Free The Widow's Kiss by Jane Feather Page A

intended during this encounter to distract him with charm, to try to confuse his responses to her. At the beginning she had begun to do that, but once again the bright knife of antagonism cut the frail accord. And now she didn’t care. Anger would distract him as well as sensual temptation.
    But Hugh was not to be provoked again. He observed with a mocking amusement, “You have an asp's tongue, my lady. Poisonous enough, I dare swear, to do away with any number of self-respecting husbands. However, if you will accept a piece of advice, when you are questioned in London, you would do well to leave such venom behind. It will not find favor, I assure you.”
    “On what subjects am I to be questioned?” Guinevere inquired, striving to maintain her own air of mocking indifference despite the fear crawling down her spine at this reminder of the journey that lay ahead if she couldn’t hit upon some desperate means to avoid it. It was all very well to play word games and rejoice in a well-placed dart, but it was an empty puerile triumph in the face of the real danger in which she stood.
    “That is for them to say.”
    “And who is it who wishes to question me?”
    “The king, for one. The Bishop of Winchester for another. Privy Seal for another.”
    Guinevere's laugh was low and humorless. “God's grace! Such marked and august attention for a mere widow from the northern wilds!”
    “A very
rich
widow,” he emphasized softly. “A lady four times widowed. Most conveniently widowed.”
    “And you are here as Privy Seal's cat's-paw,” she reiterated with a bitter scorn fueled now by desperation and fear. “You are here to find what evidence will support the facts that suit you? You think you will gain the deeds to my estate by such means? Good God, my lord! Is your greed such that you would trump up charges against meand bring about my death to get your hands on land that does not belong to you?”
    The mocking amusement died. Hugh's expression darkened, his mouth hardened. “My son has legitimate title to that land. If you are innocent of your husbands’ deaths, then I will find you so. But if you are guilty, believe me, I will find you so.”
    “You will find me so because it will suit you to do so,” she repeated in the same low and furious voice. “You think I do not know your kind, Hugh of Beaucaire?”
    A cool breeze springing up from the Derbyshire hills set a candle on the table flickering. Guinevere leaned forward, cupping her hand around the flame to steady it. Her fingers shook slightly.
    “There was an unmarked arrow that killed Lord Hadlow,” Hugh said after a pause. “Do you have an explanation for that, my lady?”
    She remained with her hand cupping the candle flame. “There were peasants hunting the woods that day. On the first Wednesday of every month, Tim …” Her voice caught for a second, then she continued, “Lord Hadlow made his tenants free of the forest to catch what they would for their own larders. He and I and Greene, our huntsman, believed that one of them let loose an arrow by mistake. No one would have deliberately killed Lord Hadlow. He was universally beloved by his tenants. But no one would come forward after he died two days later. Justice is rough, Lord Hugh, as I’m sure you’d agree.”
    It was true that the penalty for killing a lord and master, regardless of intent, was vicious and absolute. But the explanation struck Hugh as too easy, too pat to be believed without corroboration. He would need to visit the Hadlow lands and question the tenants himself.
    “My first husband fell from his horse during a stag hunt,” Guinevere said tonelessly. “I doubt he was sober at the time either. I was confined in childbed on that day. Astillborn babe,” she added without inflection. “I doubt even Privy Seal could lay that death at my door, unless, of course, I am to be accused of witchcraft.”
    Hugh said nothing and after a second Guinevere swung round on her chair and her