She looked over to him in surprise. She must have expected him to ask, How can you say such a thing, when you have me? Her nod showed a certain admiration, as if he'd made an unusual, thought-provoking move in a game of chess. Since he'd mentioned her keeper, she had to answer. And she did, with a toss of the head that sent her curls flying in pretty disarray. "Don Alejandro doesn't understand me," she said-an old gambit, but always a good one. "He's rich, he's important, but he has no idea what a woman wants."
Lope was neither rich nor important, and doubted he ever would be. As for the other. Slowly, he raised Catalina's hand to his lips. "What could a woman want," he murmured, "but to be adored?"
That was an old line, too. It didn't work precisely as he'd hoped. "Don Alejandro is the stingiest man in the world," Catalina went on, "and he doesn't give me presents or take me dancing or even"-she seemed to be reminding herself-"out on nice little picnics like this."
"Well," Lope said, "that is a pity." All at once, he began to wonder whether taking her on this nice little picnic had been such a good idea. She was beautiful, yes, undoubtedly, but was she any less mercenary than a scarred German soldier who sold his sword to the highest bidder and walked away if his pay fell in arrears?
Catalina seemed to realize she might have shown a card or two too many. She swayed towards him with melting eyes and said, "I'm so glad to go out anywhere at all, so very glad." She leaned closer yet.
To kiss her was the work of a moment. Altogether without thought, Lope did. Had he thought, he might have wondered who was doing what with whom, and for which reasons. But he'd never been in the habit of thinking around women. He'd hardly even imagined the possibility till his chance meeting with the odd Englishwoman with the cat. And so he kissed Catalina IbaA±ez, and things went on from there.
She sighed, deep in her throat, and twisted to press herself against him. "Ah, querido," she murmured when their lips parted at last. "You don't know how long I've wanted to do that."
"And I," Lope said. "Oh, yes, by God, and I." He kissed her again. Her mouth tasted of wine, but sweeter still.
Except for the twittering birds, they were all alone. The willow branches hung down almost to the ground, shielding them from prying eyes. The grass under the taffeta coverlet was long and soft and resilient.
Catalina slapped Lope's hands away a couple of times as he began to explore her, but it was only for show, and they both knew it. She giggled when he nibbled the side of her smooth white neck. The giggle turned to a soft, almost breathless sigh as he slid down so his tongue could tease a nipple.
She sighed again, not very much later, when he poised himself above her and thrust home, as if with the rapier. Her thighs clasped his flanks. Her arms squeezed him as if she never wanted to let him go. English summer, he discovered, was more than warm enough to work up a pleasant sweat, provided one found the right company.
"Oh, Lope!" Catalina gasped, just before his moment of joy. Then she let out a little mewling cry that oddly made him think of Mommet, Cicely Sellis' cat, even though he'd never heard Mommet make a sound. Her nails, sharp as little daggers, scored his back. He drove deep and spent himself.
Her mouth twisted in regret when he pulled out of her. But she quickly started putting herself to rights. De Vega got dressed, too. He reached out to pat her bare backside as she pulled up her drawers. "Even more than I imagined," he told her.
"Imagined?" She raised a hand to her face, as if to hide a blush, as if to say she couldn't imagine a man hungrily imagining making love to her.
"It was all I could do," he said. "It was. But no more." Had he been a few years younger, he would have laid her down on the taffeta coverlet and taken her again then and there. He sighed for lost youth. There would be other chances, though, and soon. And he would be seeing Lucy Watkins again before long. It wasn't as if he'd fallen out of love with her when he fell in love with Catalina IbaA±ez.
And what might that Englishwoman with the cat be like between the sheets? Lope hadn't thought about finding a lover older than himself since he was eighteen. For that one, he thought he would make an exception.
"We had better get you back," he said to Catalina, shaking his mind free of the women he wasn't with.
He gave the woman he was with a quick kiss. "I don't believe I ever enjoyed a picnic more."
"Ishould hope not." She drew herself up with touchy pride. Oh, yes-this one is all ice and fire, Lope thought. Never a dull moment with her around. He put the cork back in the wine bottle. He'd brought along a loaf of bread and a pot of honey, too. Honey and bread remained untouched. He smiled as he bundled them into the coverlet. I tasted better sweets than honey today.
Hand in hand, he and Catalina walked through the ankle-high grass of the yard no King of Scotland was likely to visit any time soon, towards the gate by which they'd come in. They'd gone about halfway from the willow grove when the gate opened. A tall, broad-shouldered man walked into the yard and strode purposefully towards them.
" Ay, madre de Dios! " Catalina Ibanez yelped. She dropped Lope's hand as if it were on fire. Under her paint, her face went white as milk. "It's Don Alejandro!"
Lope let the coverlet fall to the grass. The wine bottle clanked against the honey pot. He hoped they didn't break, but that was the least of his worries right now. His right hand fell to the hilt of his rapier.
He'd worn it as much for swank as on the off chance of trouble. Without it, he'd be a dead man now.
I may be a dead man anyhow. Don Alejandro went from purposeful walk to thudding trot. His rapier leaped free of its sheath. The long, slim, deadly blade glittered in the sun. "De Vega!" the nobleman bellowed. "Ten thousand demons from hell, de Vega, what are you doing with my woman?"
Had de Recalde come in a few minutes earlier, he would have seen for himself what Lope was doing. By Catalina's delighted response, the nobleman would have learned something, too. This seemed neither time nor place for that discussion. Lope
drew his own sword. But he gave as mild an answer as he could:
"Talking about the theatre."
"Liar! Dog! Son of a dog!" Don Alejandro shouted, and roared down on him like an avalanche. Steel clattered from steel. Sparks flew. Catalina screamed. "Shut up, you little puta!" Don Alejandro shouted.
"You're next!"
His first long, abrupt thrust almost pierced Lope's heart; de Vega barely managed to beat the blow aside.
He couldn't counter. Fast as a striking serpent, Don Alejandro thrust for his belly. Only a hasty backwards leap saved him from owning a second navel. And any puncture a couple of inches deep probably meant death, either from bleeding or, more slowly and painfully, from fever.
Don Alejandro de Recalde was a picture fencer, with a style as pure as any Lope had ever seen. He kept his blade in front of his body and poised to strike at every moment, and he was quick and strong.
He might have stepped out of a swordmaster's school and straight into the King of Scotland's yard. For their first few exchanges, Lope wondered how he could possibly come through the fight alive. And then, as he managed a thrust at Don Alejandro's belly and the nobleman beat his blade aside with a perfect parry, he suddenly smiled a most unpleasant smile.
His next thrust wasn't at Don Alejandro's midriff-it was at his face. Catalina's keeper turned that one, too, but not so elegantly, and he jerked his head back in a way no fencing master would have approved.
Lope's smile grew wider and nastier. "Don't do a lot of real righting, you say?" he panted.
"I say nothing to you, de Vega," de Recalde snarled, and bored in again. "Nothing!" Clang! Clang!