Anne swung her book from her right hand as she took several steps away. “Thank you for the offer of the sport, my lord, on the ride to Eltham, but I truly think you prefer gentler game. And as for my nephew, Henry Carey’s, heritage, who is to know if His Grace may have need of him someday? They say Henry Fitzroy is a weakling. Unless, of course, our king should take it upon himself to get a son through some other means after the Queen Catherine is sent into exile as he has publicly promised father and me.” Her musical laughter floated back to them in the sunny air.
“Mary and I will miss you greatly, my lord,” Elizabeth Bullen put in gently, “as will our little Catherine, who dotes on you it seems. I was hard-pressed to keep her from bothering you those first days when you slept so much from blood loss. I do hope I will see you again and soon. I appreciate an honest man, king’s courtier or not.”
Staff bent over her hand and kissed it. “I promise you will see me again, my lady, and it must be here since you will not come to court.”
“No, not at court, unless something very big and unexpected happens, and I pray it will not. The Bullens’ lives are already complicated enough as it is. You are always welcome here. Is it not so, Mary?”
“Yes, mother. Of course. Staff knows that.”
“Then I hope he will include us in his future plans,” the silver-haired woman added as she rose. Mary and Staff stood with her. “Please do not let Anne’s sharp tongue turn you away from her, my lord,” Lady Bullen went on. “She needs friends, and she will need her sister’s gentler influence, though I will be loath to part with Mary when she goes back.”
She smiled at her daughter, and Mary’s eyes filled with tears. Mother, Catherine and Hever—with Staff here to please them all—it was nearly heaven. But soon he must go back.
“I shall miss you,” she said to him across the tiny space of garden that separated them after her mother left.
His teeth shone white against his brown face, and his eyes darkened with pleasure. “But I shall be here a whole day and a half yet, wench, and we shall see what we can make of that.”
The day and a half Staff had promised became the most fleeting hours of Mary’s life. His chest and shoulder wounds seemed to heal rapidly, he ate enough for two healthy men, and his vitality returned. On the first sunny afternoon after they had managed to shake off Anne’s continual questions, Mary and little Catherine had taken Staff on an extensive walking tour of Hever: the rooms and courtyard, the gardens, orchards, meadows, even St. Paul’s Church down the winding lane where the forests began.
That evening they sat after supper in the solar, almost as a happy little family, chatting and playing a game of Gleek in which Anne insisted she be Staff’s partner and managed to hold all the cards too. But she soon flitted off to get her beauty sleep, and Lady Bullen bid them a quick and smiling goodnight.
At the big oak table they had used for cards, Staff and Mary sat a moment, drinking in the sweet August air. Staff was studying her as usual, not moving but for the rise and fall of his big chest, still wrapped with a heavy linen bandage under his white shirt unlaced halfway.
“A penny for your thoughts, Staff.”
“I cannot see selling my thoughts for a mere penny, lass, when the Lady Anne seems to value them so highly. But then, for one of your sweet kisses I have been greatly longing for lately, and which seem now to be in short supply, I would consider it.”
She felt little butterfly wings flutter in her stomach. “Agreed.”
“Come here and pay up then. You can hardly expect a near invalid to chase you around the room, Lady Mary.”
His voice had that old teasing tone, but he did not smile. She marvelled at the shift in mood he seemed to have undergone from the chatting, cordial man of a few moments ago at their card game.
She scraped her chair back and went to stand over him. He sat almost a foot from the table, but his arms were so long he had reached the cards easily. He lifted his head; his probing eyes reflected the glow of the big cresset lamp on the table. She bent down, leaning closer, her breath coming through parted lips as her soft mouth met his hard one. His lips opened immediately to caress hers, moving against her, tasting her. Then the kiss was over. He had not touched her otherwise. Was he really so unsure of her reaction after that night last week when she had not let him make love to her at Banstead?
She started to straighten, but his uninjured arm moved quickly to stay her, and he said, “Kiss me again. I have two thoughts I think you would like to hear.”
Inches apart in the drifting lamp glow, their eyes locked. She almost swayed into him at the impact of her desire for him, but she steadied her hands on the arm of his chair and lowered her mouth to kiss him once more.
You have fallen in love with him all over again, a voice deep inside whispered to her. Again since he rescued you after Will died at Hampton, again at Banstead, again at Hever, again this very moment.
She could not breathe. He was making her dizzy.
“You—I,” she stammered after she broke the kiss. She did not want him to know he could still do this to her. “I just did not want to fall against your bandage and hurt you, my lord,” she blurted.
He seemed so composed after their kissing, but his smile was gently teasing again. She stood to move around the corner of the table. “You have not told me the two thoughts I just paid for,” she protested.