Selfish Is the Heart Read online

  “Mistress, my knowledge of herbs is limited,” Cassian told her, though he had a guess as to why she would request his presence. “I’m not sure what I could offer your students.”

  Serenity smiled. “The trefoil’s properties are threefold, and many believe they’re tied to the blessings of the Holy Family. If you would be so kind as to come and speak to my class—they’re all first seasons, by the way, I’ve traded with Patience—about the comparisons between the story and the flower. I think they would find it most enlightening.”

  Cassian gave a quick look around the hall and found it empty, then allowed his gaze to slide over Serenity’s familiar features. He liked her. Had known her for longer than he’d been here at the Order. An accident had left her right leg scarred and stiff; her limp had made it unlikely she’d ever be sent to serve a patron. Most patrons were men, after all, and no matter what any might say, men were all too often first concerned with appearance.

  “And you would have me speak to your students on the lessons they’ll eventually learn in my own class if they’re unfamiliar with it already?”

  Serenity ducked her head with a laugh. “I must confess my patience with these first-season novitiates is wearing thin, unlike that of my Sister.”

  “She is aptly named,” Cassian said.

  “She is, indeed. And perhaps they will attend to the lesson better should it come from your lips than mine. At least in this instance. And I grow weary of them, I admit that as well. I could use a bit of a break from attempting to force knowledge into their heads.”

  Cassian tried not to laugh, but Serenity knew him too well to believe his frown. “Why did you trade?”

  “Because after five years of teaching the same lessons without cease, my Sister and I have both grown . . . overaccustomed to our roles. We thought a trade of duties might enliven our circumstances.”

  It was the first time Cassian had ever heard Serenity even hint at dismay over her role as constant teacher instead of being sent out to serve patrons.

  “And you’ve not found it to be so?”

  “Indeed,” Serenity said, “I have not. Please, Cassian. Come speak to my class and tell them the story, that I might have a rest from their constant prattling.”

  “And you believe they’ll hold their tongues for my instruction?” Cassian shook his head. “Am I so formidable?”

  “I have witnessed for myself your ability to strike women into dumbness.” Serenity raised a brow. “And it is not always because of your temper.”

  Cassian’s smile faded. He put a hand over his heart, made a formal half bow. “I regret I am unable to attend your class this morn, mistress.”

  “Cassian—”

  But he was already stepping back, his back turned. His boots thudded on the wooden planks as he went down the hall toward the stairs. He did not look back.

  Once in his own classroom, he closed the door and leaned against it, head bowed. Serenity, of all the Sisters-in-Service, might possibly be considered more than a colleague, but a friend. She, of all of them, knew the depth and breadth of his tale, for she’d been there for its entirety.

  She wasn’t wrong about his temper, which was both formidable and famous. That she could tease him about it said much of her fondness for him. He had behaved badly.

  But he must. Respect, mutual kindness, even fear he could tolerate. Perhaps fear he would even encourage. But fondness and compassion he could not abide.

  They were dangerous to him, and would remain ever so.

  Jacquin. Enough.” Annalise pushed him from her.

  “I swear to you, I can make this work.”

  “I want you to stop.”

  Jacquin retreated, frowning, his mouth wet and swollen from kisses. Her own mouth felt swollen, too. Sore, in fact.

  She sighed. Jacquin, who had spent the better part of the past two chimes attempting to convince her there should be no obstacle to their marriage, echoed the sigh. Over her head he drew in a breath of herb from the bowl she’d declined moments before. The fragrant smoke tickled her nostrils, and Annalise shifted on the settee to lean against its opposite arm. Watching him, she put her feet up and into his lap.

  “They ache,” she explained. “Pinch-toed slippers.”

  “Ah.” Jacquin set the bowl onto the side table and worked her toes with his strong fingers.

  She winced when he rubbed the soles. “My sister’s doing. I told her my feet are too broad for pointed toes, but she insisted.”

  “Your sister is such a fancy slut.”

  Annalise barked laughter and nudged him with her foot. “Hush, Jacquin. My father would have you slaughtered if he knew you were here in my bedchamber sampling my sweets before the wedding.”

  “He would not, and you know it. You’re far past the age anyone could expect an intact virtue.”

  Annalise nudged him again, though what he said was true and she’d certainly dispensed with her virtue a long time past. “Sirrah!”

  “And far too beautiful,” Jacquin added gallantly. He lifted her foot to his mouth and kissed the toes. “But I shall remain ever so silent if it causes you to rethink your answer.”

  “It’s still no,” she said.

  With another sigh Jacquin put her feet from his lap, grabbed up the bowl, and got off the settee. With his hair unbound and falling in thick, golden sheaves over his shoulders, his body trim and lean, he cut a fine picture Annalise had no trouble admiring as he paced. She particularly enjoyed his long thighs and the sculpted mounds of his buttocks.

  “Stop staring at my arse.” He actually sounded irritable as he looked at her over his shoulder. “It’s unseemly since you are so insistent upon denying me your hand in marriage.”

  “Jacquin, sweet, my love. My darling. You must admit I’m right. It would leave us both terribly unhappy.”

  “Don’t coo at me as though I were some simpleton to be put off with a handshake.”

  He was truly upset. Annalise rose from the settee and slipped into a spidersilk robe, belting it at her waist before pursuing him. She put a hand on his shoulder and he turned, his mouth drawn into a frown.

  He punched a fist into his palm. “I must marry. I must have an heir some day. I must have a wife to stand beside me.”

  “Why take a wife when a chatelaine and a good household staff could do the job as well and you’d not be beholden to her?”

  “A wife lends ever so much grander an appearance than a slew of servants,” Jacquin said dryly.

  Annalise shrugged. “I adore you, Jacquin. You know that. You’ve long been my best companion. It seemed natural enough that we should marry. It seemed right when our parents proposed it.”

  Jacquin turned and took both her hands. “So, what has changed? Surely not the sight of me with that lad. I told you, he meant nothing. And as for the rest . . . I blame the worm and herb. I shouldn’t have so indulged before making love to you . . . I swear to you, Annalise, I am capable.”

  “Capable, perhaps, but do you desire me?”

  His gaze faltered a little at that. “I do desire to marry you.”

  Annalise looked at the settee, and the bed, the blankets rumpled from their efforts. “I would not be enough for you, Jacquin.”

  His mouth worked, but no words came for some long moments. Then he sighed and scraped back the hair from his forehead. The bowl had gone out and he put it aside. His eyes had grown red from the herb and his emotions.

  “Nor,” Annalise added gently, “would you be, for me. I think we’ve proven that.”

  “I told you, that lad meant naught to me. Less than naught.”

  Her fingers tightened, curling over something she no longer held and perhaps never truly had. “But someday, someone would. And what, then? Would you have me be the cuckold?”

  “I would never ask you to keep your affections solely to me, Annalise.”

  “But I would wish to grant them so, to my husband. So, yes, seeing you with your lad is what swayed my mind from the idea that our marri