Her Lord and Protector (formerly titled On Silent Wings)

Her
Lord and Protector

COPYRIGHT
Ó
2013 by Pam
Roller

All
rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner
whatsoever without written permission of the author except in the case of brief
quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

This is a work
of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of
the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to
actual persons living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales, is
entirely coincidental.

Cover image by
RomanceNovelCovers.com
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Jimmy Thomas & Kathryn Page

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by
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Chapter One

England, April
1667

From his vantage
point on the hill facing Drayton castle, Alexander Fletcher scowled through the
misty rain at the coach halting before his door. “She is here,” he said to the
lanky rider beside him. “Would that I had declined the king’s request.”

“At least she will
be silent,” his neighbor Robert Cooke said. “She’d make a perfect wife.”

“To anyone but
me.” Alex shifted in the saddle to conceal a sudden, ridiculous loneliness that
banded his chest. Crushing the feeling, he studied the prize sent to him by
King Charles II, noting that she alighted from the coach with no companion. One
pale hand at her throat clutched a cloak that covered her from head to knees.
She paused, and her upper body bent and shook with what looked like a bout of
coughing.

Even at this
distance, Alex sensed her desperation. Useless sympathy sparked, and died, within
him. “She looks sickly. Perhaps ’twas another reason fat Rochester made her cry
off their betrothal after she became destitute.”

“Mmm. Ailing,
poor,
and
mute.” Robert shook his head, causing the drop of rain on his
hooked nose to fall. “And likely mindless from the fire. You have the luck.”

“’Twasn’t luck
that brought her to my doorstep.” Alex didn’t explain further. Despite what her
father had done, there was no cause to invite malice toward her from others. He
watched his cousin Elizabeth appear at the door to greet the woman. “Forsooth, I
will rid myself of her without delay.”

Robert glanced
at him. “You will not act on the king’s suggestion?”

“No.”

“’Tis well you
do not,” Robert said. “Taking a woman like that to wife—God knows she would
cause you no end of trouble. And your pain over Mary’s death still runs deep.”

Alex was silent,
his hands fisting around the slippery wet reins. Abruptly, he pivoted his horse
toward the open fields. “Enough. We’ll check the north end for your runaway
mare. But I will wager she has returned to her stall by now.” He pressed his
heels to his horse’s flanks.

In seconds
Robert’s mount galloped beside his. Alex stared straight ahead and allowed the
wind to whip back the hood of his cloak and the rain to slap the bitter past
from his thoughts.

****

Lady Katherine
Seymour followed a servant across the withdrawing room while smoothing down her
travel-worn dress. After making her wait an intolerable period of time—it was already
one of the clock, more than an hour after her arrival—Lord Drayton had finally
summoned her. In one damp hand, she clutched her slate.

The servant gave
a tentative knock on the door.

“Come,” a deep
voice spoke from within.

Katherine
stepped into a dim, unadorned room, her startled gaze at once drawn to the
striking profile of the man writing at a massive desk. She wondered that the
slender white quill he held didn’t snap in two within his large hand.

“Sit.” Without
glancing up, he flicked his free hand toward a wooden chair near his desk.

Despite his rude
greeting, Katherine approached and sat, back straight and head high. She laid
the slate in her lap and pulled the chalk from its holder, ready to answer his
questions about her circumstances. How much information had the king given him?

She wanted no
sympathy or pitying looks from this man. Only shelter and security. And to keep
her pride. It was all she had left.

Pausing in his
writing, he glanced at her from beneath furrowed brows. Briefly his features
went slack. “You are the Lady Katherine?”

Katherine
swallowed at the sudden dryness in her throat.

Blue eyes,
lonely and steady and deep, engulfed her senses, emptied her lungs, made the
chalk slick in her damp hand. An odd heaviness stirred within her. Stranger
still was the sudden yearning that filled her, a desire to reach out to him.

At her hesitant
nod, surprise—and something else she couldn’t identify—flickered in his eyes.
For too long he stared at her while ink bloomed black on his paper from the tip
of his quill.

Then, scowling,
he returned his attention to his work.

Taken aback,
Katherine glanced around the austere room, warmed by a crackling fire in the
hearth. Candles atop the desk added more illumination, but heavy drapes over
the windows shut out whatever light could be gleaned from the gray, rainy day
outside.

While the
scratch of his quill filled the room, she waited, holding herself erect, the
chalk clutched in her fingers.

Where was the
widower? This man’s intense concentration on the bookwork signified that he
might be the steward, here to help with the ledgers. From the appearance of the
papers piled in disarray on the desk and a nearby table, Lord Drayton needed
help.

She fell to
studying him, the way his dark blond hair fell in damp waves to his shoulders,
the ends curling as they dried. An aquiline nose led to sensually curved lips
over a strong cleft chin, on which a scar nestled within a light shadow of
beard.

After a few
moments, Katherine began to nibble at her lip in mounting perplexity. Did his
confirmation of her identity sum up her introduction? Had she been dismissed?

