The Accidental Bride (13 page)

Phoebe fell forward, her head on his shoulder, her sweat-slick skin pressed to his. He laid a hand on her curved back as if to soothe her, and for a moment her eyes closed and she seemed to sleep. But it was only a moment. Then she felt his hands beneath her bottom, lifting her slightly as he slid from her body.

She raised her head from his shoulder and looked down into the dark eyes. A smile still lingered there but there was a question behind the smile.

“I think . . . yes, I really think you have to explain,” he said. “Just what is all this, Phoebe?”

Phoebe climbed from his lap. She stood looking down at him, the sweat cooling on her skin, her expression now uncertain. “I thought . . . Portia thought. . .”

“Portia!”
Cato exclaimed. “I might have known. She has a hand in everything.”

“Well, I had to ask someone!” Phoebe said, stung. “I knew it wasn’t right, the way every night we did this. . .” She threw her hands in the air. “I don’t know what it was that we were doing, but it wasn’t making love. And I wanted to
make love.
I didn’t know how to tell you that, so I had to show you.”

Cato regarded her in frowning silence. He felt as if his entire world had turned upside down. The frigid girl he had believed he had taken to wife was no such thing. She was as lusty as any of the women of the night he had enjoyed, as uninhibited and, it seemed incredibly, as knowing. Yet he knew
she’d been virgin on their wedding night. He didn’t know what to make of it. He didn’t even know whether he liked it. Which was pure contrary ingratitude, he recognized, but it was such a shock to find a gently bred young woman possessed of such an earthy sensuality.

He saw her shiver and said swiftly, “You’re cold. Climb into bed now.” He drew back the bedcurtains and then stared at the hump of the bolster in the middle. “Phoebe, what on earth . . .”

“Well, I was afraid you might look in the bed before you undressed and if I wasn’t there . . .” She shrugged.

Cato shook his head, at a loss for words. He pulled out the bolster and turned down the covers. “In.”

Phoebe clambered into bed and nestled against the pillows. The deep feather mattress cradled her languid body and the crisp sheets were wonderfully cool and fresh against her still-overheated skin.

She watched as Cato turned away and kicked off his unfastened britches. The moment of unease disappeared as her eyes drank in every glorious inch of his back view. The long sweep of his back from the broad shoulders, the sinuous ripple of his shoulder blades beneath the muscled flesh. His backside was glorious. So different from a female bottom, Phoebe thought with a little hug of delight. It was smooth and taut rather than rounded, and startlingly white against the darker line at his waist. Obviously he had spent time shirtless in the sun. His thighs were long and hard; even the backs of his knees and the muscled swell of his calves delighted her.

And then he turned to come to the bed, and she gazed at the wide expanse of his chest, the points of his nipples nestled in the light dusting of dark hair, the narrow waist and the slim hips. Her eyes followed the trail of black hair that began at his navel. His quiescent sex now looked small and almost vulnerable, she thought, like a dormouse asleep in its nest of crisp curling black hair. A little tremor went through her
as she remembered the feel of its thrusting hardness deep within her.

“Why didn’t you wish to make proper love with me?” The question spoke itself.

Cato paused, one hand resting on the bedpost. “I didn’t expect you to enjoy it,” he said after a minute.

“But . . . but why not?”

He ran a hand over the back of his neck. “In my experience, wives are not particularly. . .” He paused, searching for words. “Particularly lustful,” he said finally. “In truth I hadn’t expected you to be any different.”

“Is it inappropriate for a wife to feel lust?”

Cato considered the question. “You’re an exception to every rule in the book, Phoebe.”

Phoebe wasn’t quite sure how to take that. “What about love?” she asked, tentatively now.

Cato turned away and snuffed the candles on the mantel. “Love has nothing to do with such alliances.”

The mattress shifted beneath his weight as he climbed in beside her. After a minute he stretched out an arm and drew Phoebe against him, twining his fingers in her hair as he turned her face into his shoulder.

