THE BRIDE AND THE BEAST - TERESA MEDEIROS by The Bride & the Beast

Author:The Bride & the Beast [Bride, The & Beast, the]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2011-01-16T17:22:15.354000+00:00

Chapter Fifteen

"GOD'S FORESKIN!" Izzy bellowed, slamming a basin heaped with soiled nightshirts down on the kitchen table.

Kitty flinched and Glynnis snatched her breakfast of stale sugar biscuits and tea out of the path of the grimy water that came sloshing over the basin's edge. The hound napping on the hearth took one look at the maidservant's thundercloud of a brow and bolted from the room.

Kitty and Glynnis exchanged apprehensive glances, but wisely held their tongues as Izzy dumped the contents of the basin into a large iron kettle that was already steaming on the grate. Still cursing beneath her breath, she grabbed a wooden spoon and began to stir the laundry, looking like a wild-eyed witch brewing up a batch of toil and trouble.

Nessa came drifting into the kitchen, her eyes swollen and bleary from lack of sleep even though it was after ten in the morning. "For heaven's sake, Izzy, must you bellow and bang so? It's enough to wake the dead."

"The dead p'r'aps, but not ye." Izzy removed the spoon from the water long enough to shake it at her. "And I've every right to bellow and bang. I was up at dawn when ye and Kitty were just creepin' in after dallyin'' all night with the menfolk."

Kitty blushed while Nessa sank into a chair and stretched, taking advantage of the graceful motion to steal a biscuit from Glynnis's plate. "Since Lachlan is the only lad I'm interested in at the moment, that would be manfolk."

The maidservant rolled her eyes. "One man at a time, maybe. But there's always another one right behind him."

"Unlike Nessa," Glynnis pointed out, "I can be quite loyal. I never once strayed from the beds of either of my husbands."

"That's most likely what killed 'em," Izzy said. "Two puir auld men tryin' to do the job of a dozen strappin' lads."

While Nessa cackled with laughter, Glynnis sniffed and bit off a dainty piece of the biscuit. "Perhaps I should have taken my breakfast in one of my own cottages, Izzy. There's simply no point in trying to make polite conversation with you when you're in such a foul temper."

Izzy jabbed her spoon at the wall. "Ye'd be in a foul temper, too, young missie, if ye were locked in this manor day and night with that daft father of yers. I don't see how yer puir sister bore it all those years. If I were her, I'd've begged the Dragon to eat me!"

They shared a moment of somber silence in honor of Gwendolyn before Kitty said softly, "Papa mistook me for Mama yesterday. He kept clutching at my skirts and begging me to forgive him."

"As well he should," Izzy snapped, "since it was his own greed that killed the puir creature."

All three girls turned to stare at Izzy, having never heard such a thing pass the maidservant's lips before. For an elusive moment, her florid face seemed to be flushed by more than just the heat of the fire.

She averted her gaze, poking at the laundry with renewed violence.

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