The King's Courtesan (16 page)

He closed his eyes and let himself drift as his dark dreams overtook him. Far away, as always, he heard a woman weep.

ROSE CAME THE NEXT MORNING
to bring Hope her tea and help her dress, proudly wearing her new green frock and bubbling with excitement. The girl’s enthusiasm was contagious and it wasn’t in Hope’s nature to sit and wait for things to happen. By midmorning they were wel embarked on a household tour.

Her first impression the day before had been correct. Most of the house was empty and closed.
I suppose I shouldn’t
take his abandonment personally. He seems to have little
interest even in his own home.
Certain key rooms were wel maintained, though. The handsome dining room, boasting carved walnut panels and a sideboard graced with a colorful Turkish rug, was situated in the north wing across from the drawing room she’d been left in yesterday.

The captain’s study was further down the hal , and a cozy room with a ceiling painted with wispy clouds and a blue summer sky was hidden off an eastern corridor at the far end. The sofas, chairs and desk were draped in sheets, but the wal s were covered with tiny oil paintings, and several cabinets and smal tables held displays of wondrous curiosities.

Brightly colored corals and polished stones stood on low bookcases. Smal sculptures were housed in cabinets alongside clockwork automata of people, animals, the solar system and even a coach-and-four complete with footmen running alongside. There was a unicorn horn and glass figurines and a spyglass set on a stand. She was particularly taken by a lovely three-story dol house furnished in exquisite miniature detail. She ran her hand along a cabinet top and flicked dust from her fingertips. “What a marvelous room! It’s a curiosity cabinet and study. Does no one come here, Rose?”

“No, ma’am,” Rose said with a shudder. “Folk stay away from this part of the house. Some say ’tis here that’s most haunted. I’ve never seen this room before. I didn’t even know it was here.”

“Excel ent! We shal keep it that way. I love this room and I intend to claim it for myself. That wil be much easier if no one else wants anything to do with it.”

“But who wil have to come here to clean it, ma’am. Or lay a fire?” The little maid was clearly nervous the task might fal to her.

“Help me today, Rose, and I shal see to it myself thereafter.

I’m not afraid of a little work.” She began removing sheets and coverings, and with Rose’s reluctant help, spent the rest of the morning dusting, polishing and cleaning windows, so the floors sparkled and the cabinets, furniture and col ection of curiosities shone with a luminous glow.

She stopped to examine a couple of exquisite miniatures of a beautiful golden-haired girl with lovely rounded features and a sweet sunny smile. They were careful y placed in one of the cabinets along with other little treasures. She stood transfixed. It seemed almost as if the girl was trying to send her a message from some distant place or time.

Something about the eyes reminded her of the captain.
Will
he ever tell me of his family? Would I ever tell him of
mine?

She shook off a sudden chil . There was stil more of this fascinating hideaway to explore. There was a window seat that looked to the water, much like her room upstairs, and with the casement opened she could hear the busy twitter of nesting birds, the soft rustle of wind through the leaves and the soothing murmur of the river. She was further delighted to find a partial y concealed door to the right of the fireplace that led to a flagged terrace flanked by a high wal covered in sweet-smel ing climbers.

She fol owed the fragrant path to an unkempt garden complete with a sundial and an overgrown fairy fountain.

The garden needed pruning and weeding, the fountain had to be cleaned and cleared, but it felt like her own little piece of heaven.

They finished the tour in the late afternoon. Other than a richly appointed bil iard room attached to a lofty, wel -lit library, the south wing was unused. Their footsteps echoed behind them as they wandered down the hal . At the far end Hope discovered an empty stone conservatory two stories tal , with an upper gal ery that overlooked the woods and fields below. Who would leave such a lovely room empty?

She imagined it fitted with mirrors, its white marble fountain burbling merrily amidst exotic plants and trees from around the world. A conservatory was a luxury she’d not had in London and she resolved to write the king’s gardener, her friend Mr. Rose.

