To Kiss A Spy Read Free

forward slightly to get a better look and was suddenly blinded as a pair of hands came over her shoulders to cover her eyes.
    Even as she started she knew to whom they belonged, and a delighted cry broke from her as she wrenched the hands away and spun around. “Robin! You scared me!”
    “No, I didn’t. Of course you knew it was me.” Her stepbrother grinned at her, his brilliant blue eyes alight with pleasure at seeing her. He was a stocky man, square built, with a shock of springy nut-brown curls on which his velvet cap perched somewhat insecurely. His dress was rich and yet somehow awry. Pen automatically reached to brush a piece of fluff from his doublet, and while she was about it resituated the jeweled brooch he wore in the lace at his throat.
    “Where have you been? I haven’t seen you in weeks,” she asked, kissing him soundly.
    “Oh, out and about,” he responded. “Out of town, anyway.”
    Pen regarded him shrewdly. Robin would never disclose whatever it was that took him away for these long absences but she had a fair idea. Her own years in the devious world of the court had taught her that very little was as it seemed. “On the duke’s business?” she asked in a neutral tone.
    He shrugged and changed the subject. “What are you doing all alone up here?” He peered over the gallery rail.
    Pen’s eyes followed his. Her mother-in-law was still at the princess’s side, and now she saw Miles Bryanston and his wife at a card table at the far side of the hall, their large faces glistening in the heat. They would be occupied all evening.
    “I felt the need for some quiet,” she said. “It’s so noisy down there and so
hot
.”
    “It’s hot up here,” Robin pointed out, looking at her closely.
    Pen shrugged. “I’ll go down again in a minute. I have need of a privy and, as I recall, there’s a commode behind the arras in the passage behind the gallery. You go down and I’ll find you. I want to hear all your news.”
    She smiled, hoping to convince him, trying not to think about precious time wasting, trying not to look down to check on her mother-in-law’s whereabouts. Robin, in company with the rest of her family, worried about her obsession, and if he thought she was following its impulses again he would certainly try to prevent her.
    Robin hesitated. They had known each other for sixteen years. When they had first met they had been smitten with each other, caught in the pangs of first love. Then their parents had married and in the hurly-burly of family life, that first love had become a deep, abiding, loving friendship. Robin thought he knew his stepsister better than anyone, better even than her mother or her younger sister Pippa.
    And he knew she was not being honest with him.
    “What’s the matter?” Pen demanded. “Why would a need for the privy cause you to look at me like that?” She laughed at him.
    Robin shook his head. “I’ll see you in a few minutes.” He turned to walk away, and Pen set off in the opposite direction. As soon as she had disappeared at the end of the gallery Robin followed her, soft-footed despite his stocky build. He turned into the narrow corridor behind the gallery and saw her ahead of him, hurrying as she might well do if she were in genuine need of the commode. Halfway along she twitched aside an arras and disappeared.
    He frowned, pulling at his unruly beard. Perhaps he’d been wrong and she had been telling the truth. He turned and retraced his steps down to the great hall.
    From behind the arras, Pen watched him depart. She’d been certain he’d follow to check up on her. She knew Robin at least as well as he knew her. When the coast was clear, she slipped out into the corridor and hurried towards the chamber that served the Bryanston family as both office and library. The only member of the family who had delighted in stocking the library had been Philip. Pen’s derisive grimace was automatic and unconscious. The present Earl of Bryanston was