A Reckless Beauty by Kasey Michaels Read Free Book Online

she’d watched her enough, and had spent enough hours in the kitchens at Becket Hall to know the rhythms and routines of that particular area, usually chopping up carrots as punishment for something she’d done and would doubtless go off to do again once Bumble released her from her stool and pile of vegetables.
    Within the hour she had struck up a smiling, gesturing friendship with a buxomy old woman named Hilda, who spoke no English. As for herself, she spoke no German or whatever language the woman kept tossing at her. She’d washed her face and hands at the wooden trough in a corner of the narrow kitchen, shoved some lovely fat slices of ham into her cheeks and made certain a heavily loaded tray had been sent up to the Ogre in the Tower, which is how she’d decided to think of the Earl of Brede.
    Her filthy scarlet jacket draped over the back of one of the high-backed chairs, Fanny sat cross-legged on her chair—wonderfully comfortable in her uniform trousers—and looked across the scarred wooden kitchen table at her brother, once again urging him to, for pity’s sake, stop pouting and eat something. After all, it wasn’t the end of the world, was it?
    Rian sat back in his chair, shaking his head at her. “You have no bloody idea how difficult you’ve made things, do you? Just as long as you’re happy.”
    “Rian, that’s not true,” she said, waving a fork at him, the threat lessened quite a bit by the small roasted potato stuck on the tines. “I said I was sorry, and I am. But we’ve suffered no major setback, now have we? I’ve seen you, I’m safely here with the Ogre, and you’re to be joining Wellington’s staff in the morning, or even later tonight. I know how happy that makes you. I’ll pen a note to Papa tomorrow and I’m sure the Ogre will frank it, so there’s nothing to worry about there. All in all,” she said, pushing the potato into her mouth and maneuvering it against the inside of her cheek, “daring to overlook my punishment when I get back to Becket Hall, I’d consider the exercise a success.”
    Rian gave up his moody pose and smiled. “As I remember the thing, you also thought coaxing Molly safely over that five-bar fence a success, even if you’d fallen off and broken your arm in the process, and couldn’t ride again for the rest of that summer. But Wellington’s staff, Fanny! Can you imagine? I’ll be right in the thick of things.”
    Fanny plunked an elbow onto the tabletop and rested her chin in her hand. Although at least six years her senior, he was so, so young. “What do you suppose you’ll do?”
    “I’ve thought about that, about how Brede mentioned how Jack told him I can ride anything with four legs—or even three. So I’m thinking, since I really don’t know anything about strategy so that the Field Marshal will be soliciting my opinion on matters, I’ll just be one of those riding out again and again, taking orders from Wellington to his generals during the battles. Jupiter will be magnificent there. He may not be the fastest of foot, but he’s got the best heart, and he’ll go forever. You know that.”
    Fanny speared the last potato on her plate and popped it into her mouth, mumbled her question around it as she chewed. She knew she was being inelegant, as Elly would call it, but real food tasted so good. “So, then, you’ll be safely behind the lines?”
    Rian shook his head. “Would you stop that, Fanny? But, yes, I’ll be fairly safe. Except when I’m riding by myself, between our ranks. Then things might become interesting.”
    “You’re just saying that so I’ll worry,” Fanny said, gathering up her dish and utensils and carrying them over to the sink already piled high with plates and pots. “But if you’re not, please remember to ride low on Jupiter’s back, your head close down by his neck, so that you don’t present too tempting a target.”
    Rian set his own dishes into the sink and smiled a thank-you to Hilda. “How many