Jane Feather - The Emerald Swan

"Just for agreeing to pretend to be Maude," he corrected. "You may not even have to play the part."

"Oh." A deep frown corrugated her brow.

"But I'm afraid the monkey is not included," he said gently.

Her response was immediate. "Oh, no, then I couldn't agree."

"You would throw away fifty rose nobles for the sake of a monkey?" Gareth was so incredulous he lost his carefully preserved calm.

Miranda's mouth set and she said firmly, "Chip belongs to me. Where I go he goes."

It was the set of her mouth that convinced him. How many times had he seen Maude look exactly like that, the same damnably stubborn expression in the cerulean eyes, the same line of the mouth? Henry would never know the difference between the two of them.

He bit the bullet and accepted the ultimatum. "Very well. But God help us all when Imogen sees him." "Who's Imogen?"

"My sister. And I'm afraid you will not like her." He stood up on the words. "Are we agreed, Miranda?"

Miranda continued to hesitate. With fifty rose nobles she could do anything. Even buy Robbie the special shoes that would lift his shorter leg. The cobbler in Boulogne had said he could make such shoes for a lame person. But he wanted five guineas for them, and where was a strolling player to find five spare guineas? Until now.

She looked up, met his dark eyes, grave and unsmiling now, but she was once again struck nonetheless by the steadiness, the sense of security, that emanated from his large loose-limbed frame.

He held out his hand and silently she took it, as she stood up. "We are agreed, milord."

His hand closed warmly over hers, then he smiled and all the gravity was chased from his expression. "Good, I believe we shall deal extremely well, you and I. But it's late and we must leave at dawn. You may sleep up here tonight since you are now in my employ, and I suggest you go to your rest now. It'll be a long and tiring ride tomorrow." With a little smile, he raised her rather grubby hand to his lips. "I give you good night, Miranda."

She touched her hand where his lips had brushed, swamped with a mixture of wonder and embarrassment. No one had ever kissed her hand before.

The door closed behind him before she could recover enough to return his good-night.

It was two hours later when the earl of Harcourt set down his tankard of rum punch in the taproom and made his way back up the narrow staircase to the chamber above the washhouse. His carrying candle threw his greatly elongated shadow ahead of him on the half-timbered plastered walls. He stepped carefully over the stack of dirty supper dishes neatly piled outside the door. Miranda apparently had some inclination for housekeeping.

He lifted the latch and entered the chamber. It was dimly lit by the moon shining through the small unglazed window. He set down his candle and gazed around, his eyes somewhat unfocused. The landlord's rum punch had been potent and the company in the taproom surprisingly convivial.

He blinked, frowning. The room appeared to be empty. Then his eye fell on the bed and a very small mound beneath the covers on the far side.

He picked up the candle again and approached the bed. The soft yellow light illuminated a slender white arm curved on the pillows, a pale turned shoulder, and two very bright eyes as the monkey, curled in the crook of Miranda's neck, regarded the earl somewhat balefully.

Gareth stood looking down at Miranda and debated. She was naked, but that was only to be expected. No one slept in their clothes. He should have thought about where she was to sleep but it hadn't occurred to him. He glanced around the chamber. Apart from the floor and the narrow window seat, the bed was the only option.

It seemed his intention to have a bed to himself, a privilege for which he'd paid handsomely, was to be thwarted, he thought ruefully. Reaching over, he eased the pillow out from under her head.

Miranda was lost in the depths of a pleasant if ill-defined dream. Feather beds were a rare luxury in her life and the warmth and softness of this one had lulled her to sleep within minutes of clambering into it. But she was a light sleeper and her eyes flew open the minute Gareth leaned over her. Disoriented, she blinked in the yellow light of a candle held close above her, for a moment unable to place the face gazing down at her.

Then she remembered. She flung an arm over her eyes to shield them from the light. "Is something the matter, milord?"

"Only that I hadn't expected to find you in my bed," he replied, shaking out the pillow he'd removed from behind her head.

Miranda sat up, the covers falling to her waist, revealing a pair of small but perfectly formed breasts and an amazingly narrow rib cage." There didn't seem anywhere else and I don't take up much room. Everyone I share a bed with says I sleep very still. I won't disturb you."

Gareth was not so sure about that. Naked women in his bed were inclined to disturb him.

"I'm sure you're a very considerate bed partner," he said, leaning over and thrusting the pillow beneath the quilt down the middle of the bed. "However, since I may be a somewhat less tidy sleeper than you, we'll create a little separation."

"Let me help." Miranda threw off the bedcovers, slid to her feet, and busily set about positioning the pillow, fluffing up the bolster, and straightening the sheet.

Gareth stepped away from the bed, aware that his heart was thudding. She was perfectly formed. A perfect miniature of a woman with dainty breasts, a tiny waist, and the merest hint of a curve to her hips. She carried not an ounce of spare flesh, but the muscles moved smoothly beneath the taut skin, reminding him of some superbly and purposefully constructed machine. She turned her narrow feet out like a dancer, and her belly was so flat it seemed to cleave to her backbone.

If asked for his ideal of womanhood Gareth would have produced a description of Charlotte: tall, deep-bosomed, well-hipped. A lush, sensual creature with rippling golden hair and a full red mouth and eyes that drew a man down and down into the seductive maelstrom of her passion. A woman who knew her power and her beauty and knew exactly how to use them.

But Miranda's sublime indifference to her nakedness, her blithe ignorance of the effect it was having upon him, was mote alluring than all of Charlotte's knowing wiles.

One too many rum punches, he told himself, turning away from the bed. His voice had a slight catch to it as he said, "That'll do fine. Get back under the covers before you catch cold."

Miranda obeyed with alacrity. It was true that the night air coming through the unshuttered window was quite chilly on her bed-warmed flesh. She drew the covers up to her chin and asked companionably, "Did you have a pleasant evening, milord?"

Gareth's murmured response didn't encourage further friendly discussion.

The moon was for the moment obscured by cloud and Gareth hastily blew out the candle, plunging the chamber into darkness. Taking advantage of the gloom in which his body would be visible as only a pale shape, he threw off his clothes, leaving them on the floor where they fell, and climbed into bed. The mattress sank under his weight and Miranda's slight body rolled against the separating pillow. Gareth could feel the warmth of her body beneath the covers, although they weren't touching, and he could smell her skin and hair, a faintly earthy yet curiously innocent scent in the air around him.

Miranda rolled onto her side, tucked up against the pillow. "I give you good night, milord."

"Good night, Miranda." But it was long before Gareth finally slipped into slumber.

When he woke, daylight was pouring through the unshuttered window and there was no sign of either Miranda or the monkey. He stretched, yawned, flung aside the covers, and stood up, surprised at how clearheaded and remarkably well he felt, given his rather short and not entirely dreamless night. His eye fell on Miranda's orange dress lying on the window seat and his well-being suffered a small dent. If she wasn't in the room, and she patently wasn't, then where in the devil's name had she gone in a state of undress?