How to Marry a Duke (A Cinderella Society 2)

Chapter Ten

That night, Meg carried the picnic hamper out into the gardens under the moonlight. She’d taken it from the carriage after they’d arrived and there were only a few biscuits left that would harden if they weren’t eaten. There were also pears, apples, a jar of blackberry compote and a pot of honey kept from a tea tray. She wasn’t likely to go hungry in Dougal’s house, but some habits were simply too ingrained. She wrapped her plaid shawl more securely around her shoulders and curled cross-legged on a marble bench supported by carved fish.

“That bench might be the ugliest thing I’ve ever seen,” Dougal remarked, strolling out of the shadows.

Meg jumped.

“You don’t care for fish?” She asked which was an absurd thing to say to a handsome man in a dark garden at midnight.

“I defy you to find a fish that looks like that anywhere in nature.” His disdain was very nearly ducal. She would have applauded if she’d thought he would take it as a compliment. He wasn’t wearing a coat, nor a vest or a cravat, just a white lawn shirt open at the throat and rough trousers definitely not sent down from a London shop. He looked at ease in simple clothes and shadows, in a way she had never seen him. She couldn’t take her eyes off of him.

“You may have a point.” She forced herself to focus on the cold bench beneath her and not on whether or not his thighs would feel as strong as they looked. She stroked a fin that looked like it belonged as a ruffle on a dress hem more than propelling fish through the sea. The stone eyes bulged, slightly cross-eyed. “I like it though. It’s cheerful.”

“Cheerful, is it?” He shook his head, grinning. “If you say so. And if I may so, you might consider spectacles. That fish is clearly bilious.”

“You’ve got the ducal tone down, I see,” she teased, risking it. She liked to think she understood him a bit better now, after so many days in the same house.

He bowed with a flourish. “I’ve been practicing.”

She knew her smile was too bright for the jest, but she couldn’t help but feel a twinge of pride that she was beginning to know him so well.

Not as well as she’d like.

Honestly, when had her inner voice turned so lascivious?

She blamed it entirely on Dougal.

At twenty-eight years old, she’d had a few kisses, a fumble in the dark, all before her uncle had squandered her dowry, of course. The men had all been pleasant enough, the experiences enjoyable. But none stirred that liquid heat in her legs that Dougal did, and she’d barely touched his arm.

“You look far away,” he remarked softly.

She started. “I apologize.”

“Shall I leave you to your thoughts?” He glanced at the basket. “Or your stale biscuits?”

She shook her head. “Of course not. I was merely woolgathering.”

About his thighs. His hands. The line of his shoulder. What it would be like to share a life with him, laughing at ducks and ugly benches.

“You know, there are probably hundreds of fresh pastries in the kitchen right now,” he said, sitting beside her. “You don’t have to settle for crumbly Jumbles.” He glanced at her out of the corner of his eye. “Although, I distinctly remember you telling me that we had eaten them all.”

She grinned. “I lied.”

“Cheeky.” Something about the way he said it and the way he looked at her sent a fierce want prickling through her. With only the moon and flowers for company, she could tell herself, however briefly, that her lack of dowry didn’t matter. Or, more realistically, that this kind of moment need have no future. It might be enough to feel his arms around her again, this time without an audience of a ballroom full of dancers.

She swayed closer, infinitesimally. She might have assumed that he didn’t notice, but his eyes flared, pupils widening subtly. She could smell the soap on his skin, woodsy and plain. Moonlight touched his hair, outlining each strand in silver. It caressed his cheek, the strength of his throat. The house behind him.

The house-breaker behind him.

“Blast and damnation,” she hissed suddenly.

Dougal paused.

“Someone is trying to break into your house,” she informed him.

“What?” He stood abruptly, turning to follow the direction of her infuriated gaze. “A bloody treasure hunter?”

“I don’t think so.”