Anne O'Brien - Conquering Knight, Captive Lady

Damnation. Worse than a nagging tooth! What could be so bad in her cushioned life that she could not recognise Salisbury as a haven of peace and comfort? Irritated with himself, Fitz Osbern pulled his cloak over his head and willed himself to sleep.

Petronilla, in her deliberate calm manner, well practised through years of marriage to men who had no consideration for her feelings, was equally irritated. Why in heaven’s name had she felt the need to explain her situation to the de Mortimer lord? Yet she had read such consideration in his face that she was tempted to smile at him … How foolish to be so flattered that she should blush like a girl! Had she not had enough of men? She would enjoy being a widow with a jointure and a home of her own. Besides, after tomorrow she would be unlikely to set eyes on Hugh de Mortimer ever again.

On which comforting thought she still found it impossible to sleep.

Whilst at her side in the west-tower chamber—the lord’s chamber still not clean enough to her liking—her daughter stirred and twitched and gave up on any possibility of sleep. Rosamund knew that she had wilfully stirred the flames into a blaze, and now she would just have to be prepared to face the consequences of making impulsive declarations. The hours before dawn could be usefully occupied in planning each careful step if, as she feared, she was ejected through her own gates. So she applied herself to her task, but not before she closed her hand around her wrist, and was once again aware of the heat, the power in the man’s grasp, the fierce but controlled anger in his body.

She closed her eyes against the little brush of memory that roughened her skin and sent a shaft of heat to her belly.

No. Rosamund’s eyes snapped open. She would not, could not allow him to defeat her. Nor could she allow him to step into her dreams. Because she knew exactly who Gervase Fitz Osbern was. He was her Wild Hawk, of course.

The man who four years ago had rejected her with no more than a second look. Beneath the grime of travel and the unshaven cheeks he was the same man whose striking face she hadn’t quite been able to forget. Although on close encounter she thought her memory must have been at fault. Fitz Osbern was obviously not the eye-catching individual she remembered, whose alliance Earl William had considered to be of some importance. The Earl of Salisbury would never seek to associate with this ruffian. Perhaps Fitz Osbern had fallen on hard times and been reduced to thievery and living off his wits. She sighed her disappointment that it should be so, then remembered her present grievance.

Hardly surprising that, given his total uninterest in her, both at Salisbury and here at Clifford, he had not even recognised her.

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