The Spymaster's Daughter by Jeane Westin Page B

as her marriage.
    â€œI have my pallet in the antechamber,” Robert explained softly, his arms loosening, setting her free, adrift. “There is nothing to ever cause you such fright.”
    Finally, she realized that she was losing his embrace, and more, that she was less comforted and safe without it. She did not want to leave such shelter, but she forced herself to withdraw, looking away, intensely aware that she wore only a thin night rail beneath his touch.
    â€œThank you. You may leave me now,” she said, trying for her normal distance when she did not want any distance. The thought frightened her and provoked a determination to cease her cowering and be the mistress again, to keep her voice low and steady. “Pauley, call my maid without disturbing Jennet.”
    He nodded, stood and bowed, and withdrew.
    She had never felt so alone.
    When her maid came, Frances asked for her sponging bowl and sent her sleeping gown to her washerwoman before she remembered that Robert had called her by her Christian name. Then she couldn’t forget the sound of it next to her ear, or what she had seen in his eyes…even the dim light could not hide…what? Only concern for a mistress. She could not go further with whathis gaze could have meant, and with a will she cut off such thoughts, determined never to think them again.
    â€œM r. Secretary is to be with the queen this afternoon,” Robert announced later when Frances once again emerged from her duties in the presence chamber. “Your hot dinner is waiting for you in your rooms, my lady.”
    She laughed. Hot food was a jest in Tudor palaces. “There is always more food than I can eat. You must join me.” She was determined to act as if the comfort he had offered a mistress in distress was nothing out of the ordinary. Anything more would be unseemly and not to be considered.
    She laughed again. “There will yet be enough left for humble pie to give the poor at the palace gate.” When he did not reply, she added, “I do not ask you in duty, but for more amusing company than my own this day.”
    â€œAs you wish, my lady.”
    There, she had assured him that she did not seek his company for any reason but her own entertainment. On second thought, she explained further. “My aunt eats in the great dining hall with the other gentlewomen, and I do not like to eat alone.” Why did she need so many excuses? She could command him all day and he must obey. Yet could she command herself?
    Robert did not reply for several minutes, until they turned into the corridor near her apartment. “Thank you, my lady,” he said as if he had just retrieved his voice. “I will try to amuse you.”
    Frances breathed deeply. She had meant to set a distance between them, but now that his reserve matched her own, she was regretful. Why did she so insistently send a flawed message to Robert Pauley? And why did he consistently misunderstand her? Even if her words had been meant in a friendly guise, he was unused to friendliness from his betters. He would be naturally suspicious.Bastards were never equals, or well treated, regardless of their merit. He had armored himself against disillusion just as she had shielded her heart against Philip’s blinding love for Stella.
    Did Robert suffer as she did? He was a man and would never speak of a sore heart. How strange that servant and mistress might have so much in common.
    A kitchen under-cook was waiting with her supper. He bowed and left, the food now cold, but then it always was, because the huge kitchens were so prone to fires that they were banished to many levels below the royal chambers in all royal palaces and great manors.
    â€œMay I warm your dinner, my lady?”
    â€œHow?”
    Robert pulled leather gloves from the pocket about his waist, donned them, and held the bowls over the candelabra. “Not hot, my lady,” he said, “but not cold.”
    He made