Cato Granville was going to learn to love her, Phoebe thought as sleep claimed her.

B
rian Morse rode up to the front door of Cato’s manor
under a lowering sky. The snow lay thick on the ground except where a party of soldiers had cleared a narrow path along the driveway.

He looked up at the house, with its mullioned windows and gabled snow-covered roof. It was a substantial pile of stone, and he wondered how much Cato had paid for it. Not that it would have been more than a bagatelle for the marquis of Granville, whose wealth was almost legendary.

A wealth that was within Brian Morse’s grasp.

He dismounted, tethered his horse to the hitching post beside the door, and banged the great brass knocker. A well-dressed retainer opened the door. He was not one of the servants from Castle Granville whom Brian would have recognized, and he regarded the stranger with an air of polite if aloof curiosity.

“Is Lord Granville within?” inquired Brian, stamping the snow off his boots against the edge of the step.

“May I say who’s asking for him, sir?”

“Who’s at the door, Bisset?” Cato’s voice came from behind the butler. He stepped out of the dimness of the hall. His dark eyes narrowed over a flash of disquiet when he saw his visitor. But he spoke pleasantly.

“Well, Brian, this is a surprise. Come in out of the cold.”

Bisset stepped aside and Brian entered Cato’s house, drawing off his gloves. “You must indeed be surprised,” he said in somewhat ruefully apologetic tones. “I trust it won’t be an unpleasant surprise though, when I’ve explained myself.”
He extended his hand to his stepfather, who took it in a firm, cool grasp.

“Bisset, have Mr. Morse’s horse taken to the stables. Have you breakfasted, Brian?”

“Not as yet, sir. I left Oxford before dawn. I had no wish to meet any patrols and thought to travel under cover of dark and snow.”

Cato raised an eyebrow. Only something of vital importance would have sent a man out alone, even armed, on horseback and in such foul weather. “Come.” He gestured towards his study at the rear of the hall. “Bring bread and meat and ale, Bisset.”

Olivia stood at the bend of the stair looking down into the hall, hardly breathing.

“Who’s that?” Phoebe murmured behind her. She didn’t know why she was whispering, but there was something about Olivia’s posture that seemed to encourage secrecy.

“The pig,” Olivia stated.

“Who?”

“The swine . . . the g-guttercrawler.” Olivia’s mouth was compressed, her dark eyes flaring. “Brian Morse,” she expanded. “My father’s stepson. He’s a loathsome, belly-c-crawling
snake.”

Phoebe had heard the famous story of how Portia and Olivia had squashed this particular snake back in Castle Granville two years earlier. Cato’s stepson had had the malicious habit of making fun of Olivia’s stammer.

“I wonder what he wants. Isn’t he supposed to be for the king? I’m sure Cato said so.”

Olivia shrugged. “I don’t c-care what he wants, just so long as he doesn’t stay.” She turned and ran back upstairs.

Phoebe remained where she was for a minute, then she went down to the hall. She paused outside Cato’s office, trying to think of an excuse to go in. She was most curious to make the acquaintance of her husband’s stepson. Cato had told her that he had adopted Brian Morse as a small child
and the man was at present his heir. He had sounded as if he found the prospect distasteful. It would be very interesting to discover why.

Resolutely she raised her hand and knocked.

“Come in.” Cato’s tawny voice as always brought the fine hairs on her nape to life. She hadn’t seen him this morning. Would he look any different . . . be any different . . . after the glories of last night?

She opened the door and put her head around. “Forgive me for intruding, but Bisset said we have a guest. I wondered if I should have a bedchamber prepared for him.” She addressed Cato but she was looking only at the visitor with unabashed curiosity.

“Why don’t you bring the rest of yourself in here,” Cato suggested in his cool way. “And allow me to present Mr. Brian Morse, my stepson.”

