“Do you want me to take you on a table?” he yelled. “Get you with child and make a hasty marriage after? The last court couple who tried that are both in the Tower!”
“Stop it!”
“I will not take you in secret. Give me the word, and I’ll go straight to William myself and tell him the truth.”
“We can’t just throw this in his face. He’s not ready to hear it.”
“He’ll never be ready, Minuette. I know you don’t want to hurt him. But he isn’t a child, and he wouldn’t thank you for treating him as such.”
“Don’t tell me how to deal with William!”
He shook his head. “I can’t do this anymore.” His voice was controlled now, and his expression. But his eyes were deep with sorrow. “You won’t confess, and I won’t lie.”
Her skin that had burned so hot flushed with cold. She knew that implacable tone—it meant that Dominic would not be moved. “So where does that leave us?”
“I won’t force the issue against your will. But I can’t be alone with you until this is settled. When we return to court, I will ask the king to give me leave. I should spend some time at Tiverton now that I am its master. When you have made your choice, you let me know.”
This isn’t happening, she thought. She stared after him blankly, bewildered and heartsick as he turned away. Before vanishing through the door, he stopped and said, “I am glad to know you are virgin still. If you were not, I should have to kill him.”
Elizabeth was reunited with William at their father’s lavish but still unfinished Nonsuch Palace. The fortified north side was medieval in appearance, but the south side had all the splendor of octagonal towers and decorative elements. Her brother greeted her with a kiss on both cheeks in the inner courtyard with its high-relief stucco panels, then led her into one of the towers for a private dinner.
Truly private, for he dismissed the attendants curtly and, the moment they were alone, snapped about her decision not to bring Minuette with her. “She’ll be as anxious to see me as I am to see her. Why did you send her on to Dominic’s mother?”
“As a courtesy. They have long been correspondents.”
“A courtesy the woman will not remember. Her mind is gone.”
“She is mad only now and again. Surely you can spare Minuette for a few days longer? Besides, this will help settle rumours of your affections, which you must know have already spread to the French court.”
What else could she say? Tell him that Minuette and Dominic had been quarreling (as much as one could quarrel with a maddeningly reserved man like Dominic), that Minuette had behaved erratically that last night in France, flirting outrageously and drinking far too much for her own good? She couldn’t say any of that. Nor could she explain the uneasy feeling that had settled in her stomach as she’d watched Minuette and Dominic at odds with other during the journey home.
One who should not be watching her in quite the manner that he is,Walsingham had warned her. Surely he hadn’t meant Dominic. And yet…
Since she couldn’t say any of that, she parried. “Have you and Robert quarreled?”
“Why, because I did not bring him along to our private celebration tonight?” he asked sarcastically. “I thought his absence might settle the rumours of your affections, Sister.”
She blinked. William was often imperious, but almost never rude. Not to her.
And she knew that they had fought. Robert had written to her often during her sojourn in France, and the things he had not said were even more revealing than the things he had.
She opened her mouth to be biting, and realized that William wasn’t really speaking to her. His temperament was all about who wasn’t here: he was taut, almost frantic, with his impatience to see Minuette.
So she changed her sentence to, “How was your visit to Kenninghall? Did the Howards behave themselves?”
“Impeccably.”
“Including Eleanor?”
“Indeed. I think you would not know her now. She has…softened. Grown up. Motherhood suits her.” William spoke casually, as if he thought nothing of it, but she did not miss the strained set of his shoulders or the way his eyes darted without settling on her.
Elizabeth was more inclined to believe that widowhood suited Eleanor Percy. “And the child?”
“She is healthy, active. Only sixteen months and already she can speak intelligibly.”
“What does she look like?” she asked, meaning,Who does she look like?
He met Elizabeth’s eyes at last. “Her hair is red-gold and curls naturally.”
