The Heiress Bride - Catherine Coulter [30]
CHAPTER
5
“WE ARE ONLY going as far as Chipping Norton, to the White Hart,” Sinjun told Colin when he stirred. “We will be there in another hour. How do you feel?”
“Bloody tired, dammit.”
She patted his arm. “You didn’t say that with much heat, Colin, which means you’re probably a good deal more than tired; you’re exhausted, what with all our hurrying and sneaking about. But you’ll get your strength back more and more each day. Don’t worry. We won’t be to Scotland for another six days as best as I can figure it. You will have plenty of time to mend.”
Because it was dark inside the carriage Sinjun couldn’t see the irritation in his eyes, and it was there, for he felt helpless, unmanned, like a small child in the care of a nanny, only this nanny was just nineteen years old. He grunted.
“Why in God’s name did you pick the White Hart?”
She giggled. An unexpected sound from a nanny, Colin thought with surprise. “It was because of the stories I heard Ryder and Douglas telling Tysen, and he was appalled, naturally, since he was studying to be a man of the cloth. Of course Ryder and Douglas were laughing their heads off.”
“And none of them had any idea that you—the infant daughter of the house—were eavesdropping.”
“Oh no,” she said, waving her hand airily as she smiled. “No idea at all. I got quite good at it by the time I was seven years old. I have this feeling you know all about the White Hart and how the young gentlemen at Oxford spent many evenings there with their light-o’-loves.”
Colin was silent.
“Are you remembering your own assignations?”
“Yes, as a matter of fact. The wife of one of my dons used to meet me there. Her name was Matilda, and she was so blond her hair was nearly white. Then there was the barmaid at the Flaming Dolphin in Oxford. She was a wild one, insatiable I remember, loved the feather ticks at the White Hart. Then there was Cerisse—a made-up name, but who cared? Ah, all that red hair.”
“Perhaps we shall have the same bedchamber or bedchambers. Perhaps we should simply hire the entire inn, to cover all the possibilities, so to speak. A symbolic gesture of your sown wild oats.”
“You’re a very inappropriate virgin, Joan.”
She looked at him closely. The moon had finally come from behind thick dark clouds, and she could at last see his face. He was pale, she could see that, and looked dreadfully pulled. The fever must have been more devastating than she’d thought to have left him so very weak. “You don’t have to worry about merely sleeping next to me tonight, Colin. You can even snore if it pleases you to do so. I don’t mind being a virgin until you have all your strength back.”
“Good, because that’s what you’re going to remain.” He felt the rawness in his thigh and wondered why he yet cared that she shouldn’t know about it. It didn’t really matter, not now.
“Unless, of course,” she said, leaning closer to him, her voice dropping to what she hoped was a seductive whisper, and wasn’t at all, “you would like to tell me how to go about accomplishing what it is that should be done. My brothers always accused me of being a dreadfully fast learner. Would you like that?”
He wanted to laugh, but ended by groaning.
Sinjun was forced to assume that was a no, and sighed.
The White Hart stood in the middle of the small marketing town of Chipping Norton, comfortably set in the Cotswolds. It was a fine, very picturesque Tudor inn, so old and rustic Sinjun felt charmed at the same time she was praying for it not to fall down around their ears. So this was where many of the young men came for their trysts. It did look rather romantic, she thought, and sighed again.
There wasn’t a soul to be seen, for it was three o’clock in the morning. Still, Sinjun was far too excited to be tired. She’d managed to escape her