Outrageous by Christina Dodd Page A

affront to his honor, he retorted, “I would hope so.”
    “I shouldn’t have hit you, no matter how insulting you were. But when you insulted the lady Elizabeth’s integrity—”
    “Wait. Wait.” He held up one hand. “Do you mean you apologize, not for the slur on my own integrity, but for hitting me?”
    Looking him full in the eyes, she answered sharply, “Only a fool would depend on a man’s integrity.”
    “What kind of men have you known?” But she tilted her head, honestly puzzled by his outrage. Disgusted—not with her, but with the men who’d taught her such values—he gestured to her. “Lead on.”
    As she led them to the end of the hall, Griffith heard Art chortle behind him, and the old man’s whisper floated to his ears. “She’ll be a tough nut to crack. Mayhap ye should give up before ye’ve started.”
    Brow puckered, Marian glanced back to verify their presence…or was it because she’d heard Art? Griffith hunched his shoulders, stepped between them, and glowered at her.
    “Don’t you ever smile?” she asked, as if goaded by his ill humor. She didn’t wait for a reply but plucked a candle from its stand. Showing no respect for the earl’s possession, she placed it on a gold-and-colored-glass wall plate and opened a tiny door hidden in the paneling. Griffith had to duck to enter, almost tumbled down four narrow steps, and found himself at the bottom of a winding stair.
    “The tower,” he said, paying Marian a grudging respect. “Aye, I can see even Wenthaven would have difficulty placing a spy here.”
    She smiled, but her mouth was lopsided and she seemed to be uncomfortable. “Wenthaven doesn’t ever come here.” Moonlight shone through thin arrow slits, providing feeble help for the candle. She lifted it high, but Griffith could see only ablack tunnel above. Beneath the stairs, the floor tumbled in a rough pattern of paving stone and boards.
    “This is the old part of the castle.” She looked up and around. “Even the rock feels ancient to me.”
    “Aye.” Art took a deep breath. “Smells like the old times.”
    She flashed him a smile, and her boots clapped against the stone as she leaped up the stairs two at a time.
    “Impulsive,” Griffith muttered, but he followed just as swiftly. To guard her steps, he told himself, for no rail protected her from a fall, but he took the chance to study the undulating bottom and legs before him. It was a new perspective, and while a woman in hose should disgust him, he found it only piqued an already reluctantly whetted appetite. The strength of her calves, the smooth movement of muscles working to get her up the stairs, entranced him, made him dizzy, and when she stopped abruptly on the top landing, he skidded back a step and banged his knee.
    She caught at his arm as if he were an old man. “Are you ill?”
    “No!” Rubbing his new bruise, glaring at the cackling Art, he demanded, “Where is this room?”
    “Here.” She flung open a door he’d not previously noticed and waved the candle. “Go on.”
    He stepped inside and smelled dust. She followed him, raised the light, and he saw elegance—and melancholy. At the very center of the round room rose a dais. Perched thereon stood a carved wood bed shrouded in brocade curtains. Tapestries alive with scenes of long-ago hunts, battles, and domesticity hung on the stone walls. An immense fireplace gaped, hungering for fuel, for light, for warmth. Chests and cupboards, placed by an artistic hand, waited to be filled. Chairs ached to embrace a human form.
    “This is no room for a guest,” he objected. “This is—”
    Marian chuckled, and the sound drifted on a current of air. At once the room seemed brighter, happier. “Wenthaven’s countess used this room.”
    “If that’s meant to reassure me,” he said sternly, “it does not.”
    “They tell me she liked to be above the hubbub of the castle guests.” Placing the candle beside the bed, she whacked the curtains.