The Taming Read online

  Rogan awoke almost immediately, and he reacted instantly by grabbing the sleeping maid from the fiery bed, then leaping up. The girl awoke and began screaming and kept screaming when Rogan dropped her on the far side of the room. He grabbed the smoldering blanket from the bed and began to beat at the spreading flames. The door burst open and Severn came in and helped his brother put out the fire before it reached the rafters of the wooden ceiling. When the flames were at last out, the two brothers shoved the charred remains of the mattress out the window, where they fell below into the moat.

  The maid’s screams had stopped, but now she stood huddled into a corner of the room, her eyes alive with terror. She made little whimpering sounds.

  “Stop that!” Rogan commanded. “It was just a little fire,” he said, then followed the girl’s eyes to where Liana stood, still holding the torch. It took Rogan a moment to understand what had happened, and then he didn’t believe what he thought to be true. “You set the bed on fire. You tried to kill me,” he stated, then turned to Severn. “She’s with the Howards. Take her and burn her in the morning.”

  Before Severn could answer, before any of the many people, including Zared, who were crowding at the doorway could reply, Liana’s rage erupted.

  “Yes, I tried to kill you,” she said, and advanced on him with the flame of the torch toward him, “and I wish I had succeeded. You have humiliated me, dishonored me, ridiculed me—”

  “I?” Rogan said, utterly astonished. He could have easily taken the torch away from her, but she looked rather good with all that fair hair and thin robe in the firelight. And her face! Was she the girl he’d thought plain? “I have paid you every respect. I have hardly been near you.”

  “True!” she hissed at him, taking another step toward him. “You left me alone at my own wedding feast. You left me alone on my wedding night.”

  Rogan wore the look of a man unjustly accused. “You are no longer a virgin. I saw to that.”

  “You raped me!” she half yelled at him.

  Now Rogan was beginning to get angry. In his view, he had never raped a woman in his life. Not because he was morally opposed to it but because with his face and form, he’d never found the act necessary. “I did not,” he said under his breath, watching the way her breasts moved under her robe.

  “I can see we aren’t needed,” Severn said loudly, but Rogan and Liana were so intent on each other they didn’t hear him. Severn pushed the others out of the room and shut the door behind him.

  “But she must be punished,” Zared said. “She nearly killed Rogan.”

  “Interesting wench, that one,” Severn said thoughtfully.

  “She has my room!” Wednesday wailed, a charred blanket wrapped around her nudity.

  Severn smiled. “She may have taken more than your room. Go sleep with Sunday. And you,” he said to Zared, “go to bed.”

  Inside the room, Liana and Rogan faced each other. Rogan knew he should punish her—after all, she might have killed him—but now that he knew her action was merely a woman’s jealous fit, he knew it was nothing to be concerned about. “I should have you flogged.”

  “You lay a hand on me, and the next time I’ll set your hair on fire.”

  “Now, see here—” he said. She was going too far. He was willing to put up with women’s little tempers—after all, they were women—but this was too much.

  Liana jabbed the torch at him. He seemed utterly unaware that he was wearing not a stitch of clothing. “No, it is your turn to listen to me. I have stood by silently and watched as you have ignored me, belittled me. You allow those…those Days of yours to laugh at me. Me! The lady of the castle. I am your wife, and I am going to be treated as I deserve. So help me God, you will treat me with courtesy and respect—I do not demand love—or you had better never sleep when I am by, for you will never wake up again.”

  Rogan was speechless. It was one thing to be threatened by an enemy, but this woman was his wife! “No woman threatens me,” he said quietly.

  Liana jabbed the torch at him and in one swift gesture he took it from her, then caught her waist. He meant to haul her from the room, to take her below and lock her in the cellar, but when her face was close to his, his anger turned to desire. Never had he desired a woman as much as he desired this one. He would die if he could not have her.

  He put his hand to her shoulder and started to tear the robe from her.

  “No!” she said, pulling back from him.

  He was blinded with passion, his brain given over to the wanting of her. He wrapped his hand in her hair and pulled her toward him.

  “No,” she whispered, her lips against his. “You do not rape me again. You may make love to me all night, but you do not rape me.”

  Rogan was taken aback by her. Women gave themselves to him, women had seduced him, but he’d never had a woman make demands of him. And suddenly, he wanted to please her. It had never occurred to him before whether he was pleasing a woman or not, but this one he wanted to please.

  His hands on her shoulders loosened their grip until his fingers were softly holding her skin. Gently, he pulled her toward him. He didn’t usually trouble himself much with kissing the women he bedded because they were always ready and eager for him and it was a waste of time to kiss them. But he wanted to kiss this woman.

  Liana leaned her head back and gave herself to his kiss, feeling the softness of his lips, her hands reaching up to touch his hair. His lips moved over hers, enveloping hers, then his tongue tip touched hers and Liana moaned and leaned her body into his.

  Rogan could wait no longer for her. His arms tightened about her, then one hand bit into her thigh as he lifted her right leg to wrap it about his waist. Then his other hand lifted her left leg.

  Liana, having had so little experience with sex, had no idea what was going on, but she loved the kissing and the feeling of her bare bottom against his skin. She was unprepared for when he slammed her back against the stone wall and entered her with all the force of a man using a battering ram to attack a locked door. She cried out in pain and protest, but her face was buried in the muscle of his chest and she could not be heard.

  It seemed that he kept up his deep, hard thrusts for hours, and at first Liana hated the act, the man, everything that was being done to her, but after a while, her eyes opened wider, for she felt a deep inner pleasure that was beginning to spread through her body.

  She cried out in surprise, then clutched Rogan’s hair in her hands, pulling it hard while she brought her mouth down on his.

  Her sudden passion was enough to finish Rogan and with a final thrust, he went limp against her, pushing her back hard against the stones as he leaned against her, his heart pounding.

  Liana wanted more. She wasn’t sure exactly what she wanted, but what she’d received wasn’t enough. Her nails bit into his shoulders.

  Rogan drew his head away from her shoulder and looked at her, startled. He could see that he had not pleased her. Instantly, he dropped her legs and stepped away from her and began searching for his braies in the debris on the floor. “You may go now,” he murmured, feeling anger rising in himself.

  Liana was energized by the too-brief lovemaking. “I have a bedroom off the solar prepared for us.”

  “Then you can go there and sleep,” he said with anger, but when he turned to look at her, his anger vanished. Her eyes were bright and alive and her hair was wild and free about her head. He almost reached for her again, but he forced his hands to remain at his side. Women who were new to him were always exciting, he told himself.

  Liana didn’t try to repress the anger she felt. The vision of him in bed with another woman was too fresh and too painful. “So that you can go to another woman?” she hissed at him.

  “Why, no,” he said, surprised. “So that I can sleep. There is no bed in here.”

  This statement, delivered so solemnly, made Liana smile. “Come with me,” she said softly, holding out her hand to him. “I have a clean, fragrant bed rea