Phoebe didn’t need a second invitation. She stepped into the room and offered a curtsy as Cato presented her with punctilious formality. She didn’t think she’d ever seen anyone dressed in such extravagant style. Mr. Morse’s coat and doublet were of crimson cloth edged with silver lace, and his lace collar was an elaborate fall of pleated ruffles. His hat, which he’d cast onto a chair, sported a flamboyant plume of crimson dyed ostrich feathers.

“Lady Granville.” Brian bowed, his small brown eyes assessing her. She looked a little different from the last time he’d seen her, a dumpy unfashionably clad creature, hurrying through the village. In a fashionable gown of blue velvet, she was more voluptuous than plump, he amended. But there was still something awry about her appearance; he just couldn’t put his finger on it.

Cato, however, saw the problem immediately. The three-tiered lace ruffles on her right sleeve were all rucked up inside the bottom of the sleeve instead of falling smoothly over her forearms. She must have dressed in haste, thrusting her
arms into the gown anyhow. He took her right arm and patiently released the lace, smoothing it down. “It’s all creased,” he said. “You had better take off the gown and . . .”

The vivid image of Phoebe’s naked body rose with stirring effect to his mind.

“Yes, my lord?” Phoebe prompted softly.

Cato blinked in an effort to dispel the image. “Tell your maid to use the flatiron on those ruffles,” he finished firmly.

“Yes, my lord.” Phoebe curtsied, her gaze turned up to him. “But maybe there won’t be time before church.”

Time to . . . His own gaze drifted to the seductive swell of her bosom and then back to her smiling countenance.

Dear God, her eyes were the most amazing color.

“Go,” he said. “The bells will be ringing soon.”

“Oh . . . yes . . . very well.” The radiance of her smile remained undimmed, her gaze unfaltering. For a minute she didn’t move. She was thinking that Cato, in his somber black velvet and pristine white shirt with its plain lace collar, was so much more elegant than Brian Morse for all his rich garments.

Cato went to the door and pointedly opened it for her.

“Uh . . . yes, right away,” Phoebe said and hurried past him.

Cato closed the door firmly and with a certain sense of relief. He turned back to Brian.

“These documents you’ve brought are very interesting.” He picked up a sheaf of waxed papers from his desk. “This list of munitions from the king of Orange, for instance. But. . .” He shuffled through the papers. “To be frank, I’m not sure how much new information is in here. We’ve known about the munitions for several weeks now.”

“I thought you probably had,” Brian said with a tentative little smile. “But I don’t suppose you knew the exact figures that I supplied?”

“No,” Cato agreed, his eyes on the documents.

“I’m sure you must understand that I didn’t dare risk
too much. If you refused to trust me . . . have faith in my conversion, as it were . . .” Here Brian laughed a little self-consciously. “Then I couldn’t risk giving up truly vital information. This is just an earnest of my intent.”

Cato raised his eyes and examined his stepson thoughtfully. “Careful as ever, Brian?” he murmured. “Don’t risk too much until you’re sure it’s safe.”

Brian flushed darkly. “Do you blame me, my lord?”

Cato stroked his chin, still thoughtful. “It argues a less than wholehearted conversion,” he observed. “However, I can see your point, if it’s any comfort. But by the same token, I assume you’ll not accompany us to church? It’s probably not in your best interests to advertise your presence here just yet.”

Brian had no choice but to agree. His stepfather had always seen through him . . . had always had the ability to cut the ground from beneath his feet.

Cato nodded briefly. “This afternoon we’ll ride to headquarters, where you may present your case to the high command. This is not a decision I can make alone, and I’m sure they’ll have a great many questions for you.” He gestured that Brian should precede him from the study and then locked the door, dropping the key into his coat pocket.

“I’ll introduce you to Mistress Bisset. She’ll take care of you until I return.”

T
he bells from the village church had already begun to
, peal when Cato, Olivia, and Phoebe left the house.

