For a moment Jack thought his heart had stopped beating. ‘What?’ he asked. His smile died. His mind turned his thoughts into somersaults. ‘Why would you want to go there?’ he cried. ‘Unless...unless –’ The truth slapped him: so she was Lancastrian!
She tightened her grip on his hands and as she closed her eyes, Jack saw tears begin to bead on her fluttering lashes. ‘I’m sorry,’ she murmured. ‘I had no choice, Jack.’
Sweet Jesu! What a fool he was! Jack snatched his hands from hers and stood up. She was Lancastrian and he’d brought her half way across England! Christ’s wounds, he was ten times a fool!
‘Look at me, Jack,’ she commanded. ‘Do I look like an enemy to you? Will I bring down castle walls or steal the crown of England from Edward’s head?’
Jack barely heard her. He ran his hands through his hair as he began to pace the space beneath the altar steps. God’s teeth, Will Kennerley would not believe this. And worse still – what would the Earl of Warwick think of him if he knew? This was a disaster! John Neville would hang him for certain if he knew he'd harboured a Lancastrian spy in their midst!
But she hadn’t finished. ‘Jack, answer me!’ she pleaded. ‘I am just like you. Like you I cannot change my birth!’
Jack looked at her again. Tears slid along her soft cheeks and her wide eyes glistened with more of them. He wanted to wipe them away; tell her not to cry, but how could he? By God's Holy blood, she could be the death of him!
