Playing For The Ashes by George Elizabeth

Author:George, Elizabeth [Elizabeth, George,]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Mystery, Thriller, Crime, Suspense, Contemporary, Adult
ISBN: 9780340831403
Publisher: Bantam
Published: 1994-01-02T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 12

The rustling of the bedclothes awakened him, but Lynley kept his eyes shut for a moment.

He listened to her breathing. How odd, he thought, that he should find joy in such an unadorned thing.

He turned on his side to face her, carefully so that he shouldn’t wake her. But she was awake already, lying on her back with one leg drawn up and her eyes studying the acanthus leaves that looped in plaster across the ceiling.

He found her hand beneath the covers and locked her fingers in his. She glanced at him, and he saw that a small vertical line had formed between her eyebrows. With his other hand, he smoothed it away.

“I’ve realised,” she said.

“What?”

“You diverted me last night, so I never had an answer to my question.”

“As I recall, you diverted me. You promised chicken and artichokes, didn’t you?

Wasn’t that why we trekked down to the kitchen?”

“And it was in the kitchen that I asked you, wasn’t it? But you never answered.”

“I was occupied. You occupied me.”

A smile feathered her mouth. “Hardly,”

she said.

He laughed quietly. He leaned over to kiss her. He traced the curve of her ear where her hair fell away.

“Why do you love me?” she asked.

“What?”

“That was the question I asked you last night. Don’t you remember?”

“Ah. That question.” He rolled onto his back and joined her in looking at the ceiling.

He held her hand against his chest and considered the elusive why of loving.

“I can’t match you in either education or experience,” she pointed out. He lifted a doubting eyebrow. She smiled fleetingly. “All right. I can’t match you in education. I have no career. I’m not even gainfully employed. I have no wifely skills and fewer wifely aspirations. I’m very nearly frivolity personified.

Our backgrounds are similar, if it comes to that, but what does similarity in background have to do with giving your heart to another?”

“It had everything to do with marriage at one time.”

“We’re not talking about marriage. We’re talking about love. More often than not, those two are mutually exclusive and entirely different subjects. Catherine of Aragon and Henry VIII were married and look what happened to them. She had his babies and got to make his shirts. He catted round and used up six wives.

So much for similarity in background.”

Lynley yawned. “What else could she expect, marrying a Tudor? Richmond’s own son. She was establishing a genealogical link to primeval slime. Cowardly. Penurious. Murderous. Politically paranoid. And with damned good reason for the latter.”

“Oh dear. We’re not heading towards the line of succession and the Princes in the Tower, are we, darling? That takes us somewhat off the track.”

“Sorry.” Lynley raised her hand and kissed her fingers. “Get me anywhere close to Henry Tudor and I become a bit rabid.”

“It’s a very good way to avoid the question.”

“I wasn’t avoiding. Merely temporising while I thought.”

“And? Why? Why do you love me? Because if you can’t either explain or define love, perhaps it’s better to admit that real love doesn’t exist in the first place.

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