Claire Delacroix (39 page)

The assembly leaned forward with gleaming eyes. Fenella blushed scarlet and Brianna had a horrible feeling of dread. “I loved him long,” the maid confessed. “But ’twas only
on this visit, when Dermot looked so unhappy, that I sought to console him.”

Dermot hung his head. “ ’Tis true matters proceeded too quickly,” he admitted gruffly, then looked up with bright eyes. “But I did not push Ismay! She was drunk, I left her in the hall that Friday eve, disgusted with her behavior yet again. She turned me from her bed years past and mocked me before all since the loss of Claremont.”

“And where did you go?” Luc asked coldly.

If Fenella’s cheeks had seemed red before that was naught compared to this moment. But she stepped forward proudly and laced her fingers tightly with Dermot’s own. “We were here, together, until ’twas nearly morn,” she declared.

The maids cackled like hens at this revelation and naught else could be heard in the armory. “We were together!” Dermot cried. “We each can speak for the other.”

“And you each had a stake in seeing Lady Ismay gone,” Luc commented with quiet authority.

The lovers looked at each other in dismay, but Brianna noted a trio of stablehands exchanging sheepish expressions. Luc evidently followed her gaze. “What do you know?” he asked the tallest.

The boy stepped forward. “We saw them, sir, and we heard them, as well,” he declared. “Denis bade us sleep in the armory, for the stable was overfull.” The ostler nodded acknowledgement of this, his single brow bobbing up and down. The boy turned on Fenella and Dermot with a grimace. “All that moaning,” he complained. “We had barely a wink of sleep.”

“Are you certain ’twas them?” Luc asked.

The boys nodded in unison. “Oh, Dermot!” cooed one in obvious mimicry of what they had heard.

“Fenella, my own sweet maid,” rumbled another, then the trio erupted into giggles.

“You listened!” Fenella cried.

“We could hardly do anything else!”

“Oho, but that was naught to Sunday eve!”

Fenella and Dermot went white, then their faces were suffused with scarlet. “You did not listen to that?” Fenella roared.

“My lord,
take
me!” one boy mimicked. “Take me
now
!”

Fenella gasped and set after the boys in outrage. They scampered into the assembly, their taunting parodies carrying from every corner of the armory as Fenella desperately sought them.

Brianna fought against her smile. Dermot might not be as honorable a man as Luc, but he was no murderer.

“Adulterer!” Father Padraig hissed. “Your sins will not be forgotten.”

“We should toss him in the dungeons,” Ruarke declared.

Luc shook his head. “We should send Dermot to make his pleas to Fenella’s sire,” he said firmly with a single glance to Brianna. “The lady’s decision is a sage one. ’Twill be Fenella’s father’s right to mete out any repercussions due.”

Dermot grew markedly paler, though he nodded agreement. A murmur of approval slipped through the ranks, but Brianna only had eyes for Luc. The assembly filtered into the bailey, but Luc lingered, a proud smile curving his lips.

“Well done, my lady fair,” he murmured. “You have learned quickly to take a keep in hand.”

Brianna smiled in return, unable to halt the glow that spread throughout her at Luc’s praise. She knew he would not grant it idly, so the words pleased her even more.

L
uc sat at one end of the hall as the evening shadows drew long, Uther’s copious notes spread before him. Somewhere in this stack of vellum lay the answer to Connor’s murder. Somewhere, there lurked a lie.

And Luc had but to find it. He frowned as he reviewed the observations of Cook, a flicker of movement distracting him from the task.

Brianna dropped onto the bench opposite and leaned closer. She was yet pale, Luc noted with concern, and there were shadows beneath her bright eyes.

“Did you find anything?” she asked anxiously and Luc knew she referred to the hiding place in the chapel.

He shook his head. “ ’Twas empty.”

“Oh.” Brianna sat back and folded her hands together before herself, her gaze dropping to the sheaves before Luc. “Have you talked to all?”

“Aye.” Luc could not keep his frown from deepening. “Yet come no closer to the truth for all of that. Someone must be hiding the truth!”

