Rendezvous With Yesterday (The Gifted Ones #2)(108)
Beth attributed Robert’s looking so young at age twenty-nine—not to mention attaining a height of six feet—to Alyssa, her healing gift, and the intriguingly advanced knowledge the woman’s family possessed and had shared with the Westcott lords. Knowledge passed down through the gifted ones’ mysterious lineage.
Apparently Westcott was something of a utopia in medieval England, with most of its inhabitants living far longer than their counterparts.
Since Father Markham was Westcott’s resident priest, Beth couldn’t tell if he was thirty and looked his age or was perhaps younger. He was handsome in a clean-cut, boy-next-door kind of way, and uniquely open-minded, considering both his profession and the time period. Beth liked him instantly. He was very friendly, and not at all put off by her odd speech and mannerisms.
Of course, if rumors held any truth, Father Markham had witnessed a wealth of unusual occurrences since making Alyssa’s acquaintance. The residents of Fosterly had, too, during Alyssa and Dillon’s frequent visits.
So Beth suspected weird had become a kind of norm for them, something that had really worked in her favor. With her modern speech, ideas, and behavior, Beth doubted she would have been so well received anywhere else.
Alyssa produced a beautiful cream-colored kirtle for Beth and helped her don it.
Robert waited for Beth outside the church doors, unbearably handsome in his finest tunic. So handsome that Beth almost tripped walking up the steps, because she couldn’t take her eyes off of him.
Fortunately, Dillon escorted her and kept her from falling on her face, his taciturn expression lightening at her no doubt besotted expression.
The ceremony took place outside the church, according to custom.
Wind whipped all present and wrought havoc with Beth’s hair. With no extra super hold hairspray on hand, she spent most of the ceremony dragging loose curls out of her eyes and wishing she would’ve donned one of those wimple head scarf things so many of the married women here wore.
Evidently, the fact that Alyssa didn’t wear one was fairly scandalous.
After the ceremony, they adjourned inside for a mass.
Feasting followed. Table upon table laden with huge quantities of food that would likely appall modern doctors and spark lectures on the dangers of high cholesterol and high blood pressure. But it was all very tasty and too tempting for Beth to resist. She didn’t know if women here were supposed to pick at their food and eat dainty portions. But if they were, then she probably raised eyebrows yet again while she packed away more food than Sir Stephen.
In the bailey, Robert hosted games and contests for the villeins and their children.
In the great hall, lively acrobats and jesters entertained, as did minstrels.
Beth thought the dancing positively surreal. It entailed very little physical contact, aside from holding or touching hands. Nothing at all sensual. A far cry from the dancing she had witnessed at twenty-first-century clubs and parties, in which couples ground on each other to the beat and simulated sex.
And speaking of sex…
Apparently, at the end of the night, there was supposed to be a bedding ceremony of some sort. Beth could never quite figure out what it involved. The whispers she managed to catch seemed to range from Alyssa and some attendants helping Beth change and prepare for Robert to deflower her (a little too late for that one), to Beth’s being escorted to the solar by the women, stripped naked, then put on display for Robert and the men who carried him upstairs on their shoulders.
Beth had three words for the latter: Oh, hell no.
She didn’t know if Robert had nixed such plans ahead of time, or if there hadn’t been any to begin with. But when the time came for them to retire, he simply twined his fingers through hers and brought her hand to his lips for a kiss. The tenderness in his blue eyes as they met hers warmed her heart.
“Shall we?” he asked softly beneath the boisterous laughter in the hall.
She nodded.
Smiling, he rose, drew her up from her seat at the high table, then escorted her from the hall.
No one followed, though several of Robert’s men called bawdy suggestions after them.
Closing the solar door behind them dampened but did not silence the revelry that took place below.
Someone had prepared a fire in the hearth and left wine for them on the table beside it.
Beth stared up at Robert, her heart pounding wildly in her chest. “I feel nervous,” she admitted, “like it’s my first time.”
He smiled and drew her closer. “It is. For both of us.” Dipping his head, he pressed a lingering kiss to her lips. “Tonight will be the first time I make love with my wife.”
She smiled. “And the first time I make love with my husband.” She kissed his chin, then teased his lips with a brief caress. “I love you, husband.”
He deepened the kiss. “I love you, wife.”
Robert took his time, divesting Beth of her wedding finery. He couldn’t resist sliding his rough hands over every bit of soft, pale skin he exposed as he removed each article of clothing. When Beth at last stood before him, wearing only her black bra and panties, lust pierced him. “You wore them.”
She nodded, flashing him a siren’s smile. “Now I’ll do you.”
Every muscle in his body went taut as she placed her small hands on his chest, then slid them down to unbuckle his belt. Every brush of her fingers as she removed his clothes sent fire racing through him. Every caress that followed on bare skin tested his restraint until he shook with the need to bury himself inside her.