Anita Mills Read Online Free Page A

where her gown clung to the curve of her breasts, and he wondered if her body was as flawless as her face.
    His mouth was so dry he had to drink again, and still he could not tear his eyes from her. And he wondered how she could possibly be barren. Aye, there was the rub. Even if Count Guy would give her, even if she brought gold and land, he’d not be able to keep it if she did not breed. And still he’d have her, for there was none to compare. Besides, Avisa had presented him with two strong sons ere she passed from this earth before her time. So he could afford the gamble.
    As if she knew his thoughts, Elizabeth reached for the cup they were supposed to share, and looking over the rim, her green eyes met his. “Do not think to wed with me, my lord,” she told him coldly. “I’d give you grief.” Draining the cup she set it down, then arose, nodding to Richard and Gilliane, saying quite deliberately, “He puts me off my food with his gaping.”
    “Your pardon, my lady, but—” William’s breath was wasted, for she’d brushed past him, leaving him to a filled trencher. “Jesu, but what ails her?” he asked her brother.
    “She’d not wed again,” Richard answered.
    “Yet she is in need of a husband—Count Guy cannot live forever. She should have a man to master that tongue of hers,” William protested.
    For a moment, Richard of Rivaux’s strange flecked eyes were more gold than brown. And a slow, lazy smile warmed his face as he turned to watch his sister pass from the great hall. “Elizabeth is not like any other,” he said simply. “She is more Cat than our mother.”
    “Still, I’d take her.”
    “He will not give her where she is not willing.”
    William’s gaze followed his. “Have any asked?” he wanted to know.
    “Every widower with a son has approached my father.”
    “These are troubled times, my lord,” William reminded him. “Count Guy will have need of allies, and there can be no greater surety than a bond of blood between families.”
    “Elizabeth would give you no peace.”
    “I’d beat that tongue out of her.”
    Richard’s flecked eyes darkened. Very deliberately, he speared a chunk of meat with his knife. “Nay, you would not. Even Ivo dared not beat her.” His gaze held William’s, sending a shiver down his spine. “I’d kill the man who would harm Elizabeth—and so would my father.”

Chapter Two

Chapter Two
    “What think you of William d’Evreux?” Catherine of the Condes asked casually.
    Elizabeth looked up guiltily, caught in straining to hear the heated dispute below. “I think him short and stupid,” she answered her mother. “Why?”
    “He asks your father for you.”
    “Then he is a fool also.”
    Catherine viewed her daughter with a mixture of sympathy and exasperation. “Liza, one husband is not necessarily like another. If you would have a household and children of your own—”
    “What did Papa say?” Elizabeth asked shortly.
    “He said the choice was yours.”
    “And you think I should like a witless man a full head shorter than I?”
    “He is besotted enough to overlook your tongue,” her mother responded, “and that is something, you must admit.”
    “I’d not have him.”
    “I did not think you would, but I said I would ask you.”
    “The fool could do aught but stare,” Elizabeth noted contemptuously. “God’s bones, but he has the manners of a lout, Maman.”
    Catherine sighed and laid aside her needlework. “ ’Tis no life for you here, Liza. You ought to have a husband and children. You deserve to be chatelaine in your own lord’s keep.”
    “Nay.”
    “There may come a time when Guy will have need of an alliance through blood,” Cat continued gently.
    Her daughter sat very still, trying not to betray the panic she felt, but Cat knew. “Liza, we face a war beyond that which Normandy and England have seen since the Conqueror joined them. If you would be a dutiful daughter, you will not ask Guy to forgo another