He glanced up to find Brianna smiling slightly. “Your eyes are very blue,” she murmured enigmatically.

Luc studied her for a moment, liking well how a faint
flush stained her cheeks at his perusal. “You seem to find significance in that, my lady,” he suggested and she flushed crimson.

“I have noted that they are thus when you find a matter—” she hesitated, licked her lips, then flicked a shy glance to Luc “—
interesting
.”

Her embarrassment only made Luc wonder when else his eyes had been blue.

“Indeed?” There was a prospect of tempting the lady to smile, Luc was certain of it. And that prospect was infinitely more intriguing than that of reading Cook’s recollection again. Luc set a sheet of vellum aside and propped his elbows on the trestle table to regard Brianna. “And what matter has prompted them to be so blue before?”

“You tease me again!” Her eyes danced, her gaze falling to Luc’s lips, then back to his eyes again. Her cheeks were aflame. “You
know
!”

“Nay, I do not.” Luc heaved a mock sigh and shook his head. “There is naught for it. You shall have to confide in me, my lady.”

Brianna glanced to the left and to the right, evidently satisfying herself that none was listening, then leaned across the table to whisper. “ ’Twas thus when you kissed me,” she confided.

“Ah!” Luc let a slow smile ease across his lips. “You speak aright, my lady, that was
most
interesting.”

Brianna caught her breath, her lips parted. The hall felt markedly warm as she stared back at Luc.

Luc suddenly recalled an issue that had been forgotten these past days. He deliberately tapped a fingertip on the board. “Do you not still owe me another
four
of those kisses?”

Brianna grinned and tossed her hair, granting him a cocky glance that was more like the woman Luc first had encountered.
“I do not know,” she said archly. “I must demand an accounting to be certain.”

“Ah, but if you demand the accounting of me, I can promise you what the result will be,” Luc mused. Brianna’s gaze flew to meet his. He winked and she smiled fully.

“ ’Tis true enough,” she conceded with mock resignation, then wrinkled her nose. “You, sir, only see such matters to your own advantage.” Their gazes held for a long moment and Luc dared to hope that the lady would grant his suit serious consideration.

He hoped that Connor had read his daughter aright.

Brianna tapped a fingertip now on the vellum, not glancing downward quickly enough to hide the mischievous gleam in her eye. “Although, Luc, I must wonder that stacks of vellum could be as intriguing to you as a lady’s kiss.”

Recalled to his task, Luc smiled slightly for her, then shoved a hand through his hair as he regarded the volume of Uther’s notes. “Rest assured, ’tis not the vellum,” he confided grimly, “but the desire to find your sire’s killer that captures my interest in this.”

Brianna leaned closer, her eyes wide. “Do you know who did this deed?”

“Nay!” Luc grimaced. “And there are precious few hints of the truth. I overheard whispers on Sunday eve but now can only conclude ’twas Dermot and Fenella.”

“What did they say?”

“That the lady must never know, never guess the truth until ’twas too late, that secrecy was imperative.”

Brianna straightened. “Do you think they planned to elope?”

“Nay,” Luc said grimly. “I think they planned the loss of Fenella’s maidenhead. The woman protested, the man insisted that they must finish what they had begun to see matters resolved to their satisfaction.”

The lady’s eyes widened. “Oh!” Then her brows drew together. “That shameless cur!” She turned an outraged gaze upon Luc. “What if he does not return for Fenella, but merely abandons her in such shame?”

Luc shrugged. “Shame may be easier to bear than a poor spouse.”

Brianna’s concern for her maid was evident. “Perhaps he truly does love her,” she murmured, plainly not convinced. “Perhaps he will change his ways and be a good spouse to her.”

There was a hopefulness to her tone that Luc did not have the heart to contest.

“Perhaps,” Luc conceded grimly, still not prepared to wager on any such optimistic possibility. “I hope, for Fenella’s sake, that he does.”

Brianna eyed him carefully. “You are skeptical of love,” she charged.

