“I have no notion but will trust your word.”
“You may ride with me.” Again, he spoke before logic intervened. “Purely out of concern for the horses, you understand. Besides, we will be there and back within twenty minutes.”
The corners of her mouth curled into a smile. She glanced at the closed curtains. “It’s dark out.”
“You may hold the lantern.”
She needed no further inducement. “Very well. I shall find your butler and fetch my cloak and gloves.”
Good Lord! An adventurous spirit proved highly attractive.
He thought to summon Crudging himself but did not wish to alert the other guests of their plans. He thought to retrieve her cloak but did not wish to leave her alone with Lord Flanders. Instead, Hugo stood and watched Miss Bennett leave the room.
“By Jove,” Flanders said, slapping him on the back. “Once you’ve made the obvious choice of taking Miss Harper for your bride, I was going to comfort Miss Mason-Jones and suggest a possible alliance. But the new arrival has blown everyone’s plans out of the water.” Flanders exhaled. “I mean, have you ever met a woman happy to converse about art and travel?”
“No. Such women are a rarity.”
Miss Bennett had swept into the house and turned everything upside down. Not since his youth had he felt the need to warn a man away from a woman he was pursuing. Jealousy roused the devil inside. Possessiveness flowed like blood in his veins.
He glanced at Miss Harper, whose beady gaze still lingered on the door. “Miss Bennett has certainly made an impression.”
The mile ride to West Chisenbury was not without its hardships. It had nothing to do with cold fingers or navigating the inches of snow covering the lane. It had nothing to do with the constant flurry of snowflakes sticking to one’s lips and lashes. Or the fact the sinking feeling in his stomach meant dinner was long overdue. Miss Bennett struggled to hold the lantern in the blustering wind. She swapped hands, shuffled her bottom against him in the seat. Being a man of experience, a man able to suppress the unexpected effects of desire and bouts of lust, he found himself in a quandary.
“I can hardly see more than a few feet ahead.” Miss Bennett held the lantern aloft although the blizzard threatened to extinguish the flame. She wriggled in the saddle. “It cannot be much further, my lord.”
Hugo suppressed a groan. “No, just around the next bend.” It didn’t help that she sat trapped between his arms, locked in a sort of embrace, or that sometimes the gusts forced her back against his chest. “Would you prefer I hold the lantern and you take the reins?”
“No. You know the road and the horse better than I do.”
Miss Pardue would have accepted the challenge, desperate to prove herself equal to a man. Miss Harper would have snatched the reins, eager to feed her voracious need to take charge. Miss Mason-Jones would have been so lost in a daydream she would not have replied. But Miss Bennett possessed the skill of speaking with authority without stripping a man of his masculinity.
Damnation!
Surely sometime soon the lady would make a ridiculous comment, display an ugly trait to dampen his ardour. At this rate, he’d end up with black toes, as the only warm blood in his body continued to pool in his loins.
“Perhaps Miss Bennett should ride back with me,” Flanders said, nudging his horse forward. “In these harsh conditions, it will be less strain on your mount.”
Like hell!
One wiggle of the lady’s soft buttocks and Flanders would be on his knees professing love.
“Spurius is an Arabian stallion and has carried saddlebags heavier than Miss Bennett.”
“Not in this weather, Denham.”
Hugo firmed his jaw. “I can tell by his gait that your horse will struggle with extra weight in the snow.” It wasn’t a complete lie. “The horse is used to pulling a carriage as part of a team.”
Flanders may well have protested, but they came upon a conveyance at the side of the road. Five inches of snow covered the roof, the box seat and footboard. Snow covered the wheels right up to the hubs. Poor Flanders practically sobbed when he realised it was his coach and not Miss Bennett’s.
“Oh, Lord!” Flanders dismounted. Snow crunched beneath his feet as he clambered towards the vehicle, his boots leaving an ankle-deep trail. “The damp will swell the doors and rot the sills. Help me clear the roof, Denham, before that blasted stuff trickles inside. Watermarks on leather seats are a devil to disguise.”
“Do you have the rope and canvas sheet Hodges gave you?”
“Yes, but I fear it’s too late for that.”
Hugo lowered his voice as he dismounted. “Wait here, Miss Bennett. Flanders will be a blubbering wreck if I do not help him protect his coach.”
“Then I shall help, too.” The lady thrust the lantern at him and had her foot in the stirrup before he could protest. She jumped to the ground and brushed flakes from her cheeks before surveying the scene. “There must be a shovel in the boot. Every coachman worth his weight has a means of freeing the wheels in these conditions.”