Susan Wiggs - At The Queen's Summons

She blushed and dropped her gaze, then blushed even deeper when she discovered she wore only a shift. She clutched the bedclothes to her chest.

“I hung your things to dry by the fire,” Aidan said. “I got the shift from Lady Lumley’s clothes press.”

Pippa touched the sheer fabric of the sleeve. “I’ll hang for certain.”

“Nay. Lord and Lady Lumley are at their country estate in Wycherly. I’m to have full use of the house and all its contents.”

She sighed dreamily. “How wonderful to be treated like such an important guest.”

“Often I find it a burden, not a wonder.”

She began to remember snatches of the storm, the lightning and thunder chasing her through the streets, the rain lashing her face. And then Aidan’s strong arms and broad chest, and the sensation of speed as he rushed her back to the house. His hands had tenderly divested her of clothes and placed her in the only real bed she had ever slept in.

She had tucked her face into his strong shoulder and sobbed. Hard. He had stroked her hair, kissed it, and finally she had slept.

She looked up at him. “You’re awfully kind for a father-murderer.”

His smile wavered. “Sometimes I surprise myself.” Leaning across the bed, he touched her cheek, his fingers skimming over her blush-heated skin. “You make it easy, colleen. You make me better than I am.”

She felt such a profusion of warmth that she wondered if she had a fever. “Now what?” she whispered.

“Now, for once in your life, you’ll tell the truth, Pippa. Who are you, where did you come from and what in God’s name am I going to do with you?”

My son Richard’s namesake is coming to London! The Reverend Richard Speed, of famous reputation, now the Bishop of Bath, will attend his nephew’s military commission. Naturally Speed will bring his wife, Natalya, who is Oliver’s dear sister and as beloved to me as blood kin.

Oliver’s other siblings will come with husbands and wives. Belinda and Kit, Simon and Rosamund, whom I have not seen in two winters. Sebastian will come with one special friend or other; these days it is a gifted but disreputable young poet called Marlowe.

Dear Belinda still clings to her scandalous pastime of incendiary displays. She has lit her fireworks for members of the noble houses of Hapsburg and Valois, and of course for Her Majesty the queen. She has promised a special program of Italian colored fire in honor of Richard.

But I wonder, amid all the revelry, if anyone save Oliver will mark the event that tonight’s storm reminds me of so poignantly. For many years I have struggled to survive our loss, and daily I thank God for my family. Still, the storm hurled me back to that dark, rain-drenched night.

It is a time that lives in my heart as its most piercing memory.

—Lark de Lacey,

Countess of Wimberleigh

Aidan was watching her with those penetrating flame-blue eyes. Pippa could tell from his fierce chieftain’s glare that he would tolerate no more jests or sidestepping.

She combed her hair with both hands, raking her fingers through the damp, yellow tangles. She felt shaky, much as she did after being stricken with a fever and then getting up for the first time in days. The storm had slammed through her with terrifying force, leaving her limp.

“The problem is,” she said with bleak, quiet honesty, “I have the same answer to all of your questions.”

“And what is that?”

“I don’t know.” She watched him closely for a reaction, but he merely sat there at the end of the bed, waiting and watching. Firelight flared behind him, outlining his massive shoulders and the gleaming fall of his black hair.

His eyes never left her, and she wondered just what he saw. Why in heaven’s name would a grand Irish lord take an interest in her? What did he hope to gain by befriending her? She had so little to offer—a handful of tricks, a few sorry jests, a chuckle or two. Yet he seemed enraptured, infinitely patient, as he awaited her explanation.

The rush of tenderness she felt for him was frightening. Ah, she could love this man, she could draw him into her heart. But she would not. In his way, he was as remote as the moon, beautiful and unreachable. Before long he would go back to Ireland, and she would resume her existence in London.

“I don’t know who I am,” she explained, “nor where I come from, nor even where I am going. And I certainly don’t know what you’re going to do with me.” With an effort, she squared her shoulders. “Not that it’s any of your concern. I am mistress of my own fate. If and when I decide to delve into my past, it will be to find the answers for me, not you.”

“Ah, Pippa.” He got up, took a dipper of wine from a cauldron near the hearth and poured the steaming, spice-scented liquid in a cup. “Sip it slowly,” he said, handing her the drink, “and we’ll see if we can sort this out.”

Feeling cosseted, she accepted the wine and let a soothing swallow slide down her throat. Mab had been her teacher, her adviser in herbal arts and foraging, but the old woman had seen only to her most basic needs, keeping her dry and fed as if she were livestock. From Mab, Pippa had learned how to survive. And how to protect herself from being hurt.

“You do not know who you are?” he inquired, sitting again at the foot of the bed.

She hesitated, caught her lower lip with her teeth. Turmoil boiled up inside her, and her immediate reaction was to erupt with laughter and make yet another joke about being a sultan’s daughter or a Hapsburg orphan. Then, cradling the cup in her hands, she lifted her gaze to his.

She saw concern burning like a flame in his eyes, and its appeal had a magical effect on her, warming her like the wine, unfurling the secrets inside her, plunging down through her to find the words she had never before spoken to another living soul.

Slowly, she set the cup on a stool beside the bed and began to talk to him. “For as long as I can remember, I have been Pippa. Just Pippa.” The admission caught unpleasantly in her throat. She cleared it with a merry, practiced laugh. “It is a very liberating thing, my lord. Not knowing who I am frees me to be whoever I want to be. One day my parents are a duke and duchess, the next they are poor but proud crofters, the next, heroes of the Dutch revolt.”

“But all you really want,” he said softly, “is to belong somewhere. To someone.”

She blinked at him and could summon no tart remark or laughter to answer the charge. And for the first time in her life, she admitted the stark, painful truth. “Oh, God in heaven, yes. All I want to know is that someone once loved me.”

He reached across the bed and covered her hands with his. A strange, comfortable feeling rolled over her like a great wave. This man, this foreign chieftain who had all but admitted he’d killed his father, somehow made her feel safe and protected and cared for.

“Let us work back over time.” He rubbed his thumbs gently over her wrists. “Tell me how you came to be there on the steps of St. Paul’s the first day I met you.”

He spoke of their meeting as if it had been a momentous occasion. She pulled her hands away and set her jaw, stubbornly refusing to say more. The fright from the storm had lowered her defenses. She struggled to shore them up again. Why should she confess the secrets of her heart to a virtual stranger, a man she would never see again after he left London?

“Pippa,” he said, “it’s a simple enough question.”

“Why do you care?” she shot back. “What possible interest could it be to you?”

“I care because you matter to me.” He raked a hand through his hair. “Is that so hard to understand?”