Marrying Winterborne (The Ravenels 2)

His lips toyed with the rim of her ear. “I was so wild for you, I couldn’t have told you my own name.”

“You don’t think anyone heard us, do you?”

“I think it was no accident that I was given a room far away from the family.”

“Perhaps they were afraid you would snore,” she said lightly, and paused. “Do you snore?”

“I don’t think so. You’ll have to tell me.”

Helen snuggled deeper into his embrace. Sighing, she said, “I can’t be found here in the morning when the maid comes to light the grate. I should go back to my room.”

“No, stay.” His arms tightened. “I’ll wake you early. I never sleep past dawn.”

“Never? Why not?”

Rhys smiled lazily against her neck. “It’s what comes of being raised a grocer’s son. My day started at first light, delivering baskets of orders to families around the neighborhood. If I was fast enough, I could stop for a five-minute game of marbles with friends before going back to the shop.” He chuckled. “Whenever my mam heard marbles clicking in my pocket, she took them and gave me a clout to the side of the head. There was no time for play, she would say, with so much work to be done. So I took to wrapping them in a handkerchief to keep them quiet.”

Helen pictured him as a gangly boy, hurrying through his morning chores with a cache of forbidden marbles in his pocket. A bloom of emotion expanded in her chest, an electrifying happiness that almost bordered on pain.

She loved him. She loved the boy he had been, and the man he was now. She loved the look and smell and feel of him, the brusque charm of his accent, the touchy pride and determined will that had taken him so far in life, and the thousand other qualities that made him so extraordinary. Turning in his arms, she pressed herself as tightly to him as she could, and gradually surrendered to an uneasy sleep.

Chapter 19

“THE CARRIAGE IS COMING down the drive,” Cassandra said, kneeling on the settee and staring through the receiving room window. “They’ve almost reached the house.”

It had fallen to West to collect Lady Berwick and her lady’s maid at the Alton railway station, and bring them to Eversby Priory.

“Oh God,” Kathleen muttered, putting a hand to her chest as if to calm a rampaging heartbeat.

She had been tense and distracted throughout the morning, walking from room to room to make certain that every detail was perfect. Flower arrangements had been scrutinized and divested of any drooping blossoms. Carpets had been ruthlessly beaten and brushed, silver and glass had been polished with soft linen, and all the candleholders had been loaded with new beeswax tapers. Every sideboard was weighted with bowls of fresh fruit, and bottles of chilled champagne and soda water had been set in ice-filled urns.

“Why are you so worried about how the house looks?” Cassandra asked. “Lady Berwick has already seen it once before, when you married Theo.”

“Yes, but I wasn’t responsible for anything at the time. Now I’ve been living here for almost a year, and if anything is amiss, she’ll know it’s my fault.”

Pacing in a continuous circle, Kathleen spoke distractedly. “Remember to curtsy when Lady Berwick arrives. And don’t say ‘How do you do’—she doesn’t like that—just tell her ‘Good afternoon.’” She stopped abruptly and cast a wild glance at their surroundings. “Where are the dogs?”

“In the upstairs parlor,” Pandora said. “Do you want them down here?”

“No, dear God, no, Lady Berwick doesn’t allow dogs in the receiving room.” Kathleen stopped in her tracks as an uncomfortable thought occurred to her. “Also, don’t say anything about the pet pig we had living in the house last year.” The pacing resumed. “When she asks a question of you, try to answer simply, and don’t be amusing. She doesn’t like wit.”

“We’ll do our best,” Pandora said. “But she already doesn’t like Cassandra and me. After we met her at the wedding, I heard her telling someone that we behaved like a pair of Bilberry goats.”

Kathleen continued to pace. “I wrote to her that you’d both become accomplished and well-mannered young ladies.”

“You lied?” Pandora asked, her eyes widening.

“We had just begun our etiquette lessons at the time,” Kathleen said defensively. “I assumed our progress would go a bit faster.”

Cassandra looked worried. “I wish I’d paid more attention.”

“I don’t care a pickle if Lady Berwick approves of me or not,” Pandora said.

“But Kathleen does,” Helen pointed out gently. “That’s why we’re going to try our best.”

Pandora heaved a sigh. “I wish I could be perfect like you, Helen.”

“Me?” Helen shook her head with an uncomfortable laugh. “Darling, I’m the least perfect person in the world.”

“Oh, we know you’ve make mistakes,” Cassandra said cheerfully. “What Pandora meant was that you always appear to be perfect, which is all that really matters.”

“Actually,” Kathleen said, “that’s not what really matters.”

“But there’s no difference between being perfect and seeming perfect as long as no one can tell,” Cassandra said. “The result is the same, isn’t it?”

Looking perturbed, Kathleen rubbed her forehead. “I know there’s a good answer for that. But I can’t think of what it is right now.”