Tori Phillips (14 page)

Brandon whistled through his teeth. “Truly, you speak of marriage? I thought you had torn that word from your vocabulary.”

Jack’s gaze never wavered. “I seem to have found it again in a rose garden.” He rolled onto his back. “But you talk nonsense—toys of the mind. Lady Katherine is yours by the hand and will of Great Harry. Methinks, not even God would dare to change that fact.”

Brandon pursed his puffy lips, then picked his words carefully. Once said, he could never retrieve them again. “What if I told you that the lady you so admire is yours for the asking?”

Jack lay very still. Brandon saw him swallow several times.

He continued. “What, if I told you, that the Lady Katherine is not that lady at all?”

Jack slowly turned his head so that his good eye could read Brandon’s face.

Brandon tilted a golden brow. “What if I told you that the lady you want to marry is, in truth, Mistress Miranda Paige? What, if I told you, that the real Lady Katherine has been playing cat and mouse with me?”

Jack hauled himself into a sitting position. Pain etched across his face with the effort. “How did you come by this intelligence—if such foolish fancy could be called intelligent?”

Brandon’s face split into a wide grin. “Fenton Scantling.”

Jack’s burnished brows shot up. “Does one drop of truth ever fall from that whining rascal’s lips?”

“Aye, when he doesn’t realize it.”

“Do you believe him?” Jack’s fingers coiled and uncoiled as he spoke.

“Aye, especially when old Montjoy confirmed it.” Brandon chuckled. “By the book, my friend, you’ve gone pale as an eggshell. Feeling light-headed from my blows?”

Jack took a deep breath. “Not the blows of your fists, but of your words. Speak plain, for my head is ringing like a church bell on New Year’s Day. You mean to tell me, that the lady I have been wooing—in your name—is truly Mistress Miranda?”

“Aye.”

“And, all unknowing, you have been playing at hearts with your true-intended bride?”

Brandon quirked his mouth into a rueful grin. “Aye.”

Jack started to laugh but broke into a rasping cough instead. “’Tis too comical. We’ve been justly served up on a platter at a fool’s feast. A recipe of our own making! Ods bodkins, Brandon, I cannot laugh, my ribs are too sore!”

Brandon hoisted himself to sit opposite Jack. “And now, my friend, what do you mean to do?”

Jack knitted his brows together. “Upon our return to the castle? Why, throw myself at Miranda’s feet, beg her forgiveness at my double-dealing, and ask her to marry me.”

“Just like that?” Brandon snapped his fingers then wished he hadn’t. The joints were stiffening.

“Aye! I have no father from whom I must seek permission. I am my own man to chart my course. We’ll wed as soon as the banns have been proclaimed if the lady...that is...Mistress Miranda will have me.”

Brandon took a long look at the bloody, bruised, swollen, disheveled knight in front of him. “Well, I wouldn’t ask her immediately, for you look like a dog’s breakfast at the moment.”

Jack inclined his head. “Aye, my thanks, and I return the compliment a hundredfold.”

Brandon touched his nose gently. Hang it all! ‘Twas as large as a turnip. He cleared his throat. “Be that as it may, Jack. Hear my device. Let us tarry in our borrowed feathers for a while longer—until the ladies themselves decide to call the game to a halt. ’Twill be good sport. Now you may woo in earnest without frightening your newfound mistress. Methinks Miranda is a skittish filly where marriage is concerned.”

Closing both his eyes for a moment, Jack tilted his head back to bask in the sun’s healing warmth. “Aye. ’Twould be only fair—seeing how our ladies have hoodwinked us thus far. By my aching head! I long to kiss Miranda’s sweet lips in earnest.”

“After yours have healed, I hope,” Brandon observed, his tongue again touching the salty-tasting split on his own lip.

“Sweet Miranda,” Jack said, and sighed.

Brandon grabbed a handful of Jack’s grass-stained cambric shirt and pulled Stafford toward him like a fish reeled in on a line. “Nay, not Miranda. She is still Lady Katherine to you, jolt-head. Do not forget that!”

When Brandon and Jack appeared at dinner, both Kat and Miranda gasped. The knights were dressed in clean hose, snowy shirts, bright-colored doublets and jaunty bonnets. Their combed hair shone clean, their nails pared, and their teeth polished bright. On the other hand, their faces bore unmistakable signs of a recent disaster, and their movements, usually so lithe and graceful, reminded Kat of Montjoy on one of his “misery” days.

