Free Under the Kissing Bough by Shannon Donnelly Page A

desire—clear and certain—rose in him to shield this wretched, trembling girl next to him from all these damnable gossips.
    "The first trick," he said, leaning down to whisper into her ear, "is to imagine they are all naked."
    She pulled back, alarmed, her cheeks as pink as a child's. "Naked?"
    He glanced around him, noticed that others had heard her. Lovely, he had just made things even worse.
    "Well, not completely so, but in their shifts with their garters and stockings showing, and their faces red from the shame of it."
    She lifted her stare just for a moment to scan the room, and her lips twitched slightly before she lost her courage again and her glance dropped. Well, it was progress.
    "And now," he went on, keeping his tone light, trying to put into it every ounce of coaxing charm that he owned, "I want you to tell me if you care what I think of you?"
    Her stare flew up to his face, and her lips parted and trembled. For an instant, he was struck with the desperate need in her eyes. He knew that feeling too well. She glanced away. When she looked back, she had mastery of herself again and had hidden away whatever desires had seemed about to be revealed.
    "I want to please you," she said. "I am to be your wife."
    Voice harsh, he told her, "Well, stop caring. Think of pleasing yourself."
"If I were to do that, I would leave," she muttered, a stubborn threat of rebellion rising in her voice.
    There might be hope for her, he thought, a smile loosening inside him. "And so you shall," he said. "So think of an exit to make. Do you want a sweeping one?"
    "A quick one. I want to be unnoticed."
    "Then do not notice others. You know that trick. I've seen you use it."
    Her glance rose up to his, startled, but the glazed, mindless panic in her eyes had receded. At least he had distracted her.
    "What do you mean? I don't have any tricks."
    "Yes, you do. A dozen at least. Tricks that let you vanish as if you're made of mist. You can't make yourself disappear just now, but you can make others disappear from your notice if you but turn that trick around. What do you think about when you want to become invisible?"
    She wet her lips and hesitated, and he wondered if she would be honest with him. But she said, her voice firm, "I just pretend I am part of the chair, or that I really am a flower on the wall coverings."
    "Good. Then just picture everyone here as furniture. That fellow over there with the large stomach, he ought to be an over-stuffed divan. And the too-tall, too-thin lady surely is a standing candelabra."
    Covering her mouth, Eleanor stifled a smile. "You really should not say so."
    "If it amuses you, I would say anything," he said, and he smiled at her, his blue eyes glinting and warm, and the smallest dimple appearing at the left corner of his mouth.
    Eleanor's heart skipped to a faster beat, and this time not from fear. She stared up at him, fascinated by the silver glints in his blue eyes and the endless depths that seemed to draw her towards them. Awareness of the others in the room—the cloying perfumes, the hum of whispers, the drone of her father's speech about the alliance of these two families—still hovered near, just as did her fear, but it no longer swamped her. She no longer felt as if an ocean wave were about to close over her head.
    The fear that had haunted her since childhood lay close, drumming under her skin with a hot urgency. She no longer worried that all the whispers must be condemning her. But she dared not lose the warmth of his arm around her waist, and the sight of his blue eyes smiling down at her.
    Gratitude that he stood between her and them made her glance shyly up to him. "Thank you," she said, and meant it deeply.
    His smile twisted with a cynical touch. "It is not something to thank me for, that I shall give you hard armor. But if you so desire, I shall toughen you so that you can walk with kings, and even make you able to speak before Parliament."
    For a moment, the image flashed in her