Luc met her gaze without embarrassment. “I have known little of it,” he admitted. “Though it seems to be oft used as an excuse for foolishness.”

“Like Fenella’s.”

Luc nodded firmly.

Brianna frowned and leaned across the board once more, her delicate hand coming to rest on Luc’s own. As previously, he was transfixed by the contrast between their hands.

“But a man and a woman can have a noble love between them, as my mother and father did. I have seen it.” Brianna’s gaze clung to Luc’s as though she would persuade him of this fact.

She swallowed and when she continued, her words were uncharacteristically tentative. “Do you believe it possible that you could feel such love for a woman?”

Luc could not halt his smile. He captured her hand and
leaned across the board. “
Any
woman?” he teased. “Or one woman in particular?”

“You!” Brianna retorted and made to withdraw but Luc held fast to her hand. “I meant whether you might love your wife.”

Luc folded her hand between his palms, interlacing her fingers with his own. He eyed her over their hands. “You meant,” he corrected smoothly, “whether I might love
you
.”

Brianna flushed, the only answer Luc needed. She parted her lips, then closed them again, clearly fighting to find something to say.

But Luc knew precisely what she wanted to hear.

“My lady,” he rumbled in a low voice, willing her to understand his intent, wanting only to reassure her. “
Brianna
.” Her eyes flashed at his use of her name and Luc slid his thumb across her hand in a smooth caress. “I have not a shred of doubt that you will claim my heart as securely as I intend to claim your own.”

Her emerald gaze danced over Luc’s features, as though she sought some sign that he was not to be believed.

But Luc knew there was none.

“Oh.” The acknowledgement was no more than a breath but Luc heard the weight of Brianna’s relief within it.

Uther, to Luc’s mind, showed markedly poor timing in that moment. The steward appeared by Brianna’s elbow and cleared his throat portentously. Brianna jumped at the sound. “My lady? Perhaps you see fit to retire?”

She looked startled by the option and charmingly reluctant to leave. Brianna hesitated and looked again to Luc.

“Perhaps ’tis a sensible idea,” he suggested, then subtly reminded her of her pledge to him. “Especially as Uther can accompany you.”

Brianna smiled then. “Of course, Uther.” To Luc’s delight,
she squeezed his fingers and cast him a shy smile before easing her hand from his own and rising from the board.

’Twas no accident that Luc’s gaze followed the lady’s figure as she made for the stairs, nor no coincidence that his heart leapt when she paused at the foot to look back at him.

Nay, Luc was fairly enamored of the lady already, and he knew well that time would only increase her hold over him.

And that suited him well enough.

Luc lingered over his wine until he heard the faint echo of the latch dropping home on Brianna’s door. Then and only then did Luc feel assured that Brianna was safe for this night.

Luc quaffed his wine and gathered Uther’s notes in a semblance of a pile. He was bone-tired and unlikely to discern any anomaly this night.

Sleep would do him good, as well. When Uther returned, Luc asked him to see the notes made secure, then strode from the hall.

Yet ’twas not the prospect of sleep that claimed Luc’s thoughts. ’Twas Brianna’s little sigh of acceptance and the accompanying shine of anticipation in her eyes that captured his thoughts. Aye, he would win this lady’s heart, if ’twas the last thing he did in this world.

The prize was worth any price.

The moon was full, the bailey quiet. The wine drifted warm in Luc’s veins and such was his mood that he did not think anything amiss when a footstep echoed behind him.

It might well be Uther. Luc managed to half turn and almost uttered a greeting before a cloth was cast over his head and someone punched him in the jaw.

But Luc was not so pensive that he did not reciprocate in kind.

Brianna awakened early Wednesday morn, Luc’s declaration echoing in her ears once more. Her dreams had been filled with Luc; she could not evict him from her thoughts.

She wanted to see him again.

Brianna dressed in haste as the first light of the morn crept through the shuttered window. Fenella was already awake and, mindful of the pledge she had granted Luc, Brianna indicated for that woman to accompany her.