because I know women need to rest more often, on account of your delicate constitutions.”
She snorted. “All right, then. Wait here. My delicate constitution and I will be back soon.” She bent to remove her boots. Edward tried not to ogle her shapely feminine ankles (a sight that would have been indecent in the royal court, as a woman’s ankles were considered scandalously provocative at this time), but he couldn’t help staring.
She had lovely ankles, he thought. Very nice.
Gracie glanced up like she’d felt his gaze. “Would you like to paint my portrait, Sire? It will last longer.”
He flushed and looked away, which was a good thing, because then she turned her back to him and quickly removed the rest of her clothes and was therefore completely naked for all of three seconds, which he just caught a glimpse of in his peripheral vision before a light flashed, and where Gracie had been standing there was a small red fox, complete with pointed ears, whiskers, and a bushy, white-tipped tail.
Yes, Gracie was a fox. No, really. She was. Literally. (We know. It’s too good.)
The fox slipped away into the underbrush, silent as a shadow.
Darkness fell. He watched the stars come out. The rain had finally stopped, and a gentle breeze was blowing, cooling his face. An owl hooted from somewhere in the trees. It was a beautiful night. The kind of night that makes you pensive. And Edward was alone.
It should be mentioned that Edward wasn’t accustomed to being alone. In his life before, it’d been exceedingly rare for him to have even fifteen minutes to himself. He’d been the glorious sun with an orbit of men revolving constantly about him. Men to watch that when he ate he did not choke. Men to help him onto his horse. Men to teach him Latin. Men to comb his hair. Men to refill his glass when it was empty, which it never was, because he had men to fill it. Even while he slept there’d been men standing just outside his door to guard him.
And now here he was, completely alone. He found this situation both euphoric (he could scratch himself and no one was looking; no one was judging him—no one!) and unsettling. (What if he choked?)
Edward could have used this time to think about many things: to consider his next move in finding Helmsley and his grandmother and a cure for the poison, to reflect on the nature of trust and betrayal and how hard it was even as king to find good, reliable help these days, to plot a way to regain his kingdom, or at the very least to worry about how his little cousin Jane was doing at that very moment, facing down Mary’s army. But Edward didn’t think about any of that.
He thought about Gracie. How she was a fox (but Edward was not aware of this little irony, as to our knowledge the term fox, used to convey the attractiveness of a woman, was not invented until Jimi Hendrix sang “Foxy Lady” in 1967). How she was, undoubtedly, a thief (but it was all too clear to Edward that although Gracie was definitely a criminal, there was nothing common about her). And how he very much wanted to kiss her.
This last part he found astounding. Gracie was the least appropriate girl in the world for him to receive his first kiss from; he knew that. He was the King of England. She was a Scottish pickpocket. But still, impractically, impossibly, he wanted to kiss her.
She was the one, he’d decided. The lucky girl he was going to kiss.
Now all he had to figure out was how to make said kiss happen.
Usually, when Edward wanted something, he simply had to ask for it. He had no doubt that back at court, if he’d wanted a woman to kiss him, all he would have had to do is say, Lady Suchandsuch, I wish you to come over here right now and press your lips to mine, and his wish would have literally been her command. He wouldn’t have even had to say please.
But this was different. First off, as Gracie had so generously pointed out, he wasn’t much of a king around here. Secondly, if he came right out and asked Gracie to kiss him, he had a feeling that she would laugh in his face. And thirdly, he didn’t just want to kiss Gracie. He wanted her to want him to kiss her.