The Courtship (Sherbrooke Brides 5)

“Depending on your momentum, you might well have smashed me flat.”

“Oh, dear, I hadn’t thought about that. I might have driven you right into the ground, like a stake, or broken your ribs. Ah, but then I would have knelt beside you and held your hand until you managed to get your wits together again. It would have been just fine. You would have smiled up at me and lifted your hand, weakly, to touch my cheek. Yes, that forms a pleasant picture in the mind.”

“Only your end result. I would have deplored the process. Men do not like to be weak, Miss Mayberry, ever.”

Alexandra cleared her throat. “I know you are much enjoying yourselves, but I must tell you, Spenser, that Douglas grows livid whenever Helen talks about meeting you. He rants, Spenser. He insults you. He grinds his teeth. He ordered Helen to steer a wide berth.”

Helen laughed. “Douglas fears for my virtue with you in the vicinity, Lord Beecham.”

It was very warm in the middle of the afternoon. There would be no need for a fire in his bedchamber even with the both of them naked. He mentally put his mouth and his hands on her. He rose and held out his hand to her. “Well, then, to spare Douglas’s teeth, I will simply remove Miss Mayberry from the premises before he returns home.”

“Where would you remove me to, Lord Beecham?”

“To Gunther’s. For an ice.”

He had never seen a woman glow so much in his life.

“That would be wonderful. It is my favorite treat since I came to London. How ever did you know?”

Lord Beecham looked over at Alexandra, who was looking just a bit shell-shocked. “Tell her, Alexandra, that I am a man of vast and varied experience. I have the gift of looking at a woman and clearly reading her deepest desires.”

“Perhaps that is true,” Alexandra said as she bit into a mince clapper. “However, I did not know you could guess as deep as Helen’s endless desire for Gunther’s ices.”

“Now you do.” He was still holding out his hand to Miss Mayberry. “Shall we?”

Helen winked at Alexandra even as she closed her hand over his forearm. “Tell Douglas I have succeeded.”

“What was that all about?” Lord Beecham asked as Mankin opened the front door for them and then bowed very low. Sunlight streamed through the doorway and glittered off his bald head.

Unfortunately, neither Lord Beecham nor Miss Mayberry noticed.

“How have you succeeded? By meeting me? Surely that would not require you running me down in the park.”

“Are you acquainted with Gray St. Cyre, Baron Cliffe?”

“Certainly. What of him?”

“He got himself wedded not too long ago.”

“Yes, I know. What about him?”

“He and his bride happened to be near my inn after Jack had escaped from Arthur Kilburn. Unfortunately, Gray had gotten himself thrown and cracked his head against an oak tree.”

“You own an inn?”

“Yes. It’s called King Edward’s Lamp. It is the premier inn in Court Hammering, a market town an hour or so northeast of London.”

“Arthur had kidnapped Gray’s bride? I had not heard of this. Her name is Jack?”

“That’s right. In any case, once we resolved everything, my father and I came back to London to attend their wedding. It was quite charming, really, and quite small and private, and so you weren’t there. I saw Douglas again.”

“And you were infatuated with Douglas when you were fifteen,” he said, staring at her, his fascination growing by the word. He forgot for a moment that he wanted to bed her by two o’clock in the afternoon.

This afternoon. No later than three.

“So you were the man who overheard Alexandra and me talking in the Sanderling’s library.”

“Oh, yes. Discipline is a subject that is dear to my heart.”