The Maiden's Hand by Susan Wiggs Read Free Book Online Page A

hand he reached into the cuff of his boot and pulled out a coin. “I did find this when we searched the coach.”
    Both Oliver and Lark leaned forward to study the coin. Their foreheads touched, and as one they drew back in chagrin.
    “Curious,” said Kit, angling the coin toward the waning light through the kitchen window. “Tis silver. An antique shilling?”
    “Nay, look. ’Tis marked with a cross.” Cocking hishead, Oliver read the motto inscribed around the edge of the piece. “‘Deo favente.’”
    “With God’s favor,” Lark translated.
    Oliver discovered a useful fact about Mistress Lark. She was incapable of keeping her counsel. Like an accused criminal in a witness box, she turned pale and ducked her head with guilt.
    Damn the wench. She knew something.
    “Who were they, Lark?” Oliver demanded.
    “I know not.” She flung up her chin and glared at him. Oliver wondered if it was just a trick of the sinking light or if he truly saw the glint of fear in her eyes.
    “I’ll keep this and make some inquiries.” Kit left the kitchen through a passageway to the taproom.
    Oliver grinned and spread his arms wide. “Alone at last.”
    She rolled her eyes. “Take off your doublet and shirt.”
    He sighed giddily. “I love a wench who knows her own mind and is forthright in her desires.”
    “My only desire is to find the source of all this blood.” She pointed to the dark, sticky stain seeping through his clothing.
    “Your barbed tongue?” he suggested.
    “If I could inflict such damage, my lord, I’d have no need of a protector, would I?” She patted the tabletop. “Sit here so I don’t have to stoop to examine you.”
    He hoisted himself up. Without hesitation, she drew on first one lace point attaching his sleeve to his doublet and then the other. His bare, sun-bronzed arms seemed to stir her not at all. Did she not see how smooth and well muscled they were? How strong and shapely?
    “Now the doublet,” she said, “or shall I remove that, as well?”
    “It’s so much better when you do it.”
    She nodded absently and began working the frogged onyx fastenings free.
    Her hands were as light and delicate as the brush of a bird’s wing. As she bent close to her task, he caught a whiff of the most delicious scent. It clung to her hair, her clothes, her skin. Not perfume or oil, but something far more evocative.
    Woman. Pure woman. How he loved it.
    “Why did you stop me from killing that sheep biter who tried to murder me?” he asked.
    She parted the doublet like a pair of double doors. “You are no assassin, my lord.”
    “How do you know?”
    “I don’t know for sure. But instinct tells me that you have never killed a soul, and it would pain you if you did. You seem a compassionate man.”
    “Compassionate?” His doublet, finally freed, fell backward with a clunk to the table. “I am no compassionate man, but a bold and brash rogue. A brute of the first order.”
    “A brute.” Her mouth thinned, and a sparkling echo of humor lightened her voice. “Who faints in the aftermath of battle.”
    He snapped his mouth shut. So, she thought the asthma attack was a swoon. Should he set her straight, or should he allow her to go on believing him a coward? Worse than a coward. A high-strung, tender, emotional, limp-wristed, sentimental man. A wretch beyond redemption.
    She answered the dilemma for him, bless her. She turned those enormous rain-colored eyes up to him and said, “My lord, I do not impugn your manhood.”
    “Thank God for that,” he muttered. Seeing that he had irritated her, he donned a look of earnestness. “Go on.”
    “Your behavior today marks you as a person of true courage. For a man who loves combat, to fight is no sign of bravery. But for one who abhors it, to do battle is a sign of valor.”
    “Quite so.” The idea pleased him. If the truth be known, he loved a good sword fight or round of fisticuffs. But let her think he had been forced to drag courage from