The Game by Brenda Joyce Page B

intentions to remain as cold as stone, to remain conscienceless, guilt nagged at him. He stole another glance at Katherine. He had her best interests at heart, did he not? Otherwise, she would return to Ireland to beg for bread, no different from the other homeless victims of the wars there. She needed his protection, she needed him. And in time, she would be as pleased with him as his other women had been. He would make sure of it. He would satisfy her in bed, and out of it, he would shower her with more wealth than she had ever seen.
    Their gazes collided and held. Her defiance remained strong. Animosity and resentment made her green gaze glitter brilliantly. They were leaving Londontown behind them now, and Liam felt a flaring of pity for his captive that he could not rein in, that he could not control. His heart seemed to lurch with it, the feeling sickening. Toowell, he recalled what it was like to have everything taken away from oneself, to be powerless, an innocent, unwilling victim of those in power, in absolute control. As he himself had been on that day sixteen years ago when Shane O’Neill had so abruptly appeared in his life, changing it forever.
    Essex, 1555
    The boy heard them shouting and he crept silently to the window, crouching below it. He realized that his mother was weeping, and his fear intensified. He lifted his head to peer outside.
    He gasped.
    Some dozen men sat a dozen horses in the small yard outside their home. They were all big men, wearing shaggy bearskins and old iron shields upon their backs, their heads shaved, huge swords strapped to their sides. Beneath the fur cloaks they all wore coarse woolen tunics, and their legs and feet were bare. The boy stared. He had never seen such strange and savage men before.
    “You cannot do this, Shane!” his mother cried.
    The boy glanced at his mother. Mary Stanley was a fair woman with fine, delicate features. She was elegant of bearing and dress, but now her gray eyes were wide with fear. The boy cried out as the huge, shaggy-haired stranger facing her raised his arm upward. “Enough, woman!” Shane shouted. And he hit her.
    The boy’s mother fell to the ground. The sound of the brutal slap resounded in the courtyard.
    With a cry, the boy rushed from the house, realizing too late that he had no weapon with which to fight this intruder. “Halt!” he shouted. And he jumped at the stranger.
    “God’s cock, what is this?” Shane O’Neill was four times bigger than him and swatted at him with little effort. He fell into the dirt beside his mother, who abruptly pulled him into her arms, her face white with fear, tears shimmering in her eyes. But he did not want her protection—he wanted to protect her . He struggled free of her grasp. As he rose to his feet, Shane reached down and grabbed him by the back of his velvet doublet, actually lifting him off his feet.
    Shane turned to face his men. “This is my son?” He was incredulous. “A silly English fop?”
    Liam ceased struggling, for there was simply no way that he could free himself from this man’s hurtful grip. This man, Shane O’Neill, the father he had never met—the man who had raped his mother once, so many years ago, when she had been traveling at sea. Mary had never told him the truth—but he had heard the story many times, for they had talked about him and his mother behind his back when he and Mary had lived at court, first with the Dowager Queen, Catherine Parr, and then with the Princess Elizabeth.
    Now the Irish warriors chuckled and grinned at the sight of the boy in the blue doublet and white hose, hanging from their leader’s hand.
    Disgusted, Shane dropped him so abruptly that he landed on his backside on the hard ground. Hatred welled inside him. Immediately he lurched to his feet. “Don’t hurt my mother.”
    Shane’s gaze widened, then he laughed. “I do what I please, boy, and from now on, you do as I please. You’re coming with me.”
    “No!” His mother rose