Prologue

PROLOGUE

" C aedmon? I can't believe it, it is you!"

Before Caedmon could answer or even open his mouth, Frigyth had fallen into his arms and wrapped him in a bear hug. His own arms closed around her, an automatic, natural response. At the contact of her familiar body against him, his heart gave a jolt. Had it been ten long years since they had last seen each other? Yes, it had. In other words, an eternity. Dear God, how he had missed her. He closed his eyes and did not resist the urge to place a kiss on the top of her head.

Finally, he was home.

All too soon, she broke away from the embrace and took a step back to take a better look at him. Her eyes were full of unshed tears.

"What are you doing here?"

He didn't want to answer, didn't quite know what to say to explain his presence in the Norsemen village. The truth was out of the question.

I left London because the woman I was supposed to marry made a fool out of me. And the worst of it was, I didn't care a jot, because I never loved her like I love you. I came because I should never have left and I miss you too much. I'm here to see if, against all odds, I can win you back.

"I'll tell you everything in good time," he grumbled. "For now, just let me look at you. You haven't changed a bit, Frig."

She laughed at what she took for an outrageous compliment, but that was no lie. Heaven help him, she'd even grown lovelier since he'd last seen her. Normal people, including himself, aged as years went by, but somehow she had only become more beautiful, more…radiant. That was the first word that came to his mind.

Radiant with happiness.

He dipped his head to inhale her feminine, unique smell. Freshly baked oat cake, with a hint of honey. Even that hadn't changed. How was that possible? Yes, now he was most definitely home.

A cough behind him made him stiffen. Without turning around, he knew who would be looking at them. Or should he say glaring at them…Sigurd, Frigyth's husband. In other words, the luckiest man in the country.

Caedmon slowly turned. As he'd thought, a tall, not best pleased Norseman was staring at him, his fingers bunched into fists.

"Coldman. Welcome back." The greeting was as warm as the man's ice blue eyes and the deliberate mispronunciation of his name didn't bode well. Ten years had not lessened the animosity he felt toward him. Well, it hadn't lessened his either, but he would not cower. Without this man, he might be happily married to Frigyth right now. It was enough to make Caedmon hate him.

"Seagull," he answered. "Delighted to see you."

The man's lips quivered, a reaction he had not anticipated. Was he amused? It would be a first.

"Oh, please," Frigyth interposed before he could be sure. "Stop it, you two! I'm not in the mood for your male posturing."

"No posturing, Birdie. We're just having a friendly chat, telling each other how nice it is to meet again after all these years."

With that, the Norseman wrapped an arm around his wife's shoulders, confident in his right to do so. It was not the possessiveness of the move that had Caedmon's guts writhe like angry eels. It was the way his and Frigyth's bodies seemed to fit together, as if they had been in that exact same position thousands of times, as if they were the two halves of a whole.

These two people belonged together, he could not doubt it anymore.

Well, what had he hoped?

That Frigyth would throw herself into his arms, say that she had spent the last ten years wishing he'd come back to her, that she had made a terrible mistake in refusing his offer of marriage and wanted to flee with him?

Yes, sadly, part of him had been hoping for exactly that, which went to show what a fool he was.

Caedmon stared at the sun peeking through the trees and sighed.

He should never have come. It was clear nothing but disillusion awaited him in this village.