Her Lord and Protector (formerly titled On Silent Wings) (5 page)

“Then you must
learn your facts before you cause my embarrassment and Lady Katherine’s
discomfort,” Sarah shot back. Bits of brown food flew from her lips and added
visual impact to her heated words.

Katherine’s
round-eyed gaze flew from Robert to Sarah.

“’Tis true we
were mistaken,” Alex said through the tight muscles clenching his jaw. “The
king informed me only of her entrapment in the fire and her father’s death, as
well as her broken engagement to the Earl of Rochester. We assumed the rest, as
Robert has said.”

No longer
looking as if tears threatened, Katherine sipped her wine and regarded him, as
he did her. How would her voice sound? Low and musical, he mused. Full of
elegance as was her walk, yet with a vibrancy like the glossy curls that graced
her shoulders.

“I did assume
the rest,” Robert muttered. “How was I supposed to know she can think? Why in
damnation would anyone care—”

“Fie, Robert, do
hush!” Sarah said. “Your words tonight are deplorable.”

“Silence,
woman!” Robert snapped. “Would that
your
voice could—”

“Enough.” Alex’s
voice, low but hard, silenced the Cookes. There would be no games or reading
after the meal. Inviting his nearest neighbors to dinner so Katherine could
meet them had been a terrible mistake.

Robert turned to
Alex with a pained, set smile. “We apologize, Drayton.”

Alex nodded,
resisting the urge to order them all to leave right now. “We all misunderstood
Lady Katherine’s difficulty.”

As if relieved,
Katherine closed her eyes.

Robert tipped up
his wine goblet and drank, and then wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.
“I suppose it will be harder now to convince the king as to why you didn’t
pursue his suggestion.”

Katherine’s eyes
flew open.

Agnes’ sharp
eyes speared her father. “I am certain Lord Drayton will succeed.”

Puzzlement
filled Katherine’s features. She arched her brows at Alex, clearly expecting an
explanation.

“’Tis not
important,” Alex said to her, and watched her eyes narrow.

She raised her
slate to the table.

“’Twas nothing,
Lady Katherine.” Damn Robert! The man couldn’t keep a straight head when he
drank. And it was too late now to tell him the king’s suggestion of marriage
was a ruse. He’d built the lie to avoid telling Robert the real reason she was
here, that her father had been Cromwell’s spy.

As she neared
her chalk toward the surface, Alex felt his throat constrict. He did not need
further association with this woman. “’Twas only a suggestion. I shall discuss
it with you in private.”

Elizabeth said,
“Shall we return to the parlor for—”

Katherine
slammed chalk to slate. Each swift, screeching stroke of letters drove needled
pain into Alex’s ears. Then, she swung the slate around.
You will tell me
now.

Alex swore under
his breath and slapped a hand on the table. “Fine. Anything to stop that sound.
The king suggested I take you to wife.”

Katherine’s jaw
dropped. Her slate clattered to the table. She stared at him in wide-eyed
shock, and shook her head.

“You needn’t
concern yourself, however,” Alex continued. Why did she grimace so? “As we
discussed yesterday, I will—”

Katherine rose,
her back stiff and straight.

“I did not
excuse you,” Alex said.

The command gave
her pause, but only for a moment. She raised her chin and arched a haughty brow
at him before turning heel and sailing out of the room.

Alex maintained
a vigilantly stern countenance. He should be satisfied that she objected to the
marriage suggestion. Instead, a band of iron seemed to tighten around his neck
and a strange, sinking distress over her reaction weighted his heart.

Did she, too,
think him the fiend that his wife had?

Agnes lay a hand
over her deep cleavage. “I am shocked at her willful behavior, my lord,” she
gasped. “
I
would never think to do such a thing.”

Alex dragged his
gaze from the empty doorway to Agnes. To his knowledge, she had never raised
debate over anything he said, but was drearily agreeable with him. “I am sure
you would not.” He forced a smile that felt like a grimace, and Agnes cocked
her head in that annoying manner that reminded him of a bird listening for a
worm in the ground.

Robert dipped
his fingers into the small bowl of water set before him and then wiped them dry
on the tablecloth. “I’d say a beating is in order for that vixen.”

Alex turned to
Robert and held no check on his displeasure. “I’d say you will not give your
opinion of how to handle a willful woman in my household.”

“I’d offer to do
the job myself, but I know you will put her in her place.” Robert leaned back
in his chair and lifted his cup to his host.

Alex stood to
lead his guests into the adjoining withdrawing room for dessert. He fervently
wanted everyone gone.

Elizabeth caught
up with him at the door. “What will you do, Alex?” she whispered, her eyes
bright with worry.

Alex paused with
one hand on the doorframe. What would he do? What he’d like to do. Catch
Katherine before she got to the stairs, swing her hard toward him, and grasp
her head in his hands. Taste her luscious mouth. Run his hands down her
damnably sensual body.

His hand on the
doorframe clenched. “That is not your concern, Elizabeth,” he said, wanting to
drive his fist to his forehead and pound some sense into himself. “She will
soon learn that I have control over her and will demonstrate it fully if need
be.”

“You do not
mean—”

“I will do what
is fitting to Lady Katherine Seymour,” Alex said. “And since she cannot speak,
I will not have to listen to her futile protests.”

****

“M’lady, do ye
require help—”

Katherine slammed
the door, leaving Millie standing in the corridor. Yanking out hairpins and
tossing them onto her dressing table, she began a rapid pace across the room
and back.

She didn’t know
at whom she was angrier—King Charles, Lord Drayton, or Sir Cooke. Charles would
not care for a complaint after so generously finding her a guardian, yet she
felt compelled to pen him a letter anyway and remind him of her father’s many
years of service during His Majesty’s exile. Out of deference to her father,
the king should have told her of his suggestion. Instead, she had to hear about
it at the dinner table in front of Lord Drayton’s guests.

