Betrayed, Betrothed and Bedded by Juliet Landon

Author:Juliet Landon [Juliet Landon]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Fiction, Romance, Historical, General
ISBN: 9780263239973
Google: HPX1AgAAQBAJ
Amazon: B00I66GBU8
Barnesnoble: B00I66GBU8
Goodreads: 21926949
Publisher: Harlequin Historical
Published: 2014-01-01T07:00:00+00:00

Chapter Six

Dreamy with memories of the previous night and her body still alive with sensations, Ginny gowned Queen Anna in her finest furs and most becoming greens to walk in the gardens at Whitehall, determined that if the king wanted to walk with her, he would have to walk with Anna, too. Crystals frosted the garden like a confection, glistening on the long colour-striped posts that decorated the corners of each pathway where, in the raised beds, crocuses, snowdrops, and hellebores were hardly noticed by the groups of courtiers strolling with their faces towards the weak sun. Topping each pole, mythological beasts bearing shields shone with gold leaf, adding rich colour to the silver-white frost, Anna’s soft velvet gown being the only sign of green on that occasion. Ginny saw the king looking hard at her but, after the shortest of enquiries about her health, left his queen in the company of Sir Jon Raemon and took Ginny by the arm to walk with her apart, too conspicuously for her comfort. Others fell back to give them some privacy, though she could feel Sir Jon’s eyes upon them.

Henry tucked her hand into the soft bend of his elbow and patted it in a fatherly manner. ‘I’m glad you’ve returned to us, my lady,’ he said. ‘I knew you were the one to set the queen’s wardrobe to rights. You have style, you see. More than any woman at court.’ He sighed. ‘I thought I, too, would have a wife with a liking for our culture, for music and singing, for poetry and fine things. Mistress Howard has an eye for pretty things, does she not? Now, if you were my wife, my lady, we would have so much more to talk about, I know. But my new wife will never understand me, I fear, the way you do. Charming, of course, in her own way, but, ah...I cannot see how I shall ever come to, well...be with her as a husband should. It’s so hard for me to find a way forwards on this matter. I have no heart for it anymore.’

‘The queen has many fine qualities, Your Grace. Once you get to know her better, I’m sure you will find you have much in common. And she’s so eager to learn our language and our customs. She has the most wonderful sense of humour, too.’

But Henry was feeling sorry for himself, sure he’d made a mistake that could not be rectified by any effort on his part, with not a thought about how his foreign wife must be feeling far away from home amongst strangers. He had done little to rectify the situation, or make things easier for her, nor had he offered her more than courtesies in place of the love she would have preferred, and Ginny was left with the impression that things would not improve when he had now begun to leave Anna to her own devices, especially at night.

She need not have been

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