Free To Wed a Scandalous Spy by Celeste Bradley Page A

not afraid of cobras."
    Cobras
? Nathaniel blinked. "Wh—what? Why would you say something like that?"
    Willa pursed her lips. "You'll think me odd."
    Nathaniel put one hand over his heart. "I promise, my opinion of you will not change."
    She hesitated, looking askance at his phrasing. Then she shrugged. "Oh, very well. It is merely a game I play. People can be difficult to understand sometimes. I find it easier to predict how they will behave if I decipher what sort of wild creature they resemble. For instance, Moira could be compared to a brown bear."
    Since Nathaniel had experienced Moira's burly protectiveness firsthand, it seemed like a good match to him. A game? Could this truly be all there was to her deadly accuracy? "So you find me snakelike?" If the matter turned out to be a silly jest, he might take the time to be insulted.
    "Oh, don't take offense! If you understood snakes, you'd like them very much, I'm sure."
    "But Willa," he said quietly. "Why a cobra?"
    "Oh, a number of reasons !" She began counting on her fingers. "Cobras are really quite shy, and don't like to be disturbed. When they are disturbed, they put on a great show of ferocity, raising their hoods and weaving about, but it's really mostly show. They only strike when they must." She smiled hesitantly at him. "Like you."
    "I'm not poisonous," Nathaniel reminded her, although a voice inside reminded him that his disgrace might very well be contagious.
    She shrugged. "I did not say it was a perfect concept."
    "I have never 'puffed up' at you—until now, anyway." Nathaniel wasn't too happy about her astuteness. Who would have thought a curvaceous country miss could have such a keen mind? If that was truly all there was to this.
    Willa sighed. " Tis only a game," she said slowly, as if to a simpleton.
    Nathaniel scowled. "So you have decided that I am a cobra. What difference does that make?"
    "No, not just any cobra. A king cobra.
Naja hannah
. I have a book that describes them very well. They live in India. They are very large and handsome, but are the shyest of them all. They will retreat from a child."
    Lovely. Now I'm a cowardly snake
. "Enough. You were going to explain how I ended up on the side of the lane, unconscious."
    "I'd rather talk about snakes."
    "Willa"
    She huffed. "Oh, very well. It is commonly considered a fact, not only in Derryton and Edgeton but in all our surrounding farms and communities, that I am jinxed."
    Hell. And here he'd thought her sophisticated. She was just a superstitious country miss, after all. "You don't believe in such nonsense, do you?"
    "I wish it were nonsense. I wish it were some silly story, but most of all I wish it were about someone else."
    Nathaniel rubbed the back of his neck. "So you believe
you
are jinxed?"
    "Some would say I
am
the jinx."
    Ha. More like the "minx."
    "Who would say that?"
    She ticked off one finger. "Wesley Moss, for example."
    Nathaniel dug deep for patience. "Willa, would you kindly just tell me everything, so I don't have to pull it from you word by word. You believe you have bad luck?"
    "Oh no, I have marvelous luck. I am always the first one to find berries in the spring, and my cakes never fall. It is only my suitors."
    "Such as this Wesley Moss?"
    "Yes, poor Wesley was one of my more famous incidents. Of course, that may be because he actually went so far as to kiss me. Or to try to."
    "So what happened to him? Did this terrible jinx smite him dead?" Nathaniel smirked.
    Willa shook her head quite seriously. "No, thank goodness, although it was close. But he regained consciousness after only a few weeks, and I hear he is now able to walk again."
    Nathaniel was appalled. "What did you do to him?"
    "
I
did nothing. It is not my fault that he fell into the millstream. I was only trying to push him back. He should never have let his feet get tangled in my knitting like that."
    "So he was injured when he fell into a stream?"
    "Oh no, he only got a wetting from the stream. It was the