The Taming Read online

  It was Liana’s turn to be shocked. “Me? Never would I do such a thing. Never!”

  “You countermanded my orders for the peasants.”

  “Yes, but you were flogging innocent people.”

  “You tried to burn me in my bed.”

  “But you were in bed with another woman,” she said indignantly.

  “You seduce me away from my work with sweetmeats and music and pretty smiles.”

  She smiled at him as his words convinced her of how right she was to have married him.

  “And you disobeyed my orders before my men.”

  “When?”

  “The morning the Howards attacked.”

  “I was merely—”

  “Interfering,” he said sternly. “It wasn’t any of your business. If I hadn’t been drunk, you might have—” He stopped. He didn’t want to tell her that while he lay in a drunken stupor, the Howards might have taken her prisoner.

  “I might have what?”

  His face changed, and Liana could see he was hiding something. “What might I have done?”

  Rogan moved away from her and got out of bed. “If that damned brother of mine doesn’t send us food, I’ll hang him after burning him.”

  “If you hadn’t been drunk, I might have what?” She wrapped a sheet around herself and followed his nude form into the garderobe. Even as he began to use the urinal, she didn’t hesitate. “Might have what?”

  Rogan grimaced. “If I ever capture a Howard spy and want information, I’ll send you to him.”

  “Might have what?” she asked again.

  “Been taken,” he snapped, turning back to the room.

  “The Howards wanted me?” Liana whispered.

  Rogan was angrily pulling on his braies. “The Howards seem to always want what the Peregrines have: our land, our castles, our women.”

  “We could make them a gift of the Days.” Rogan did not find humor in her words. She went to him and put her arms about his neck. “You were so angry that morning because the Howards threatened to take me? Rogan, you do love me.”

  “I don’t have time for love. Get dressed. Severn may come in.”

  She let the sheet fall off her body so that her bare breasts were against his chest. “Rogan, I love you.”

  “Humph! You haven’t spoken to me in weeks. You’ve made everyone’s life miserable. Even Zared’s room has rats in it. And I’m so light from lack of decent food, my horse doesn’t know me. My life was better when no woman said she loved me.” What he said did not agree with how tightly he held her.

  “Severn has taught me something,” she said. “I swear to you that never again will I leave you alone. If you hurt me—and I’ve no doubt you will do so often—I promise I will tell you why I am angry. Never again will I shut myself away from you.”

  “It’s not me who matters, but the men need decent food and—”

  She stood on tiptoe to kiss him. “It is you who matters to me. Rogan, I will never betray you as Jeanne once did. Even if the Howards were to take me, I would still love you.”

  “The Howards will never take another Peregrine,” he said fiercely.

  “And I am now a Peregrine?” she asked, smiling.

  “An odd one, but a Peregrine more or less,” he said reluctantly.

  She hugged him and didn’t see the way Rogan smiled into her hair, the way he closed his eyes as he held her. He didn’t like to think how much he’d missed her in the past few days or how much her frivolous chatter had come to mean to him. He had lived his life without her and done very well, but she had entered his life meekly, then literally set him on fire. Nothing had been the same since. Pleasure, leisure, softness, had never been part of his life. But this snippet of a girl had introduced them all into his life and it was amazing how quickly he’d adapted.

  He pulled away from her, her face held in his big hands. “I think my stupid brother locked us in here to get you to clean his room and to talk to the bakers.”

  “Oh? And who is to persuade me to do what he wants?”

  “Perhaps I can,” Rogan said suggestively, and swung her into his arms. “You told everyone we once spent a whole day in bed. Now you shall make your lie true.”

  They made love to each other long and slowly, their first needy passion already spent. They explored each other’s bodies with their hands and tongues, and when they at last came together, it was leisurely, slowly, caressingly. Liana had no idea how Rogan watched her, how he wanted to give pleasure to her, how he wanted her to enjoy their lovemaking.

  Afterward, they lay in each other’s arms and held one another.

  “Do we hang your brother or kiss his feet?” Liana whispered.

  “Hang him,” Rogan said firmly. “If there was an attack—”

  Liana rubbed her thigh over his. “If there were an attack, you’d be too weak to fight, so it wouldn’t matter.”

  “You are a disrespectful wench. You ought to be beaten.”

  “By whom?” she asked insolently. “Surely not the worn-out oldest Peregrine.”

  “I’ll show you who is worn out,” he said, rolling over on her, making Liana giggle.

  But a thud on the floor near them caught Rogan’s attention. Immediately, he covered Liana’s body with his as he looked about for the cause of the noise. “At last, my damned-to-hell brother has sent us food.” He scurried off Liana, out of bed, and went to the package that Severn had managed to swing through the narrow arrow slit and then release so it dropped on the floor.

  “You’re more interested in food than in me?” she asked.

  “At the moment, yes.” He brought the food to the bed and they ate there. When bread crumbs dropped on Liana’s bare breasts, Rogan licked them off.

  They stayed in bed together all day. Liana got Rogan to tell her about his life, about when he was a boy, about the things he’d dreamed about and thought about as a child. She couldn’t be sure, but she didn’t think he’d ever really talked to anyone before in his life.

  At sundown Liana mentioned using some of her dowry wealth to add on to Moray Castle. Rogan was speechless with horror at the idea. “This is not Peregrine land,” he said. “The Howards took—”

  “Yes, yes, I know. But you have now lived here two generations. Our children will make the third. What if it takes another five generations to get the Peregrine lands back? Will all of them have to live in a place where the roof leaks? Or live in a place this small? We could add a wing to the south—a proper wing, with paneled walls. We could add a chapel and—”

  “No, no, no,” Rogan said, standing up and glaring down at her in bed. “I’ll not put money in this puny place. I’ll wait until I have the lands the Howards stole.”

  “And until then you’ll spend every penny that I brought you for making war?” Liana’s eyes blazed. “You married me so you can wage war?”

  Rogan started to yell that yes, that’s why he’d married her, but his eyes changed. “I married you because of your beauty that surpasses all other women’s,” he said softly. “Including my first wife.”

  Liana looked up at him, her mouth open in astonishment, then she leaped from the bed and threw herself at him, her legs about his waist, her arms about his neck. “My beautiful husband, I love you so much,” she cried.

  Rogan hugged her tightly. “I will spend the money how I see fit.”

  “Yes, of course, and as an obedient wife I would never contradict you, but just let me tell you of my ideas for enlargement.”

  Rogan groaned. “First you part me from my women, then you burden me with a bunch of red-haired brats, and now you propose to tell me how to spend the money I have worked so hard for.”

  “Worked so hard for!” she said. “You didn’t even attend the wedding feast I had planned so carefully. And you insulted my stepmother.”

  “She needed insulting. She needs a hand applied to her backside.”

  “And you’d like to do it?” Liana asked archly.

  “I wouldn’t want t