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difference between lust and love. No matter that his body drew hers, like iron to lodestone, she’d not give him the chance to once again ruin her life.
    Best she get this first encounter done and over, keeping in mind that this Norman lord could destroy the life and peace she and her girls had found at Branwick.

Chapter Three
    W hat was Marian doing at Branwick?
    He’d envisioned her at home on some distant manor with her husband and child, far from where she could distract him.
    Such a distraction. Gowned in dove gray, the linen’s weave rough and suited for workaday wear, Marian gracefully floated toward him. So beautiful. He’d thought so from the first moment he set eyes on her—standing beside her mother on the steps of Murwaithe, awaiting presentation to the baron of Wilmont and his youngest son.
    The two of them had made an effort to resist an instant and powerful attraction. On the third day of his visit, however, they gave in to their lust—and once done, easier done.
    “Stephen, I fear your audience with my uncle must wait a few moments,” she said, her voice matter-of-fact, and yet melodic. She turned to Ivo. “His lordship wishes to sit at table for evening meal. He asks you to send his body servants to him.”
    “At once, my lady. I gather you and our guest have met.”
    She glanced Stephen’s way before she admitted, “We have.”
    Most assuredly they had. So many years ago and so well met. For two days they’d taken every chance to place eager hands and warm mouths on each other’s bodies. Well met, indeed.
    Stephen bowed in her direction. “Lady Marian and I have known each other for several years. Mayhap she and I can renew our acquaintance while I await his lordship’s convenience.”
    Ivo’s eyebrow arched. “Only a moment ago you were ready to tear down the draperies from around his lordship’s bed.”
    Stephen shrugged off his former impatience. True, he needed to talk to William, but the mystery of Marian’s presence proved too enticing to resist further examination. Obviously she was visiting Branwick, but why and for how long? With or without her child and husband?
    Had she ever tumbled in the hay with her husband? How odd he should wonder. Even odder he should realize he’d never tumbled in the hay with any other woman.
    “’Twould hardly further my cause if I disturbed his lordship at an untimely moment,” he explained to Ivo. “I shall wait until he is fully prepared for my visit.”
    Ivo took his leave.
    Stephen took a longer than normal breath, remembering the unease of his last conversation with Marian. Part of that unease, certes, had been their state of undress and seclusion in a bedchamber. Yet, even though they stood in Branwick’s hall, with servants scurrying about to prepare for evening meal, with Armand hovering nearby, Stephen’s body and mind were firmly engaged by the woman standing before him.
    “I do not see you for many years, then you appear in the most unexpected places,” he said, then could have bitten his tongue for evoking the faint blush that bloomed on her cheeks.
    He’d seen her turn vivid scarlet once before, her face and chest fully involved. She’d been astride him at the time. He hadn’t known those many years ago what that meant, but he did now—a female reaching her full pleasure. Try as he might, he couldn’t tamp down the pride of realizing he’d brought Marian to her peak without knowing what he was doing. He truly hadn’t—which meant Marian must be one of those women who reached bliss with little effort on her bed mate’s part.
    So much for pride.
    Marian’s husband must be delighted with so easily pleased a lover for a wife, if he cared at all. Many men didn’t, which made no sense. Pleasured bed mates made for eager bed mates.
    “I hear Carolyn did not receive you well.”
    The edge in Marian’s voice both rebuked him for reminding her of their meeting in a bedchamber, and turned the conversation back to