Claire Thornton - The Defiant Mistress

‘Was. He’s dead,’ Athena reminded him. ‘He was my stepfather’s nephew.’

‘Your stepfather? You told me you went to live with your aunt in London after you were orphaned.’

‘My father died,’ said Athena. ‘My brother was only six. Several of our neighbours wanted to seize our house and estates. My brother was too young to defend his inheritance, so my mother remarried to protect us. My stepfather was—is—a good, upright man. But he favoured a match between me and his nephew. Samuel. When I could see no other way to avoid the marriage I ran away to London where I altered my name. I thought Samuel would never find me. He did. He found me the day before our wedding was meant to take place.’

For several long moments there was silence in the gondola.

‘Why the hell didn’t you tell me that story before—when I asked you to marry me?’ Gabriel growled at last. ‘Did you plan to leave me forever in ignorance of your family?’

‘No. I was so happy. I didn’t want anything to spoil it…’

‘If what you claim is true, you were a stupid, heedless wench,’ Gabriel said brutally. ‘You deserved your fate.’

‘Never!’ Athena thought of all she’d endured to keep Gabriel safe from Cromwell’s executioner. ‘How dare you judge me so harshly. You know nothing. Nothing.’

‘If you’re telling the truth, I know more now than I did then. You lied to me in London. From beginning to end—you lied to me. You were even going to marry me without telling me your real name. How the devil did you expect me to protect you if I didn’t know you were in danger?’ he exploded.

‘Protect me? You watched and did nothing to stop Samuel—’

‘Before!’ Gabriel roared. ‘If I’d known before, do you think I’d have left you under the protection of one elderly widow woman? You could have had a place in Sir Thomas Parfitt’s household until the wedding. You didn’t think, Frances. You just danced through your days, expecting life to fall into your pretty lap.’

‘I didn’t dance,’ Athena whispered, hating the way he made her sound so heedless.

‘Yes, you did,’ he said flatly. ‘You danced and left the practical business of life to others.’

‘I don’t even know how to dance,’ she protested, remembering her awkwardness earlier that evening.

‘Your spirit danced.’ He stared up at the roof of the gondola, then laid his forearm across his eyes.

‘Oh.’ Tears trembled in Athena’s own eyes. ‘I was a foolish virgin,’ she whispered. They had gone on a picnic once, and she’d been so lost in thoughts of Gabriel she’d forgotten to pack the bread. He had teased her about the parable of the wise virgins who had filled their lamps with oil in preparation for the coming of the bridegroom, and the foolish virgins who hadn’t been so well prepared.

‘It would appear so,’ he said.

‘Well, I’m not—’ she began without thinking, then bit her lip to stop herself crying.

‘No.’

‘Foolish now!’ she snapped, lifting her chin defiantly, although he wasn’t looking at her and would not therefore be impressed by the gesture. ‘I may have been foolish once, but I am not foolish now.’

‘You arrived in Venice with no idea how you were going to continue your journey and had to beg the Ambassador to arrange your transport home! How much more damned foolish can one woman get!’

‘I was not foolish!’ Athena fired up. ‘Rachel needed my support. She was in such distress. Only someone with a heart of stone would have refused to help her.’

‘Another foolish wench. Has she any idea how much her presence here may hinder her husband’s career?’ Gabriel said derisively.

‘She didn’t come to hinder his career, she came to save herself from her lech of a brother-in-law! If her husband had left her better provided for, she wouldn’t have needed to come to Venice. Men always think they know best. They don’t know anything.’

‘What were you doing in the convent?’ Gabriel asked.

‘That’s where I ended up after I ran away from Samuel the second time,’ said Athena.

‘You ran away? When?’

‘Three weeks after the wedding.’

‘Three weeks!’ Gabriel swore. ‘If you had the resolution to run away then, why not earlier?’

‘Because earlier I didn’t know—’ Athena caught herself up before she revealed that it was only after Gabriel had set off for Turkey that she’d run from Samuel. ‘Circumstances changed,’ she said instead. ‘There was no longer any risk involved if I left him. My mother’s sister lived in exile in France. Her husband was a royalist who fought for Charles at Worcester. He was hanged when the Roundheads captured him after the battle. I went to her.’

‘To France? All on your own?’ Gabriel’s voice was redolent with scepticism.

‘Yes! I cut off my hair, dyed it brown and pretended to be a youth,’ Athena declared proudly. ‘I got all the way to my aunt’s without anyone seeing through my disguise.’

Gabriel looked at her in disbelief, his eyes resting on the womanly curve of her breasts.

‘I bound them and wore baggy clothes,’ Athena said impatiently. ‘And I practised walking like a cocky youth. I based my impersonation on you. People only see what they expect to see.’

Gabriel raised his eyebrows. ‘In my experience cocky youths usually walk straight into trouble in unfamiliar surroundings,’ he said drily.

‘Hmm. Well,’ Athena muttered, discomfited. ‘After certain incidents I concluded, upon reflection, that a more modest bearing might be advisable. But I reached my destination quite safely. I am not the only woman who has chosen the protection of male clothing when travelling,’ she pointed out.

‘And what happened when you reached your aunt?’

‘We decided, Aunt Eleanor and I, that the English Convent in Bruges would be the safest place for me to hide. One of her childhood friends is the Abbess there. She took me to the convent early in 1659 and I stayed until Rachel needed a companion on her journey here.’

‘Seven years in a convent,’ Gabriel mused, his expression unreadable as he looked her up and down. ‘You are certainly not dressed like a nun.’

‘I wasn’t a nun, I was a guest of the convent.’

‘Hardly a charitable case, by the look of you.’

‘My aunt made donations to the convent. But I also worked for them in the infirmary and sometimes the gardens,’ Athena said. ‘And I made my lace.’ She touched her bodice. ‘It fetches a good price, you know.’

‘Yes.’ His eyes raked her face. ‘It is a very plausible story,’ he said.

‘Don’t you believe me?’

‘I reserve judgement.’

‘You have no right to judge me!’ Athena fumed.

‘It was judgement that separated the wise from the foolish virgins.’

‘It was common sense and foresight,’ Athena shot back.

‘Both of which you completely lack if this latest exploit is any indication.’

‘And you’ve lost your compassion. And your gallantry,’ she added, as an afterthought. ‘How could you treat me so rudely at dinner?’

‘Very easily.’ He moved suddenly, startling her into huddling back into her seat, but all he did was twitch apart the curtains a couple of inches to speak to the gondolier standing in front of the small cabin.

‘Oh, my God, they heard us?’ she whispered in horror, as Gabriel sat back again.

‘They don’t speak English,’ he replied indifferently.

‘What did you say to him?’ Athena still kept her voice lowered.

‘I ordered them to take us back to the embassy.’

‘Oh.’ Athena experienced a strange sense of anticlimax. ‘Then what?’

‘You may retire to your quarters and I will retire to mine.’