“Nay, we will not.”

She disentangled from his embrace, jumped from his lap, and began to run away. He grabbed for her, but caught only a thick strand of trailing hair. Still, it stopped her. She froze, her back to him, her shoulders still trembling from the passion they had shared.

“Come back to me. You know that you want to.”

“What I want is a small thing in this. In all of this.”

“Not to me. Making you want me, and then fulfilling your desire, will give me great pleasure when we are wed.”

“You and I will never wed.”

“We will. Very soon. I will not permit more delay now that I know what is waiting.”

She glanced over her shoulder. “It must have been the full moon. It makes some women mad.”

“Nay, it was the pleasure. That too makes some women mad, and you are one of them. If Edward had not given you to me, I would fight to claim you now anyway.”

She walked away. It made her hair yank in his hand, and he released it.

She gave him one last look. “Now the moon is making you mad. The King’s man should not be swayed so easily by a few kisses in a garden.”

Nesta rose from her bed, sleepless again. Naked, she walked to the window and peered down at the spot where she had recently behaved very stupidly.

She should stay away from moonlit gardens. They kept getting her into trouble.

Marcus would return in the morning. She did not doubt that. He would come, and demand entry, and no tale of illness would work this time. He would come to speak of the betrothal, or just to woo his lady, but he would be here all the same.

That was going to complicate things.

A muffled sound distracted her, and she turned to the bed. A dark head rose and darker eyes blinked away sleep. “Are you awake still?”

“Aye. Go back to sleep,” Nesta said.

“You should put on a robe, or wrap yourself in a blanket.”

“I do not feel the cold as most others do. You know that.”

“Still, you might take ill. That would be a fine thing, and hard to explain a real illness after this long false one. And it might keep us here.”

“Nothing will keep us here.”

The head sank back into its pillow. “I have been told that he is very handsome.”

“Not handsome enough. No English knight would be.”

A deep yawn filled the chamber. Nesta turned back to the window. In her mind’s eye she saw a man standing near the pool, tall and strong and young, with a stimulating vitality in his aura. Aye, very handsome, and exciting enough to take her breath away and turn her knees to water. But still, not handsome enough.