Randolph stared at the young woman riding beside him and tried to contain his irritation. But if he were a dog, his hackles would be rising. Hell, they’d be standing all the way on end.
What was it about Lady Isabel Stewart that made him feel as if a nettle had worked its way under his plaid and wouldn’t stop poking? There was nothing outwardly in her appearance to give an indication of trouble. Fair-haired and blue-eyed, with pretty enough, finely boned features, she was so serene-looking her likeness would not have seemed out of place on a church wall.
Too bad her temperament didn’t match.
From the first moment they’d met, he sensed that she was amused by him—and not in the way he was used to amusing women. Nay, it was almost as if she was laughingathim. Which was ridiculous. Women didn’t laugh at him. They smiled, flirted, and occasionally simpered, but they definitely didn’t laugh. They might bat their eyes, but they sure as hell didn’t roll them, as he could swear he’d seen her do more than once.
What the Devil was wrong with the lass?
She didn’t even look at him the way other women did. He hadn’t noticed the difference until meeting her had made it clear.Unawareness. That’s what it was, and he didn’t like it. Especially as he could hardly make the same claim toward her. He was oddly attracted to her, which under the circumstances, only increased his annoyance. He was about to ask her extremely beautiful and would-make-him-a-perfect-wife cousin to marry him, for Christ’s sake. He shouldn’t be thinking of ways to make Isabel—“Izzie” as her family called her—aware of him. Plenty of women were aware of him; he didn’t need another.
But it didn’t stop him from imagining how satisfying it would be to see those big, laughing blue eyes darken with arousal and those pink lips, always set in a wry grin, part with a gasp of pleasure.
It wasn’t just her unawareness riling his irritation this time, however. Unknowingly she’d struck a tender spot. Learning hadn’t come easy to him. “Not all of us are born to be clerks or churchmen.” With a long, meaningful look, he couldn’t resist adding, “Indeed there are other things in which I do excel that ensure priesthood will never be in my future.”
When she took his meaning, he was rewarded with a sharp intake of breath that if not a hint of passion, was close enough for him to imagine it could be. Viscerally. He felt it run through him in a hot buzz as if a lightning bolt had been set at the base of his spine.
Their eyes met, and in her shock, he wondered if maybe she wasn’t quite as unaware as he thought.
But just as he was about chastise himself for acting like an arse by baiting her—inappropriately—to salve his pride, she did it again. She laughed and gave a half roll of her eyes. “So I’ve heard.”
Damn her. At least if she were haughty, condescending, or judgmental, he’d have cause to be so irritated. But it was partly the good humor with which she imparted her indifference that annoyed him. She might have been a distant aunt, teasing him for being incorrigible.
But she wasn’t his aunt, damn it. She was the twenty-two-year-old unmarried daughter of the great patriot hero John Stewart of Bonkyll, who’d died leading his archers beside William Wallace at Falkirk sixteen years ago. She was also cousin to both the Lord of Douglas and the current Steward of Scotland. In other words, she was just the kind of well-connected young noblewoman who usually tried to impresshim.
But she didn’t seem to care what he thought, and he knew it wasn’t because he was nearly engaged to her cousin. Nay, she’d simply sized him up and found him somehow wanting.Him.Wanting! And that irritated him to no end.
She was a young woman at court for the first time, and he was one of the most important knights in the kingdom. It was unnatural, blast it.
What did he need to do to impress her, slay a dragon? Hell, that probably wouldn’t even do it. She was remarkablyunimpressible.
Why the hell was he even thinking about this? It was probably the novelty of having a young woman not interested in him. Aye, that must be it.
Still, he couldn’t resist prodding her a little. “I’d tell you not to believe everything you hear, but in this case…” He shrugged with a wicked smile.
To which she was completely immune. His comment merely elicited another eye roll and an adorably twitching mouth. “I’m sure everything you do is perfect, my lord.”
He pulled on the reins, and swung around his horse to face her. “What the Devil is that supposed to mean?”
She didn’t seem taken aback by his anger at all. Rather the opposite as a matter of fact. The lass was entirely too self-possessed for one so young. It was disconcerting, and he didn’t like it.
She stopped her own horse and turned to face him, shaking her head with a wry smile and something of an “Are you kidding me?” expression on her face. “Come now, my lord, is that not what I’m supposed to think? Sir Thomas Randolph, the perfect, quintessential knight: handsome, charming, chivalrous to the core, whose prowess on the battlefield is only equaled by his prowess in the bedchamber?”
Randolph’s mouth might have gaped. She’d shocked him speechless. Now, admittedly he’d been suggesting that very thing, but for her to come out and actually say it was different. It made him feel almost… embarrassed. Hell, hewasembarrassed.
How did she do this, damn it? How did she so easily turn the tables on him when he was the aggrieved party? Wasn’t he?
Bloody hell.
He would have dragged his fingers through his hair if he wasn’t wearing a helm. “It isn’t like that.”
She smiled, clearly amused. “Isn’t it? But no matter, my lord. I did not mean to offend you. I think it’s just that we don’t share the same sense of humor.”
That was an understatement.
She tilted her head, her mouth in a bit of a frown. “Do you ever laugh, my lord?”
“Of course.” All the women found him quite witty. All except her, that is. He laughed with them… didn’t he?