She shook out
her hair until it fell loosely down her back, then strode to the window and
flung aside the curtains. She would marry Lord Drayton when hens made holy
water! Thank heaven he agreed with her way of thinking.

He was just as
much to blame. Had he only told her during their first meeting, she would have
tolerated the unpleasant duration of the meal. As it was, now he knew that her
forced silence had done nothing to dampen her tendency to speak her mind. He
would have good reason now to remove her from his house at once.

She should
apologize to him for leaving his table. The idea, however, made her stomach
twist into disagreeable knots. No matter what else she’d lost, she must keep
some semblance of pride.

She glanced
behind her at her closed bedchamber door and then opened the window. Breaking
the silly rule would no doubt cause another flurry of alarm from Elizabeth, but
Katherine didn’t care. The breeze felt good, and it dried her unbidden tears.

Lord Drayton had
been so quick to discount the king’s suggestion, telling her it meant nothing.
She
meant nothing.

If only she knew
what her future held.

She leaned out
and gazed at the pebbled carriage drive, imagining his big hands grasping his
wife, shoving her out, and watching her body fall.

A sharp rap came
at her bedchamber door, and, with a shiver, she jerked the window closed.

Millie curtsied
when Katherine opened the door, and the maid’s round eyes were wide. “M’lady,
Lord Drayton is finished with his meal and wants ye to come to his study.”

He would rebuke
her now. Or banish her from his house. Perhaps both. Sudden trepidation made
her feet refuse to move. Where would she go?

“He said at
once, m’lady. I am sorry.” Millie’s eyes lowered.

Gripping her
slate in her trembling hands, Katherine followed the maid downstairs.

Lord Drayton’s
fierce expression and harsh tone made Katherine, legs shaking and arms hugging the
slate to her chest, unable to respond to his words with even a simple nod. All
coherent thought now centered on Millie’s words of his fierce quarrels with his
wife.

He stood in the
middle of his study, arms akimbo and feet wide apart. “The Cookes are in the
parlor, so I shall not keep them waiting. Should you dine at my table again,
you will wait to be excused before leaving. Your abrupt departure, regardless
of the cause, was unpardonable.”

Was he finished?
Would he punish her?

He followed her
furtive glance to the thick rod hanging on the wall to his right. To her utter
surprise, the hard set of his lips relaxed into wry amusement.

“You could never
do anything to warrant that,” he said. “’Tis dusty from disuse.”

Relieved,
Katherine wetted her dry lips. Nonetheless, she remained stiff and still in
front of his study door until an itch in her throat made her turn and spend the
next moment coughing into her hand.

“Are you ill?”
he asked when she at last straightened and moved her loose hair back from her
face. “Should I send for a doctor?” His hands, loosely clenched, had dropped to
his sides.

She lifted her
slate and then studied his reaction.

“Go ahead. I
understand your frustration. I could not speak for a week after my parents—” He
stopped as if catching himself, and shook his head. “Go on, answer me. Do you
wish for a doctor or not?”

Although his
voice had once again become firm, his eyes held a searching quality.

She wrote,
keeping her strokes light to minimize the chalk’s squeak.
Doctors are useless
.
I have coughed since the London fire
.

“Ah. Well.” He
seemed almost disappointed. “I will not send for one, then. Have you tried
lozenges?”

She nodded. Why
did he care?

“Edward Cooke
knows his herbs. Perhaps he could suggest something.”

Perhaps. Katherine
nodded once more, watching the play of candlelight on the bristles of his jaw.
How would they feel against her neck?

“Very well. I
will ask him.” Lord Drayton once again crossed his arms, took a breath, and
leveled his chin. “And there is one more thing that I wish to make clear, Lady
Katherine. ’Tis only a ruse that the king suggested we marry. If he truly had,
I would have taken you to wife yesterday—out of loyalty to him.” He turned away
and lifted the single candle from his desk. With his back to her he added,
“Forsooth, I saw by your reaction in the dining room that you are as against
the idea as I.”

Katherine’s
insides took an odd tumble at that declaration. When he again faced her, however,
she raised her chin and arched one brow in question. Why had he lied to the
Cookes? She didn’t want to look away from him to write the question, however.
There was an intensity in his eyes that stilled her.

Lord Drayton’s
mouth opened, then closed and tightened. As he walked toward her holding the
candle, the room shrank behind him in the darkness.

Since he hadn’t
dismissed her, Katherine did not move.

He stopped and
scrutinized her, his features flickering in the candlelight. “Must you always
tremble like this? I do not wish to frighten you. Whatever the past, you may be
assured of your safety.”

There it was
again, that reference to the past. She hadn’t met him before now, had she?
Insulted him during a party at Whitehall? Perhaps Ellis had done something.

No. She’d never
seen Lord Drayton before. She would have remembered his height, the span of his
considerable shoulders, those blue eyes, that jagged scar on his jaw. Her
overwhelming draw toward him.

“Would that you
could speak,” he said softly. “We would have much to discuss.”

Indeed they
would. She’d question his paradox of behaviors toward her, protecting her from
others while maintaining a simmering animosity. She took in a slow breath then,
and caught the clean masculine scent of him, warm citrus and spice.

At once,
everything about him stood out in more vivid detail than a single candle could
possibly provide. Katherine heard his intake of breath with clarity, felt the
air around them crackle.

His eyes
darkened as they drifted to her lips. He stood so very near.

The sleeve of
his linen shirt rasped as he moved his hand toward her waist. His tongue wetted
his lips, and Katherine feared her heart would burst from her chest.