Free The Longing by Tamara Leigh

Rather, she saves up her defenses for another.” He jerked his head in the direction of Judas de Balliol. “It is for him she does it—and other things.”
    Everard did not like the sound of “other things,” but he set the question behind him. One at a time.
    “I would not say Baron de Balliol was cruel to the boy, but—” The knight snorted. “Aye, cruel fits, though I have seen worse.”
    Once again, Everard felt his anger churn.
    “Most times it was not bad, but when the wine and ale flowed…” He nodded. “…one would not believe the boy was of the baron’s loins, and the more de Balliol imbibed, the less he believed it himself and the louder he cursed and claimed to have been cuckolded.”
    But what of when Judith had yet lived? Had her husband suspected he had been cuckolded? Had he treated her ill as her body burgeoned with child? The knave had named her son Judas—Judas!
    “That does not seem to sit well with you, Lord Wulfrith,” Sir Elias murmured.
    Neither did this knight whose narrowed eyes witnessed emotions Everard was unaccustomed to making an effort to suppress. Clearing his face, he said, “Do you intend to tell me in what way Lady Susanna allowed me to think ill of her?”
    “She took the blame for our…indiscretion, did she not?”
    Refusing to yield to his knuckles, Everard flexed his hands. “Your face tells otherwise.”
    “Ah, well, there is that.” The man touched his swollen nose. “However, that misunderstanding she did set right. Ne’er was she in danger of ravishment. I do have more honor about me than that.”
    Everard let an impatient breath slide out between his teeth. “I grow weary, Sir Elias—”
    A cheer shot through the hall, and he turned his head and looked upon those entertained by a piece of Sir Rowan’s tale that very likely involved the edge of a blade. It took a more practiced eye to discern if Judas, who continued to stand at the outskirts of the group, was as moved as the others, but there was a lean to his body, tension in his bearing, and a widening of eyes that told he wished to draw nearer.
    Before Everard had gone abovestairs and found Lady Susanna dishonoring his hospitality with a tryst, he had observed the boy and concluded Judas de Balliol was, indeed, one to be watched. On the surface, he appeared mostly harmless, but he was far too watchful to be trusted. There was something sly about him. However, if it was true what Lady Susanna and Sir Elias told of his upbringing, it was to be expected. And corrected if he was to one day rank among men worthy of knighthood.
    Everard returned his gaze to Sir Elias and discovered he had become the observed. “Which misunderstanding did the lady not set right?” he prompted.
    “She let you believe she is wanton, did she not?”
    Everard waited.
    “She is not wanton, Lord Wulfrith.”
    “Then what?”
    “Desperate—in a world beaten in and out of shape by men.”
    Desperate was not entirely unexpected, but that last was, especially as it was spoken by a man. Again, Everard tried to take the knight’s measure, but Sir Elias seemed ever shifting, one moment as if something inside him was trying very hard to be honorable, the next as if that something was not powerful enough to battle his baser, self-serving side. Why? Might he have deep feelings for Susanna de Balliol?
    It was not something Everard was inclined to ask, as it had nothing to do with him, and yet he said, “Do you think yourself in love with the lady?”
    Sir Elias dropped his head back against the wall and seemed to consider it. “I have thought I could be, but I do not dare, for methinks she may be too…broken.”
    Concern pushed its way through Everard’s resistance. “Broken?”
    “Aye, I have seen what such desperation can do to a woman—beat her down so that what remains of her unplucked petals is too bruised to stay long upon the stem.”
    Again, a peculiar choice of words. “You sound more a poet than a knight, Sir