Free To Kiss A Spy by Jane Feather Page A

looked directly at Owen d’Arcy, mistrust and suspicion still clear in his gaze. “Lady Pen’s family stand in your debt, sir,” he said in clipped tones.
    “Not at all,” Owen responded cheerfully. “It was fortunate I happened to see her leave the water steps.”
    “As Pen hasn’t seen fit to introduce me, sir, I must introduce myself,” Pippa announced. She regarded Owen with her head on one side. “I’m Pen’s sister Philippa, Chevalier.” Her hazel eyes, the twins of her sister’s, sparkled mischievously as she subjected him to a full and frank assessment.
    Owen bowed over her hand, carrying her fingers to his lips. “
Enchanté,
my lady.”
    “Oh, how pretty!” Pippa cried. “I think we are to become great friends. After all, you saved Pen’s life and that means we can dispense with all sorts of formalities.”
    Robin and Pen exchanged speaking glances. Pippa was at it again. She was an incorrigible flirt but for some reason no one ever took her liveliness amiss.
    “Well, that is certainly something I look forward to, Lady Philippa,” Owen returned gravely.
    “Pippa,” Pippa corrected. “No one ever calls me Philippa. Not even the king, and old King Harry never did either.” She smiled at him, setting dimples dancing at the corners of her mouth.
    “I can see how that might be,” Owen said with the same gravity, well aware that she was flirting with him. “Pippa suits you much better.”
    Her smile became a grin and Owen could easily understand how men were attracted to her. She was far from pretty in any conventional way, quite the contrary. Her nose was long and pointed, her chin sharp, her countenance liberally sprinkled with freckles. She was thin and quick, and in her crimson and emerald silk she reminded him of a brightly plumaged little bird, not an exotic though, more like a sparrow in borrowed feathers. The French had a word for women like Lady Philippa.
Jolie-laide.
Her plainness was somehow attractive. But for his own money, he found her sister infinitely more appealing.
    He turned away from the sparrow and back to Pen, who he decided reminded him of a thrush—brown, speckled, bright-eyed, and very sure of who she was and where she was going. A no-nonsense bird. He spoke with deliberate formality although his eyes had a very different tone. Their message was one of intimate complicity. “I can see I have no need to see you safe inside, madam. I leave you with Lord Robin and your sister. But I trust you’ll permit me to inquire after your health tomorrow.”
    “I shall be happy to receive you, Chevalier,” Pen returned with the same formality. “I should like to present you to Princess Mary.”
    “I would be deeply honored.” He leaned forward and kissed her full on the lips as he’d done once before and said softly, “In the meantime, I’ll consider that other matter.” Then he turned away and said calmly, blandly, “Lord Robin . . . Lady Pippa . . . I bid you farewell.”
    “Don’t wait too long before you come to call upon Pen,” Pippa said. She had barely noticed the kiss.
    “Believe me, Lady Pippa, I will not.” He stepped into the wherry where Cedric was waiting impatiently, although the page had found the exchanges on the water steps most interesting. The oarsmen took up their oars and pulled out into the current.
    Owen stood in the bow with his hands clasped at his back, gazing across the river. A thrush, or a dove? No, definitely not a dove. Too sickly sweet. No, she was a thrush. Seemingly nondescript but a sweet-tongued yet tough dweller of the hedgerow. He smiled to himself. Then he recollected her stepbrother and a grimace twisted his mouth. Lord Robin could prove to be a nuisance.
    Owen had made it his business to learn all he could about Pen’s brother. He knew that the man was more than a peripheral member of Suffolk’s household, that he did more than just walk the halls of the ducal houses of Northumberland and Suffolk. Robin of Beaucaire took an