“Oh, poor Brandon!” Miranda escorted her lord to his place next to her. With tender care, she tucked his napkin into his collar before seating herself on his right. “Leaping trout! You look as if your horse tossed you into a bramble hedge.”

Jack attempted to smile. With half his face still swollen and one eye shut, the result looked more like a grimace than a grin. “’Tis nothing, I assure you, my lady. A few scratches.”

Kat eyed Brandon—the real knave of that name—as he gingerly sat down on the bench next to her. She covered her mouth with her napkin lest he see her grin.

“Good day, Miranda,” he murmured, helping himself liberally to his wine cup. “I trust you had a pleasant morning?”

“Oh, aye.” The concealing cloth muffled her answer. “Though I do not think mine was half as interesting as yours and Sir Brandon’s.”

“Does it hurt much, Brandon?” Miranda fluttered at Jack’s side, patting his shoulder, stroking his wounded cheek and uttering a number of cooing noises.

He tried to smile again, with even less success than before. “Nay, my lady. I feel no pain when you hold my hand as you do now. In truth, I am transported from the agonies of purgatory to the joys of heaven. You are the angel of my delight.”

“Pig’s rot!” Brandon muttered under his breath.

Kat leaned closer to him. “And are you also in the agonies of purgatory, Sir John?”

He flexed his scratched, swollen hand stiffly. “I am not sure about purgatory, mistress, but I have been in hell for most of the morning.” He grunted as he shifted on his steal

“Did your horse throw a shoe, or run away with you?” Miranda asked Jack, her voice dripping with concern. “Pray tell me you were not attacked by a wild boar! I have heard from the woodcutters that there are several lurking within our district.” She spooned a large portion of the creamed turnip soup, sprinkled with parsley. “Allow me to assist you, sweet Brandon. Open wide.” She held up the brimming spoon.

Jack grimaced again. “I’ll gladly open for you, my lady, but I cannot manage very wide.”

“Poor Sir Brandon!” Miranda crooned as she shoved the spoon into his mouth.

Kat threw down her napkin. What was the point of hiding her amusement when neither man seemed particularly ashamed of his appearance? Indeed, Stafford lapped up not only the savory soup but Miranda’s attentions, as well.

“Save your pity, coz,” Kat told her. “’Tis as plain as a sunny day. Our guests have not suffered a riding accident. They have been fighting!” Kat flashed a challenging look at her dinner partner.

Brandon lifted his cup in a silent toast.

Miranda’s green eyes grew rounder. “Oh, Brandon, who were you fighting?”

Jack looked down at his trencher, reminding Kat of a little boy who expects a scolding for dessert. His ears turned pink.

Kat rolled her eyes to the vaulted ceiling of the hall. “Hang it all, cousin! They have been fighting each other!”

Miranda nearly spilled the next helping of turnip soup on Jack’s silver doublet. “Crickets!” she squeaked.

Jack took the spoon from her fingers, then kissed her hand. “’Twas for a good cause, my lady,” he whispered.

“How now?” Kat tapped Brandon on the wrist—one of the few parts of his anatomy that did not appear to be injured. “Can you enlighten us, my Lord Stafford?”

Arching his back, Brandon winced. “My Lord Cavendish remarked that I was getting too fat, and that I needed some exercise.”

Kat glared down the table at Jack. “Your pardon, my Lord Cavendish, but I beg to disagree with your observation.” Kat regarded the man at her side. She was acutely conscious of Brandon’s athletic physique. Her pulse accelerated. “I find my lord’s form and figure to be...pleasing to the eye.”

Dipping his blond head slightly, Brandon replied, “My thanks, mistress, but the...exercise was invigorating—and necessary.”

Jack nodded, then blinked his good eye. “Cleared the air.

“We were growing too sluggish,” added Brandon.

“Good for the blood,” Jack explained to Miranda.

“Aye, my lord. I can see that. You made it flow,” Kat snapped. She found herself wondering who had won the fray.

“Healthful,” Brandon continued, giving her a lopsided grin, which she found most endearing.

“Relaxing.” Jack swallowed another spoonful of soup with a satisfied purr.

Kat snorted. “Just so? And did
you
find this barbaric activity also relaxing, Sir.. Sir John?” Kat tried to keep a stern tone in her voice, but found herself weakening toward the end.

