Free The Rebel Captain's Royalist Bride by Anne Herries Page B

too long. Yet it was not only that. Despite himself there was more.
    No, he was a very wretch to think it. A surge of punishing grief pushed through him, and he shook his head. He would not betray Jane by thinking of Mistress Babs.
    When he married it would be for comfort, nothing more....
    * * *
    Rising from her bed the next morning, Babette stretched and yawned. She’d had pleasant dreams, though she could not recall them, but they had left her feeling refreshed and happy. She poured water from her ewer into a bowl and washed her face and hands, then smoothed the washing cloth over her arms and breasts and down her body. Although she could not bathe as often here as at home, where the servants were at her beck and call, she liked to keep herself fresh and clean and her soap, which had been made in France and sent from London, was gentle on the skin and smelled of flowers.
    When she had pulled on a clean gown of pale grey, thin woollen cloth, she went to the window and looked out into the back courtyard. Captain Colby was there, talking and laughing with his men, and she thought they must have been training or working for they all looked hot and, as she watched, several of them took a long drink from a jug of her aunt’s good ale. Then Captain Colby pulled off his shirt and went to the pump, dipping his head under it. He shouted as the cold water cascaded over his head and shoulders, trickling down his back. Babette could not help but see that his skin had the soft golden colour that showed he sometimes worked with his shirt off, perhaps in his fields at home.
    His shoulders were broad and he had strong muscles in his back and upper arms. It was hardly surprising that she could still feel the imprint of his hands where he had held her in the woods.
    As he withdrew from the pump, he looked up at her window, his eyes meeting hers so intently that she drew back hurriedly. Her cheeks flushed as she realised he must think she was spying on him. Sensing that some of the other soldiers were about to follow his lead, she moved away from the window. She ought to have done so as soon as she saw what he intended, but she’d been fascinated by the strong tanned torso and the way the water had trickled from his hair down his back.
    He was a handsome man and there was something very attractive about him, a masculine presence that made her feel as if she would like to be taken in his arms and held there safely. Babette admitted that she felt drawn to him against her will, because his smile was so charming that she sometimes forgot that he was her enemy—but she must not forget, because her brother’s and Drew’s life might depend upon her keeping up her guard. The rebel captain was a clever man and, if she allowed him to, he might discover her secret.
    Babette finished her toilette and then left her room. When she reached the kitchen she found her uncle seated at the table drinking ale. It was their habit to eat in the kitchen at breakfast, for it saved the trouble of laying the table in the parlour. Babette went to the pantry and brought out the salted bacon, beginning to cut several thick slices. She fried them with slices of bread and brought them back to the table just as Captain Colby entered. He had put his shirt on again, but it clung wetly to his body and his hair was slicked back from his face and beginning to curl above his ears.
    ‘Will you have porridge, sir?’ she asked. ‘Or fried bacon and bread?’
    ‘Have you no mushrooms to offer me?’ he asked and smiled at her.
    ‘You need to be out early to gather them for everyone likes a tasty mushroom,’ Aunt Minnie said, not understanding that it was a joke between them. ‘I’m sure had my niece known you were partial to them, Captain, she would have risen early to pick them for you.’
    ‘Thank you, ma’am, ’twas but an idle jest,’ he said. ‘I will have porridge—and some bread and a little of that excellent honey, thank you, mistress.’
    ‘I shall pick