And then I’d looked on him every day since, each day my eyes a bit more open to his face, his heart, his soul. And then there were something else there, something quite like salvation but different still.
He opened the door, and I looked up. The moon were bright and the skies clear of snow, so I hadn’t lit a candle. I liked the blue of midnight light. I liked it more when he stood in it, making him glow bright, the shadows that had haunted him leaving off for once.
I stood and walked over to him, holding up my palm and shivering as his slid into it, pushing my fingers apart and sliding his own between them, binding our hands together. He leaned his head down and kissed me, the first one cool and light like silver, then again, growing warmer, his mouth opening and his tongue speaking a strange new language into my mouth. His hands fell to my hips, and my body shook. All I wanted were to stop shivering, and I pressed tighter against him.
He made a sound that vibrated into my mouth, pulling my waist tighter and up so I bent backward, leaning into him like a willow branch. I gripped his neck, not sure if I were on my feet or not, touching the ground or not. My name, my parents, my place—I weren’t sure of a damn thing except his mouth, his kiss, his tongue touching mine and making me feel separate from my whole being. His hand came up and stroked my neck, so warm and hot on my bare skin that I gasped, and he pulled back, breathing hard.
“Good God, Scarlet,” he moaned in my ear, pressing my cheek to his, his fingers on my neck, in my hair—I could feel their touches like he were plucking strings on an instrument, resonating on my skin like music. “We have to stop.”
The shivery feeling changed fast. “I did something wrong.” I pulled away. “Oh, Rob, I’m not very good at all this!” I told him.
He laughed and pulled me back against him. “Not the reason we have to stop, my love.”
“Why?” I asked, my voice gone quiet.
His laugh went softer, and he kissed the corner of my mouth, my cheek, right below my ear. “I forget how innocent you are,” he said, and I flushed, frowning. He kissed the hanging bit of my ear and my good hand curled into a fist on his neck, the frown forgotten. “If I kiss you once more, Scar, we certainly won’t be talking for the rest of the night. And you can forget whatever you wanted to tell me before making you my wife, because whether or not the church agreed, you’d be my wife.”
My blood ran thick and hot, rushing to my skin, everywhere. “Oh,” I breathed. “But we were just kissing.”
His lips were on my cheek. “Kissing you …,” he said, but he didn’t finish the words. He kissed me again, and his lips and tongue and the wet slide of it all spun me. All I wanted were to touch him more. To touch his skin.
I pulled away with a sharp breath. “Oh,” I realized. A dizzy thought slipped through my mind—if I were meant to submit to Gisbourne, what were the harm in Robin’s hands on me, blotting out the ink of Gisbourne’s touch?
“Tomorrow,” he promised, his voice low and rough, slipping into my blood. His eyes glittered. “Many, many kisses tomorrow.”
No—if I were to keep touching Rob, I’d have to tell him, and if I told him, he would kill Gisbourne. He would lose everything for his love of me.
He leaned his head on mine, and my heart felt like a stone.
“What do you need to tell me?” he asked. “You worried me.”
“You don’t seem worried,” I murmured.
“Your kisses are very reassuring,” he told me.
“I tried—yesterday, I wanted to tell you—but you needed sleep. I didn’t want you not to sleep, not because of me,” I started, and the shivering turned darker as I went. What if this changed everything? How could I say these things out loud when they had just bare started feeling true in my chest?
“What is it, Scar?” he asked, rubbing my back.
I shook my good hand out. “I saw my parents. You—you won’t need their permission for anything.”
“No? It didn’t go well?”
The swamping wave of their hate hit me again, and the shaking stopped, covered with dark and shame. “They think I killed Joanna. Their real daughter. Their only daughter,” I said, looking up at him.
“Only?” he repeated.
I nodded, feeling water draw up in my eyes. “They just kept saying it were my fault. My fault, and I weren’t theirs.”
“Love,” he murmured, hugging me tight. “From all you’ve told me, Joanna lived for you. She didn’t die because of you.”
It seemed easier—less painful—to remember her when I were inside Rob’s arms. Her smile. The way her long, elegant hands felt touching my face, tending to the scar Gisbourne put there. Rob stroked my hair, my neck, his hands on me melting everything away like butter in the sun.
“So they took you in?” he asked. “Did they tell you who from?”
“They didn’t,” I told him. “But Eleanor did.”
He pulled me off his chest to look at my face. “Eleanor of Aquitaine?”
I nodded.
“Who?” he asked.
“Richard,” I said, trying to find strength in my voice. “I am the daughter of Richard the Lionheart.”
Robin’s hands fell from me, and he staggered back a step. Then he stepped forward and kissed me.
I pushed him off. “What are you doing?” I snapped. “I just told you—”
“And I decided we’re just going to have to do this the dishonorable way, because there’s no way in hell I’m asking for his permission to marry you,” he told me, stepping forward again with a grin. “I love the man, but he terrifies me.”
I ducked his kiss. “Rob!”
He stopped, but caught me up anyway. “What?”
“This isn’t a joke. Eleanor told me herself.”
“Well, if you want me to, I’ll ask for your hand from him. Maybe I can just ask Eleanor. She seems to like me.”
“She does like you. But Rob! Please be serious.”
“Why?” he asked, losing the grin. “What problem do you see that I’m missing?”
“It’s why Prince John hates me. He’ll keep coming after me. There’s nothing to stop him.”
His arms tightened. “I already knew that he hates both of us. Why answers a bit of a mystery but doesn’t change anything. I’m sheriff now. I’ll have guards and the means to protect us and our children. And beyond that, I’ll protect you and you’ll protect me. I was thinking I should give you new knives for a wedding gift.”