Brandon turned his full gaze upon her. A faint light twinkled in the depths of his bright blue eyes. Featherlike laugh lines crinkled and deepened. “Aye, sweet Miranda. Afterward, I lay on my back a full two hours, snoring like a beached whale.” Leanirig closer, he whispered in her ear, “You don’t mind that I snore, do you, mistress?”

Kat had just bitten into a piece of saffron chicken. At the unexpected question, and the intimacy it suggested, her mouth went dry. She fought the overwhelming desire to kiss the injured lips that hovered so near. She managed to swallow the chicken with a gulp.

Her hand shook as she reached for her wine cup. “Nay, may lord, why should I mind what you do in bed?”

Under the table, he closed his hand over hers. His mere touch sent a warming shiver through her. His thumb traced a lazy circle across her knuckles, causing her skin to tingle.

“You have relieved my mind a great deal, sweet Miranda.” Lifting her hand, he brushed his bruised lips across her fingertips.

Kat mewed in the back of her throat.

Giving her hand a parting squeeze, Brandon turned his attention to the platter of ginger carp that his grinning squire had placed before him.

Somewhere deep within the most private part of Kat’s heart, an unfamiliar response awakened and stretched, flooding her whole being with a deep sense of longing. Casting a sidelong glance at her dinner partner, she caught him watching her with the intensity of a kitten at a mouse hole. He slowly winked at her.

Kat jumped, knocking over her wine cup.

Angels in heaven! What is happening to me?

Chapter Ten

C
urling herself up into a tight ball on her side of the mattress, Miranda wished she were dead. Sighing deeply, she tried to banish the tears that threatened to slip out from under her closed eyelids.

Great wailing wolves! Why had she ever agreed to Kat’s mad scheme of exchanging places? After resigning herself to a lifetime of quiet spinsterhood, Miranda realized that she had fallen head over heels in love—with dearest Katherine’s betrothed.

On that first day, Miranda had expected to greet some lean-shanked stripling. But both their. guests had quickly put the lie to that assumption. Miranda couldn’t believe her good fortune to be introduced to the handsomer of the pair as her “husband-to-be.” After her initial shock at Brandon’s unexpected maturity, it was easy to play the game—too easy. She must never allow Brandon to kiss her again as he had done after supper this very evening. He had tasted of honey mead and fresh mint. Her mouth quivered under his tender assault. Miranda had clung to him, her body demanding more.

Fie upon you!
her conscience chided from a distant part of her brain.
This man is not yours, but your cousin’s. Shame on you for desiring what is not yours to have!

Once she was back inside the hall, Miranda had pleaded a headache, and all but flew up the stairs to her chamber. Later, when Kat had tiptoed in, Miranda pretended to be asleep.

Sleep? How could she, when a thousand little darts of guilt and envy pricked Miranda’s soul?

If only Sir Brandon Cavendish were not bound to Kat! And by the king, no less! Miranda pursed her lips. Henry VIII was a great, meddling old fool, just because he himself was besotted with a woman who was not his wife. Miranda’s anger at her sovereign outweighed any guilt she might have had for such treasonous thoughts.
Let His Grace play Cupid within his own court, but leave us alone at Bodiam!

Miranda ran her tongue over her lips, tasting the memory of Brandon’s kiss. But what of Kat? That kiss was meant for her. And what was my lady fair doing while Miranda wrestled with her conscience in the arms of the most wonderful man in the world? Teasing Sir John about his swollen nose!

Kat had totally taken leave of her good sense. Anyone could see that Sir Brandon was a far better man than Sir John. True, the two were much alike in color and form, but they were a world apart in their speech and manner. While Sir Brandon breathed poetry, Sir John muttered lists of castle improvements. What could Kat possibly see in the man? Why was she paying any attention to Stafford at all? She was supposed to be “finding out” Sir Brandon. Miranda sniffed. Two weeks, and Kat had not spent any more time in Sir Brandon’s presence than she absolutely had to.

Which left Miranda in a ticklish predicament. Very ticklish. She squeezed her thighs together and tried not to dwell on Brandon’s touch upon her cheeks, his arm about her waist, his long body pressed scandalously close to hers, and his...his manroot! Miranda gulped.

Tonight, when he had held her so tightly in his arms, Miranda felt, for the first time, the hard evidence of a man’s passion. The brief contact both alarmed and intrigued her. These warring emotions still plagued her and banished sleep from her eyes. She sighed a third time.

“What ails you, coz?” Kat suddenly asked from the other side of the bed.

Miranda jumped. “Forgive me for waking you, Kat.”