Rose tugged at her sleeve and directed a worried look outside. The sky had darkened quickly, with towering pil ars of leaden cloud. “We’ve no candles to light our way, my lady, and it’s growing late. Shouldn’t we hurry back now? I’d not like to be caught in these hal s once it’s grown ful dark.” Hiding her own uneasiness and exhausted from her explorations, Hope readily agreed. They hurried back to the comfort of lighted rooms and the smel of slow-roasting beef. Too tired to endure forced conversation and stiff politeness, she ate her supper in her room and promptly sought her bed.

Across the hal and three doors down her husband sought a bottle. He didn’t want company either. He wanted brandy, and he wanted to be alone. Today would have been Caroline’s birthday.

HOPE TWISTED AND MOANED, restless in her sleep.

Somewhere a loose shutter banged on a wal and she shifted and whimpered as half-heard sounds invaded her dreams. Her heart beat faster and her breath came in shal ow gasps as she clutched her blanket, gripping it tight.

She twitched and started violently, fighting to wake, trapped by whatever chased her through her nightmare. She woke suddenly, as if dragged from her sleep, with the eerie feeling that someone had been cal ing her name. She often woke at night. As a child in a brothel on Drury Lane one always needed to be on guard. But she liked it, too.

Walking alone, enveloped in the soft mystery of the dark. It never used to frighten her, but it did tonight.

The wind had picked up since early evening, and was blowing from the east. Unfamiliar houses made unfamiliar noises. But did they sound like whispers? Footsteps? Or the sound of something lost, cal ing in the dark? Something clattered in the hal and she stifled a startled scream.

Creaking floorboards, slamming windows and eerie whispers were nothing more than what was to be expected.

The normal grumblings of an elderly house as its joints complained. It was nothing but an overactive imagination that made it seem like anything more.

Fighting a panicked urge to hide beneath her blankets, she lifted her chin and stiffened her spine, deliberately chal enging her fears. Reminding herself that she loved storms. They fil ed her with anticipation and a sense of power, which was something she needed desperately right now. She drew a loose, floor-length silk robe tight around her and set off for the library, with its magnificent view.

She walked back and forth between the library and bil iards room as the rain drove across the river in great angry gusts, slamming against the windows and rattling doors. Rather than excited, she felt distinctly on edge. In the city one watched a storm from a bulwark of buildings, but here in the country, one stood directly in its path. It felt wilder, rawer and far more dangerous, like a wild beast approaching, roaring its hunger and snapping off limbs as it moved through the forest. There were the same familiar rumblings as thunder loomed closer, but other sounds, too, were born on the wind. Shrieks and wailing and mournful cries.
It’s
nothing but the wind tearing through the woods
. Yet she couldn’t help thinking of Rose’s fearful tales.

Something shifted and stirred in the air around her and a bright crack of lightning il uminated the sky. A face flickered in the window and she turned to run with a startled cry. She slammed into something warm and hard.

“I see the storm woke you, too. I’m sorry if I startled you.” He held her tight, to keep her from fal ing, and she clutched at his shoulders with a gasp of relief. She could feel his strength, coiled beneath her fingers. It made her feel safe in an oddly familiar way. He held her a little longer than necessary, before letting her slide down his body until her feet touched the ground. He seemed different somehow.

His movements were relaxed, his voice was husky, and she could smel brandy on his breath. His arms were stil wrapped around her, and his arousal pressed firm against her bel y, weakening her limbs and making her melt inside.

It was the chance she had been waiting for. To teach him he was no better than she was. To make him hers.

“I heard noises in my room. They frightened me,” she whispered, smoothing and straightening the front of his robe before sliding beneath it to place a dainty hand on his hard, muscled chest. His naked skin was hot to her touch and his heart beat strong beneath her palm.

“So you came down here al by yourself in the dark?”

“I came down here to better watch the storm.” She took a step closer, so the soft curves of her body molded against him. He was naked beneath his banyan and her fingers trailed across his taut bel y, then curled around his arousal with a firm squeeze. He swel ed in her hand, smooth as velvet and hard as iron and she stood on tiptoe to whisper against his throat. “They make me feel alive and restless.

They make me ache with longing and feed some nameless need. Do you feel their power, Captain Nichols? When is the last time you had a woman?”

