The Virgin's War (Tudor Legacy #3)(54)

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Over the course of the next week at Kenilworth Castle, Kit applied himself to the task of womanizing. He couldn’t decide what made it more uncomfortable—Anabel’s presence or his parents’. He judged that at least his parents weren’t likely to try and kill him because of it.

It wasn’t that he didn’t know how to talk to women. He’d always had a reputation for teasing charm and a lightness of heart that drew people to him. Though it had been tempered in the last years, it wasn’t too difficult to remember how to flirt. And there were plenty of women willing to let him practice.

But he was older now. At twenty-three, most women expected more from him than flirtatious words or multiple dances. Almost at once it was clear that all Kit needed to do was start the matter. The women would finish it for him.

He let himself enjoy it. It wasn’t so difficult—just stop paying attention to the critical voices in his head and let his instincts guide him. He was young and healthy and, unlike probably most men his age, a virgin. At last it was beginning to weigh on him.

Lettice Wixom quickly showed herself the most determined of those competing for his attention. The daughter of a prominent member of Parliament, Lettice was nineteen and merry and buxom. She’d been married at seventeen to an elderly Midlands landowner who had conveniently died after six months, leaving his young widow a wealthy woman looking for pleasure.

She promptly latched onto Kit to give it to her. He thought himself in control of the situation, until their fourth night at Kenilworth when she neatly managed to cut him away from the crowds and maneuvered him into an empty section of the loggia that led to the formal gardens. It was no hardship to kiss her, and if his conscience burned a bit at the thought of Anabel, it was not so difficult to submerge it in her warmth.

Her hands were skilled and far more experienced than his own. But he was a fast learner. Her giggles gave way to sighs of pleasure and at last she whispered, “I know a quiet way through the back of the castle. I have a private room,” she teased.

A little breathlessly, he said, “I don’t think that’s wise. Surely someone would notice.”

“My father was half drunk before we came out here. And he doesn’t care.”

“Mine does.”

“Afraid of your father?” She breathed into his ear, her hands busy with the buttons of his jerkin.

“My mother, more like.” Despite his words, he kept her pulled against him, hands encircling the corseted waist. His mouth trailed from her lips to the line of her jaw and farther down. He knew there were reasons this was a bad idea, but they were rapidly flying from his head. Any moment now she could simply crook her finger and he would follow her without thought.

“They might be glad to have the gossip dispelled,” Lettice said. “And for certain, the queen will.”

He stilled. “What gossip?”

“That you’re sleeping with the princess.”

For all that Kit knew such things were being murmured in shadows and corners, to hear it thus lightly spoken of shocked the desire right out of him. He stepped away from Lettice so sharply that her hands were left hanging in midair. He might have found her surprised expression comical if he wasn’t suddenly, thoroughly furious.

“If you were a man, I would strike you for that. In point of fact, I have done so. No one speaks of Her Royal Highness in such terms.”

“I didn’t mean anything by it. Heavens, do you think I care? I know what it is to be sold off into a marriage not of your choosing. Why should she not take her pleasures where she can?”

His hand had actually raised of its own accord, and Kit forced himself to drop it without slapping her. “Go. Now. And keep your mouth shut.”

His temper might have been disastrous with another woman, resulting in either tears or tantrum. But Lettice was not easily insulted. “You know where to find me when you want me. You might think me a foolish girl, but I am not wrong when I tell you the best thing you could do to serve Her Highness is to flaunt your presence in other women’s beds.”

Kit was the one who stalked away, leaving the girl bemused and probably pitying behind him. If he’d been somewhere familiar, he’d have known where to go to be alone. But at Kenilworth, from sheer bad luck, he entered through what he thought was an unattended door into a side corridor only to walk straight into his sister.

On second thought, knowing Pippa, it probably wasn’t luck of any kind.

Without a word between them, Kit shut his eyes and swore under his breath. Then he opened them. “Where is she?” he asked.

“I’ll take you.”

She did not lead him to Anabel’s privy chamber or bedchamber. Instead, he followed her to a quiet room, kept discreetly away from the bulk of the guests. Pippa’s room, he knew at once. Well, Pippa and Matthew’s.

Of course there was a bed in here, but Kit had never felt less like kissing Anabel than he did now. She stood at the window, her back to him, and waited until Pippa had left to stand guard before saying, “I always thought Lettice Wixom an uncommonly silly girl. But then, I suppose it is not her conversation that attracts you.”

“You told me to flirt,” he said. “Do you not remember it?”

“That was not flirting. If I hadn’t sent Pippa to find you when I did, would she have had to look in Lettice’s bed?”