She waited. He
continued to write. Perhaps he wanted to complete a letter for her to read. It
wouldn’t be the first time someone thought she was deaf as well as mute. She
leaned forward slightly to see, but his arm, which looked strong enough to toss
a horse into the air, blocked her view.

At length,
Katherine released a thinly disguised, impatient breath. Indignant heat rose to
her cheeks and a little knot of anger balled in her stomach. He was ignoring
her!

No more.

Her chalk’s
shrill screech could bring boisterous chatter in Whitehall’s banqueting room to
an abrupt halt. Now, watching him with narrowed eyes, she set it to her slate
and dragged it hard across the surface.

The man’s head
jerked up and his shoulders hunched. Ah, now she had his attention, grimace and
all. And she would keep it. With raised brows she wrote,
And you are?
She
turned the slate for him to read.

A heartbeat
passed. Two. Then, he locked crystal eyes with her. “I am Lord Drayton. Your
guardian.”

Oh, mercy. The
chalk slipped through Katherine’s numb fingers and dropped to the wood floor.
With her defiant action, she had just compromised her chance to be sheltered,
and the king would not likely attempt to help her again.

Even so, she
held Lord Drayton’s gaze and fought to breathe. In turn, he scrutinized her as
if searching her mind for some secret she might hold.

“You are
trembling,” he said. “Have you a chill?”

No. Not a chill.
The shiver was due to something else entirely, a restlessness that heightened
all her senses. She shook her head—more in confusion over the new sensation
than in answer to his question—and leaned forward to pick up her chalk.

“Wait.” He
reached down, fetched the chalk, and held it out.

Careful not to
touch his long fingers, Katherine took it, then wiped her slate clean with an attached
cloth. When she began to scribble an apology for her discourtesy, he put up a
hand. The hostile distrust in his eyes made her draw back in alarm and almost
drop the chalk again.

“No games. I
want the truth. Do you know why you are here?”

Through her
bewilderment at his harsh tone, she tried to keep the chalk steady in her
trembling fingers.
The king wished to provide for me
, she wrote.

The slight
narrowing of his eyes indicated his disbelief. “I will make myself clear only
once, Lady Katherine. Had I refused the king’s suggestion to send you here, he
would not look favorably upon me. That is the sole reason you are in my home.”
He leaned toward her and his voice slowed, but rose in volume. “Do you
understand what I am saying?”

She drew back
from him, frowning.
Of course
, she wrote.
I am not an idiot
.
Nor
deaf
. She tapped an index finger on the last word for emphasis, wondering
if Lord Drayton was aware of how stridently his voice had echoed in the
bare-walled room.

Indeed, she would
go deaf if he kept that up.

Contemplation
passed over his features as he read. Then, his face became impassive, his
voice low and cold. He stood. “Your opinion of yourself is of no concern to
me.”

Katherine
couldn’t voice her sharp retort regarding his disgraceful conduct, and writing
it would diffuse her point into a petty, time-consuming reaction. Her head felt
suddenly heavy and she lowered it, trying to will away the familiar weary
despair. His statement summed up her existence since the fire that had raged
through London and consumed everything dear to her, including her voice. No one
cared to ask what she wanted. None of her opinions mattered.

She became aware
that Lord Drayton’s snug rust-colored breeches, buttoned up his thighs, were
directly in her line of vision. No fashionable loose petticoat breeches hid the
powerful lines of his legs. In the midst of her stunned hurt at his
discourtesy, Katherine felt heat blaze her cheeks.

Rising to her
feet, she found her eyes level with his broad chest. She tilted back her head
and ran her gaze to his face.

The man was a
castle unto himself: tall, formidable, all hard lines and impenetrable fortitude.
No one, to her memory, seemed packed with more strength. What was such a man
doing out here in the countryside? He should be in London, where the women of
the Court would drink him up like fine Madeira wine.

The rapid
cadence of his pulse revealed itself on his neck above the unlaced collar of
his white linen shirt. Warmth emanated from his body. Breathing him in,
Katherine found his clean, masculine scent pleasing. Stirring.

She couldn’t
pardon his insulting reception, however, and returned his scowl with a glare.

“I sympathize
with your loss,” he said. “You’ve suffered a great deal.” He turned, and with a
grace that belied his size, walked to the door. “Whatever the past, you are
safe in my home, and may make yourself comfortable while you are here. I will
find you a suitable husband who will treat you well. But try to understand, my
lady, as soon as I make the arrangements, you will leave.” He opened the door.

It seemed he
would waste no time in passing her off to someone else. Struggling for
composure, Katherine remained rigid by her chair and waited for him to speak further.

Instead, he left
the door open, returned to his desk, sat and picked up his quill.

His dismissal
came without words.

****

God’s nails!

When the door
clicked shut behind her, Alex dropped his sweat-dampened quill, slumped back in
his chair, and let out a ragged breath.