“Of course.” His voice was subtly lower, more resonant, the sound sliding through her. “Who knows? We might even learn the reason behind…all that’s gone before.”
She kept her eyes wide. “Indeed. That would be a blessing.”
Something—some hint not of laughter, but of wry acceptance—showed in his face. His eyes remained locked with hers. Then, with blatant deliberation, he shifted his fingers and stroked the fine skin over her inner wrist.
Her lungs seized. Hard. She actually felt giddy.
She would never have believed such a simple touch could so affect her. She had to look down and watch the mesmerizing caress. Realized in that instant that this would never do; she forced herself to swallow, to diguise her reaction, to turn her locked attention to good effect.
Continuing to look at his hand holding hers, she stated, “I realize you have only recently returned to society, but this really is not the done thing.”
She’d intended the statement to be coolly distant, calmly censorious; instead, her voice sounded tight, strained, even to her ears.
“I know.”
The tenor of those words jerked her eyes back to his face, to his lips. To his eyes. And the intent therein.
Again moving with that deliberation she found shocking, he held her stunned gaze, and raised her hand.
To his lips.
He brushed them across her knuckles, then, still holding her gaze, turned her hand, now boneless, and placed a kiss—warm and hot—in her palm.
Lifting his head, he hesitated. His nostrils flared slightly, as if he was breathing her scent. Then his eyes flicked to hers. Captured them. Held them as he bent his head again, and set his lips to her wrist.
To the spot where her pulse leapt like a startled hind, then raced.
Heat flared from the contact, streaked up her arm, slid through her veins.
If she’d been a weaker woman, she’d have collapsed at his feet.
The look in his eyes kept her upright, sent reaction rushing through her, stiffening her spine. Had her lifting her head. But she didn’t dare take her eyes from his.
That predatory look didn’t fade, but, eventually, his lashes swept down, hiding his eyes.
His voice when he spoke was deeper, murmurous thunder rolling in, subtly yet definitely menacing. “Tend your garden.” Once again he caught her gaze. “Leave the burglars to me.”
He released her hand. With a nod, he turned and strode away, over the lawn toward the parlor.
Tend your garden.
He hadn’t been speaking of plants. “Tend your hearth” was the more common injunction directing women to focus their energies in the sphere society deemed proper—on their husband and children, their home.
Leonora didn’t have a husband or children, and didn’t appreciate being reminded of the fact. Especially on the heels of Trentham’s practiced caresses and the unprecedented reactions they’d evoked.
Just what had he thought he was doing?
She suspected she knew, which only further fired her ire.
She kept herself busy through the rest of the day, eliminating any chance of dwelling on those moments in the garden. From reacting to the spur she’d felt at Trentham’s words. From giving rein to her irritation and letting it drive her.
Not even when Captain Mark Whorton had asked to be released from their engagement when she’d been expecting him to set their wedding day had she permitted herself to lose control. She’d long ago accepted responsibility for her own life; steering a safe path meant keeping the tiller in her hands.
And not allowing any male, no matter how experienced, to provoke her.
After luncheon with Humphrey and Jeremy, she spent the afternoon on social calls, first to her aunts, who were delighted to see her even though she’d purposely called too early to meet any of the fashionable who would later grace her Aunt Mildred’s drawing room, and subsequently to a number of elderly connections it was her habit to occasionally look in upon. Who knew when the old dears would need help?
She returned at five to oversee dinner, ensuring her uncle and brother remembered to eat. The meal consumed, they retreated to the library.