He took her hand in a hard grip and forced her to take a step back. “Madam, I am drunk, but in the morning I shal be sober, and you wil stil be the king’s whore.”

“And your wife. I’l stil be that, too,” she said, stung.

“Good God, madam! You act like a bitch in heat. You are his. Would you have it otherwise?”

“And you a hound with the scent, sir.” It wasn’t going at al as she’d planned. She was angry, and despite herself her feelings were hurt. “You want me. Your prick can’t lie. You’re just not man enough to act on it. I may be his bitch, but you are his cur and the master is far from the kennel. Why shouldn’t we please ourselves?”

“Have you no love for him, then? Are you truly so venal? He has treated you wel enough. At least show some honor to the man who has fed and clothed you. You owe him that much.” His voice was laced with disgust.

“No!” Her angry shout startled them both. “Love for him?

Honor? I owe him nothing. I’l not love a man who doesn’t love me. He’s no better than you! You are hypocrites both.

And I am a courtesan, not a whore. I am educated. I can dance and sing and play cards. I can use a napkin and speak some French and write and read. I have even learned to do my sums. I have known only three men. Yes.

They bought and paid for my company, but I’ve been faithful to each one. I daresay that’s more than you or he can say.”

“I pray you forgive my doubts regarding your faithfulness when I have just removed your dainty hand from about my cock. I’m a man, Hope. And yes…I have your scent. I spring to attention whenever you walk by. It’s in your voice, your look, your walk. Women like you were born to entice, but like it or not, you’re not some strumpet I can walk away from. Your name, and thus your honor, is now bound to mine. As long as you’re his, I’l treat you as guest, not lover or wife.”

“Hah!” Her laughter was harsh. “Listen to yourself. You think that refusing to acknowledge we’re married makes you any less a cuckold? You have no honor left to lose, Captain.

You sold it for a title,
my lord.
” Robert sighed. He didn’t real y want this constant animosity.

There didn’t have to be a contest. She was what she was and he was what he was. A whore and a kil er who’d failed in his duty. Far better if they could just let each other be. He careful y modulated his tone. “The title means naught, Hope. Al I cared about was keeping Cressly, so I might honor a promise made years ago. There must have been other men to suit your purpose. If you find me so distasteful, why in God’s name did you choose me?”

“Choose you? What choice did I make? I was not even forewarned. As you and he decided how I was to be disposed of, I was seeing to his guests and readying the maypole and doing my best to make him proud. He thanked me by denying me the thing I want most. I know what you think. Jewels. Money. Position. But what are they when dependent on the good graces of another? I wanted my freedom, Captain. I had no wish to be there when his queen arrived. I begged him to let me leave court and retire to a place of my own before he married. And what did he do? He sold me to a man who hates me. Married me to someone I’d never met and forever denied me my freedom.

He does not love or honor me, so why should I him?”

“He is your monarch.”

“As someone who has slept in his bed I can tel you that al that he is, is a man.”

Her hair was disheveled, her lovely face stained with tears, and Robert felt a gut-wrenching ache that spread to his chest and squeezed his throat. The thought that she might not have known, might not have been complicit, had never occurred to him. If what she said were true, Charles had treated her badly indeed, and she was no more at fault for their current predicament than he. She was as much a pawn if not more. At least he had been given a choice. “I didn’t know, Hope. I thought it was something arranged between the two of you.”

She looked taken aback but quickly recovered. “And I thought it was something between you and him. He used us both, Captain. When I saw you in London my pulse quickened. I had never been so interested or attracted to a man. It’s not something I would have acted upon, but we are far from London now and so much has changed. Why not seek comfort from one another? There is sorrow in your eyes and I am lonely this night.”

His body tightened and he took a harsh breath. She was such a lovely creature he ached to possess her, from her tumble of night-dark hair to her pretty toes. He looked into violet eyes that shone with their own inner light. “And when he cal s for you?” His voice grated.

“You know as wel as I do that I wil have to go.” He took a step back. “I wil not take advantage of a guest, madam.”