The Virgin's War (Tudor Legacy #3)(74)
“Did you really suffer for it? I thought…from what I understand, men’s desires are easily satisfied with almost any woman.”
“Are you asking me if I’ve been satisfying myself elsewhere? Because I have not. I have not done so since I left Ireland. And certainly not once I landed in Edinburgh last year and laid eyes on you again.”
“Why?”
He tried to think how to explain it. It hardly seemed the time to turn delicate now. “What you said about men and satisfaction…it is true enough that lust is a hunger that can be met rather easily. I have had my share of such careless encounters when I was younger. But desire? Desire is wound around and shot through with love, so that only the one desired can satisfy it. I had long since fallen in love with your mind and your heart, Mariota. Once I realized how much I desired your body as well, it was far too late for any other woman to suffice. Only you.
“And that is why I asked you to marry me. In hopes that one day we might meet in the middle.” He looked around them wryly, at their disheveled clothes and her discarded robe. “This was rather more than I expected.” With the lightest touch, he traced her cheekbone and down her throat. “Or dared hope.”
“I suppose I was rather forward.”
“And thank heaven for it, for I’d never have had the nerve. Come.” He shifted and stood, pulling her with him. Then he swung her up and she twined her arms around his neck. He carried her to the door, her light weight in his arms both warm and arousing.
“Wait,” she said. “Won’t we shock the servants?”
“You have the best trained servants in all Scotland.” He laughed softly. “And we were not exactly silent. I’ll wager they are all of them as discreetly far out of earshot as they can get without leaving the house.”
“Where are we going?”
“Where do you think? We are going, my wife, to a proper bed. And I do not plan to leave it for some hours. We have weeks to make up for.”
Kit had never seen a more depressing view than Lakehill House. True, the whole of the North could appear bleak and barren to those accustomed to more flagrant beauty, but he’d learned to appreciate the stripped-down nature of both the landscape and its people. Eleanor Percy had clearly not even tried. Her farmland was scraggly and unkempt, the farmers resentful and suspicious, and the manor house itself looked fitting to an engraving of hell.
It did not help his opinion any that he kept imagining his father here, brought secretly from the Tower after a feigned execution, chained up for the king’s vengeance until Elizabeth became queen and Dominic Courtenay emerged from Lakehill House missing his left hand. It was not a story told within their family. The Courtenay children had to piece it together over the years from gossip. And when approached, the queen had been willing to lay out only the bare facts.
The last time Kit had seen Eleanor Percy, they’d both been guests of the Earl of Ormond in Ireland. The woman had clearly been angling for the earl at the time, and despite his noted toughness of mind, Ormond had succumbed sufficiently to install Eleanor at Kilkenny for two years. Kit wondered if being cast off since had humbled her at all.
It hadn’t. When summoned by Kit’s abrupt commands to her slovenly steward, Eleanor Percy wafted into the dark hall dressed for court. Everything about her proclaimed charm and availability—from the low-cut square neckline of her wine velvet gown to the delicate curls of her golden hair. Only when she drew closer did Kit note the slight stiffness of that hair, denoting an expensive wig. He imagined she kept the chamber shadowy in order to hide the betraying signs of age in her face.
“Lord Christopher!” she trilled. “What a surprise. Though not as surprising as your recent rise in the world. Your brother’s disgrace is certainly working to your advantage. Or is it,” she said with a confidential smile, “that you have learned the trick of pleasing a certain young royal? And here I thought you despised me, but you seem to be following in my steps. What will they call you, I wonder, when the princess seeks your bed rather than her husband’s?”
She uttered the insults secure in the knowledge that a gentleman—and the Courtenays were undoubtedly gentlemen—would never lay a hand on her. It was a close run thing, though, and Kit had to deliberately loosen his hands to keep from slapping her.
He had a better weapon at his command.
“Eleanor Percy Howard Gage Stafford.” He used every name she had ever possessed to ensure all was done in proper form. “You are under arrest, charged with high treason. You will be taken from here to a prison of Her Highness’s choosing to languish at her pleasure. You have fifteen minutes to gather any personal items you might require. You will not be allowed servants to attend you.”
Silence, broken by Eleanor’s voice trying valiantly to convey amusement. “My dear Lord Christopher, you have run mad.”
“We have evidence,” he said tonelessly. “And I expect we will uncover somewhere here the gold you are storing to pay England’s enemies.”
It was Eleanor who ran a little mad then. She flew at Kit without warning, managing to score his cheek with her fingernails before he could get a grip on her. It was like trying to subdue a wildcat. She hissed and spat and shouted obscenities.
“I should have killed him when I had the chance! Dominic Courtenay and his little whore…she was no better than me…I never tried to pass off another man’s child as my husband’s…Bitch, she’ll pay for this…”