Free The Widow's Kiss by Jane Feather

household, but he had loved her.
    He dropped the hairbrush and it clattered to the table. The chamber came back into focus and he remembered why he was here, who this woman was. He spun away from her, away from that bewitchingly beautiful face, the brilliant, intelligent eyes.
    “So Stephen Mallory fell from that window. Where were you when he did so?”
    She turned slowly in her chair to look at him as he stepped away from her. What had happened to break that connection between them? It had been so strong, so real. But now he was regarding her with all the old antagonism and a very real and personal hostility.
    “In the garderobe,” she said slowly, aware that her palms were clammy, her cool composure reduced now to a facade.
    “You didn’t see him fall?”
    “No.” She had almost come to believe it herself, but as she told the lie she felt her foot twitch the way it had as he’d lunged for her. Her ankle tingled as it had after Stephen had caught his foot against it. She resisted the urge to bend and rub it.
    “Did anyone see him fall?”
    She shook her head. “Not as far as I know. The torch men came running when he cried out, but he was on the cobbles before they reached him.”
    “He was drunk?”
    “He was always drunk. Viciously drunk.” She said it simply but there was no disguising the bitterness of her tone.
    “Was that why you don’t mourn him?”
    “Among other reasons.” She turned back to the mirror, her hands falling into her lap as she watched his reflection. It was easier somehow than watching him in person.
    “And what of your other deceased husbands? Did you mourn them? Or were they also unworthy of such respect?”
    “You consider my feelings towards my husbands to be relevant to your inquiry, my lord?”
    “I am inquiring into the circumstances of their deaths. Your feelings could provide a motive for those deaths,” he observed dispassionately, his shoulders propped against the wall behind her, hands thrust into the deep pockets of his gown. He was master of himself once more, his expression cold and hard.
    “A motive for what you intend to prove,” she threw at him. “If you discover that indeed I had little love for any of my husbands that will give you a motive and you need look no further. Is that how you and your masters reason, sir?”
    “I doubt your motives were as simple as dislike, madam. I believe them to be more venal,” he stated.
    “You talk as if my guilt is already an established fact. We have not as yet discussed the deaths of two of my husbands.” Her tone was sweet as the marchpane on Pen's birthday cake, but her eyes were shrewd and cold. “Don’t you wish to question me about those, or is it not worth going through the motions since you’ve already made up your mind?” She kept her back to him, her hands still lightly clasped in her lap.
    “You will have a fair hearing,” he said tightly.
    Guinevere shook her head. “I know the facts of life, my lord. If Privy Seal intends to find me guilty for his own gain he will find me so. I assume you’re merely his instrument … the cat's-paw you might say.” Now she had really hit home. His vivid eyes burned and he pushed himself off the wall. For a minute she thought he was about to lay hands on her, then he strode instead to the open window over the courtyard. He put one foot on the low sill, resting a hand on his upraised knee.
    He said with icy calm, “Be careful, madam. You talk treason. Such statements about Privy Seal impugn his master, the king. Were they to come to Lord Cromwell's ears, he will have your head.”
    Guinevere shrugged. “If he intends to have it, sir, he will have it on one pretext or another.” She turned sideways on her chair to look at him fully. “However, I can see only one way in which they might come to Privy Seal's ears. Only one person heard me. Will you tell tales, Hugh of Beaucaire?”
    Somehow she had forgotten in the crisp satisfaction ofbesting him that she had