The Pleasures of Sin by Jessica Trapp Page A

knew naught of her imprisonment this past year; he did not need to know of her family’s personal strife. ’Twas best she not appear like a gaping fish pulled from the lake.
    Still, she glanced around uneasily.
    Had Montgomery’s men already started to rob her family’s wealth? It did not seem possible for them to have changed so much in such a short time.
    “Come, my lady,” Montgomery said, his voice a low command. He shifted his tunic and l’occhio del diavolo glinted in the sunbeams streaming in through the windows. It bore both testimony of her failure and a silent warning. Her palm itched again, and she wished she could take the knife.
    By force of will, she turned her gaze away from it and stepped into the hall. Naught would be gained by foolish gestures. She would wait and she would observe.
    Montgomery tugged her forward and she stepped into the pandemonium.
    All the castle’s inhabitants had been invited to the wedding feast and the hall was loud and riotous. The cacophony caused the clanking of her chains to be lost.
    Across the chamber, she saw Egmont the blacksmith sucking ale from a tankard. Her heart sped. The two of them had always been friendly in the past; mayhap she could secure his help with the manacles. She craned her neck, hoping he would look in her direction, but he did not even look up. She bit down a wave of disappointment.
    “Wife!” she heard one of Montgomery’s animals yell from across the hall.
    Brenna cringed. If she did not escape, such would be her lot now: for a man to forever be ordering her about.
    “Have I not told you to leave your hair unveiled?” the warrior continued in a bellow.
    Glancing up, Brenna saw a huge scarred brute pluck a silken veil from a small beautiful pregnant woman’s head. An abundance of red hair, darker than her own, spilled down her back and hips reaching nearly to the rushes.
    “My lord!” the lady admonished, reaching for the shiny green fabric. Her wide emerald eyes flashed him a look of irritation. “I just had that made. ’Twas expensive! And we are guests!”
    The monstrous brute gave Brenna and Montgomery a quick glance. With a flick of his wrist, he tossed the veil into the hearth. Orange and green flame brightened around the material, burning the delicate fabric in a flash.
    “Aaagh!” the lady exclaimed.
    Irritation curled through Brenna at the frustrating lot of a married woman. At the mercy of some oafish man’s whims. ’Twas exactly why she planned a life of independence at a nunnery! She glanced down at the masculine hand that held her wrist and pressed her manacle into her skin. Loathing waved through her.
    Fighting the urge to pull away, she looked back at the new beast.
    The unveiled lady raised herself onto her toes to glare into the giant’s eyes. She grasped a handful of his blue tunic in each of her small hands. Her smooth alabaster complexion contrasted with his tanned scarred skin. Her delicate limbs with his brawny ones.
    “You are the most vexing husband a woman could have. Arrogant, impossible, beef-witted blackheart!”
    Brenna squirmed, wanting to close her eyes to what would surely happen next and yet was unable to turn away. She awaited the warrior to cock his arm back and club her for her impudence.
    Instead, a slow smile lifted his lips into a lopsided grin that crinkled the white crescent scar on his cheek. His eyes lit with blue flame. He slapped his wife on the bottom, but the stroke was without heat. His hand lingered, folding over her buttock in a gentle, overly familiar caress as he pressed her into himself. Even with all his brutishness, ’twas obvious he was being cautious with her pregnant belly.
    “I like your hair,” he said simply.
    The woman gave an exasperated long-suffering sigh, then yanked him close and kissed him.
    “Barbarian,” she said when the kiss was broken, but she tilted her chin down and glanced up at him in a way that made Brenna wonder if the lady had worn the veil