Another warm smile soaked through her. “My, my, your flattery grows more eloquent with each passing day!”
“That is because I cannot possibly adore you enough,” he said with a smiling bow. “Casual words are increasingly insufficient to describe my esteem for you, so I must improve my thoughts and speech to capture your lovely essence.”
“That’s really very lovely,” Kate said with a coltish tap of her umbrella against his boot. “But I confess to being quite in the dark as to the true motives behind such eloquence, my lord.”
“My lord, my lord . . .” He sighed wearily. “When will you take leave to call me by my given name, Kate? I shall remind you once again that it is Darien, the name of my grandfather, and his father before him. As to my motive, I think you have deduced it quite accurately—it is simply to hear my name on your breath as I make you succumb to pleasure.” He gave her an easy, roguishly charming smile.
A blush spread rapidly across her cheeks. It was strange, she thought, how this sensual banter between them never failed to both appall and appeal to her. Certainly Richard had never spoken to her in this way. She was glad of it. Richard had not been as . . . exciting . . . or dangerous . . . as Lord Montgomery.
Kate leaned forward onto her umbrella so that she was only inches from him, and tilted her face up to his. “You shall hear that name on my breath, Darien, when I accuse you once again of being a roué.”
“Ah,” he breathed, and clapped a hand over his heart, closed his eyes, and laid back his head. “ ’Tis as sweet as I’ve imagined.” With a chuckle, he lifted his head and held out his hand to her, smiling broadly. “Yet there is so much more I’ve dared to imagine. Come with me now, Kate.”
“Come with you?” She laughed. “Are you mad, sir?”
“Yes, quite. Mad with thoughts of you, constant and unabashed thoughts of you and your shimmering green eyes and creamy skin and golden-red hair. Come with me, Kate—I’m so bloody mad that I’ve arranged a picnic, in your honor, just for you.”
“A picnic? Today?” she cried, and laughed again. “Have you not noticed, my lord, that the skies are pouring rain?”
“I hardly notice the earth or the sun or the moon in your presence, Kate. You overshadow them all.”
That prompted a hearty laugh from her that had him smiling. “I could never fault you for being less than poetic in your persistence, but you know very well that I cannot possibly attend a picnic with you!”
“Why not?” he demanded, leaning forward on his umbrella, so that she could not miss the shimmer in his eyes, nose to nose as they were.
“I’ve explained, have I not?” Kate demanded, poking him in the chest with her finger. “Very well, then, I shall endeavor to explain it all again. It would be unseemly of me to go off with you, a confirmed bachelor, without escort. Can you not imagine what the parishioners might think?”
“I have not a care for what they might think,” he insisted sternly. “I have often been the subject of wretched speculation. Just this week, I have heard tell that I intend to offer very soon for a debutante, can you imagine? Yet I give it not a thought, for I know what is in my heart, Kate. There is no debutante, there is you, only you, and has been you since almost the moment I laid eyes on you, there in the church, beneath the organ pipes, looking quite angelic.”
Kate knew better than to allow flattery to seduce her, but how could she help the butterflies that winged in her belly when he spoke to her so earnestly, his dark brown eyes glowing deeply? “You may not have a care, sir, but I do. And what of my father? Have you a care for what he believes?”
“Where is he, then?” Montgomery demanded. “I shall at once beg his leave that you may accompany me to a picnic!”
With a laugh for his bravado, Kate playfully pushed him back. “He’s resting! And I shan’t wake him for your amusement.”
“Ah, there, you see?” he asked, grabbing her hand and holding it tightly in his, bringing her knuckles to his warm lips. “It is our good fortune to be blessed with such a dreary spring day, while your father rests and the parishioners sit about their drawing rooms, moping,” he said with a wink. “Fate is smiling on you, Kate. Don’t be so foolish as to turn your back on it.”
“And now you would have me believe it is fate?”
He pressed her hand against his chest, covering it with his big hand, and the smile faded from his face. “I certainly do. I say this not to amuse you but to convey nothing but the utmost respect and adoration that I have come to hold for you. I only want to be with you, Kate. Rather, I must be with you, or I will truly go mad. Say yes, say you will spare this poor man’s heart. Come with me.”
There was something in his voice that rang true; she forced herself to drag her gaze from him and look about. Fortunately, as the guest house was stuck in the corner of the vicar’s Mayfair estate, no one could see them, save her father and their man William, were he of a mind to look out the window.
“You mustn’t fret about prying eyes. I’ve taken care of everything.”
“What do you mean? And how can you possibly intend to picnic in this rain?”
A grin, boyish and pleasing, turned the corners of his mouth. “You must come with me to have your answer. I promise a picnic for you, a perfect setting and fit for a princess, if I do say so myself,” he said, bowing slightly. “Come with me, Kate,” he urged, stepping backward now and tugging her along.
Come with me, Kate. Her heart was beating rapidly, the blood flowing hot through her body. She could not deny the desire she had to be with him, either. The kisses they’d shared had awakened the dead and shriveled-up woman inside her. She felt as if she’d literally come alive these last few weeks, and at the moment, she was feeling her body and her heart push her toward him.
“No one shall ever know; I give you my word,” he vowed.
As much as she wanted to go, as much as she longed to go, she knew what sort of man he was, and she knew very well what a man like him would want with a widow. Hadn’t her father just said as much? And as much as she might want the same, she could not risk her honor. “I scarcely trust a man with your considerable reputation, sir.”
“Aha. Then you have heard me labeled a scoundrel, have you? I will freely confess to being a scoundrel and more, if it pleases you,” he said, with a fetching grin. “It’s all quite true; I will not lie. But that was all before you, Kate. You have my word that I will honor you, as you have my word your honor will be protected always with me.”
When she did not immediately respond, he tugged her closer. “You know I adore you. You know I want you. And if that desire is unrequited, I scarcely care—I will honor your wishes if you will just be with me for the afternoon.” And then he smiled in that devilishly charming way he had, tugging lightly at her hand, and Kate felt herself light up inside like one thousand beeswax candles.