From a window in the front bedchamber allotted to him, Brian watched them go. Cato walked a little behind the girls, his cloak blowing back in the wind revealing the somber richness of his doublet and britches. His high-crowned black felt hat had no adornment, and the fur-edged collar of his cloak was turned up at the back, covering his ears. Brian
knew that the serviceable elegance, the casual richness of his stepfather’s dress were merely an extension of the man himself. The marquis of Granville was assured, commanding, powerful, and he looked every inch of it. Every inch as formidable as Brian remembered. He would not be an easy victim.

As Brian watched, Phoebe slipped on an icy patch. Cato seemed to have predicted it and moved almost before it had happened, an arm around her waist, steadying her. She looked up at him with a rueful smile, catching her bottom lip with her teeth. Cato shook his head, straightened her bonnet that seemed to have gone askew beneath the capacious hood of her cloak, and tucked her hand into his arm.

Interesting, Brian thought, remembering the almost automatic way Cato had adjusted his wife’s rucked sleeve earlier. It seemed to bode an easy familiarity that was unlike Cato.

Brian frowned, pulling at his chin. It had been easy enough to dispose of Diana. She’d been all too willing to accept the gifts he sent her in secret, and he guessed she had enjoyed the thought of her clandestine correspondence with an admirer.

Poison was such a versatile weapon, Brian reflected. It could be administered at a distance and in any number of ways. The gloves had been the most elegant trick, he thought. They had been of the softest doeskin, lace-edged and studded with tiny seed pearls. Very beautiful, and quite deadly. Every time she wore them, the poison would seep into her skin.

There had been silk stockings too—the kind of intimate loverly gift that would excite a woman as susceptible to flattery and courtly gestures as Diana. And the little boxes of comfits. Little jeweled boxes of lethal sweetmeats.

He had been in no hurry and it had taken about eight months before she died. The poison had mimicked a wasting
disease and the bloody flux, symptoms too common to arouse the suspicion of foul play, particularly when there was no obvious reason for it.

Brian smiled to himself. The refinements of Diana’s death had pleased him almost as much as the fact itself. And then, of course, Cato had to marry her sister and undo all his good work.

Well, he might have to be a bit cruder in his methods this time, but that should pose no problems . . . now that he was firmly established under Cato’s roof.

A
ll but the sick were straggling down the village street
, wrapped against the cold, shuffling booted feet through the drifts. No God-fearing soul would neglect Sunday service, even for the snow, and the lord of the manor, if he was in residence, would never neglect the observance for fear of setting a bad example.

The congregation in Woodstock, as in so many other villages across the land, was mostly women, old men, and small children. The able-bodied men for the most part had been pressed into the army regardless of their views on the civil strife. The women bobbed little curtsies, the old men touched forelocks as the manor party walked up the path to the church door. Phoebe greeted them by name and would have stopped to chat if Cato hadn’t been holding her arm so securely, propelling her inexorably to the church door, where he moved his gloved hand to her shoulder, easing her in front of him.

Cato was thinking about Brian Morse. What was the real reason for this visit? A change of allegiance seemed unlikely. He didn’t want the man under his roof, but without good cause he couldn’t refuse to shelter his adopted son and heir. Well, he would play a waiting game. Brian would reveal his hand soon enough.

The vicar’s sonorous boom broke abruptly into Cato’s reverie.

“The arm of the devil has a long reach. His servants are to be found everywhere. And, my people, they are to be found among us now. Here in the very bosom of our village lurks evil, a follower of the devil. Her vile hand has fallen upon the innocent and the weak and we must cast her out.”

Here the vicar paused and raised his eyes to heaven, his arms flailing as if in ecstasies of prayer. “You have taken your children to this woman, in times of trouble; in times of weakness you have sought her help. And she has preyed upon your sorrows with the devil’s art.”

Phoebe felt the first icy shaft of premonition. It was something she had always feared, something that Meg risked with every act of healing. And it had to be Meg. She had been called a witch before, but before it had been almost an affectionate description, never accusation. There was no other member of this community who would fit the vicar’s diatribe. She glanced around. There were nods and whispers and grim faces. She glanced up at Cato, sitting beside her in the Granville pew, and saw that the vicar now had his full attention.