“But why? Why would you do it?”
“After all I’ve done for him, he kicks me out! Sends me away like a dog with his tail between his legs. So I’ve taken his castle and ruined him.”
Without taking his eyes off her, he backed up to the door and put his hand behind him. She heard the scrape of the bar sliding into place.
“And now I’m going to take his wife.”
William cooled his heels Efor half a day at Monmouth while Prince Harry dealt with some unexpected business. Damn. He was anxious to get this appearance at the king’s Christmas court over with and get back home. It was midafternoon before the prince was finally ready to start the journey to Eltham.
“What an hour to get started,” William grumbled to Stephen. “We’ll have to stop for the night in a couple of hours.”
As they mounted their horses, two score of men-at-arms bearing the Lancaster lion banner pounded through the main gate.
The prince watched them with narrowed eyes. “ ’Tis my uncle Beaufort.”
William dismounted. They wouldn’t be going to Eltham today. He scanned Beaufort’s men but did not see Edmund.
After greetings were exchanged, William said to Beaufort, “I sent a man to you yesterday. If you came on the London road, you should have crossed paths.”
“We traveled on it all the way from Eltham,” Beaufort said. “We passed a few men but none stopped us.”
An uneasy feeling settled in the pit of William’s stomach.
“We are difficult to miss,” Beaufort said. “Are you sure your man took the London road?”
It was the only road Edmund could take to Eltham Castle.
William tried to tell himself something could have happened to waylay Edmund. His horse took lame. Bandits attacked him. He got drunk and found a woman along the way.
William had fought beside Edmund for ten years. He’d trusted the man with his life more times than he could count. And yet, all he could hear were Catherine’s words:I do not trust him.
He remembered the night he met her here at Monmouth Castle. She had told him her betrothed was not a man to be trusted. As an inexperienced girl of sixteen, Catherine had seen Rayburn for what he was. No one else had.
His heart thundered in his chest as he mounted his horse.
“Catherine may be in danger,” he said to Prince Harry. “Make my excuses to the king.”
He did not wait to hear the prince’s reply.
He signaled to his men to follow and galloped out the gate.
Chapter Thirty-one
Was it you who arranged my kidnapping?” Catherine asked in an attempt to divert Edmund.
“Aye, I did it to save him,” he said. “William was a fool for you from the start. I could see you would be the ruin of him, bedding every man from prince to troubadour right under his nose.”
Edmund sat in the chair on the other side of the small table and took another long drink from his flask.
“The Welsh wanted you as soon as I told them Prince Harry would pay any price for you,” he said with a cold smile. “Then I made William believe you’d run off with a lover. Believe me, I just had to plant the seed.”
She felt the smoldering anger beneath his taunting humor.
“I expected the ransom demand to the prince to remove any doubt about the sort of woman you are,” he said, shaking his head. “After that, William should have been happy to leave you to rot in Wales.
“I meant to cure him of you. If the Welsh offered me money to sweeten the pot, why not?” Edmund slammed his fist on the table. “William got his land and wealth. By heaven, did I not deserve something as well?”
His shifting moods were frightening her as much as his words.