.... She banished the image. Damn him for making her want a life with an Englishman.

For that she hated him most of all. For that she had barred her chamber door to him.

The crackle of the feu d’artifice and the cheers of the crowd grated on her nerves. Everyone accepted Rand and the gifts of King Henry. Everyone except her and Macée. Lianna felt a stab of compassion for Gervais’s wife. Tomorrow, Lianna would do what she could to reassure Macée. But tonight...

The metal of the door latch grated. Lianna’s head snapped around to the thick door, stoutly secured by her own hand. She took a step back, her gaze locked on the door.

“Lianna?” Rand’s deep, rich voice called. He worked at the latch again.

She fell still, mute, and tried with all her might to crush a niggling spark of fear. The long silence, punctuated by fireworks, calmed her. Perhaps he had realized she would not submit to him and had gone off to make his pallet elsewhere.

Her sigh of relief became a gasp of astonishment when something heavy slammed against the door. The sound thundered again. She jumped. With horror and awe she watched the iron latch give, rent from its anchoring.

The door crashed open.

His face calm, his hand idly rubbing one shoulder, her husband stepped into her chamber.

He seemed no more distraught than a man entering the hall for his noontide meal. Then he jerked the damaged door shut. Candle flames, flaring in the breeze generated by the motion, lighted his face. And Lianna saw that he was not calm at all.

His eyes glittered, keen and formidable as tempered steel. Never had anger looked so magnificent on a man, nor so fearsome. She forced herself to stand still, her chin jutting defiantly, her eyes unblinking.

“Never,” he said softly, “never bar this door to me again.”

“Did it wound my lord husband’s pride?”

His hand stopped kneading his shoulder and dropped to his side. “Your pettiness wounds us both, and all who serve us. If I lack harmony with my own wife, the poison of dissension will eventually taint this entire household.

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