At some point, etiquette would dictate that she and Freddie would have to talk to one another while their current companions turned to their other side, but for now, she would live in denial.
‘But, of course, no one would want that, would they?’ Baron Drainage laughed.
Emily forced a smile while praying that the baron wasn’t truly asking her to comment because she had now completely lost the thread of the conversation. Fortunately, he wasn’t and the conversation moved on, or rather, it carried on without any input from her before he turned to the person on his right and began again with the same story.
She held her breath.
To the left of her Freddie continued his conversation with the laughing lady. Freddie had no shortage of admirers despite never showing any signs of committing to one in particular and she had no doubt this woman would be as enamoured with him as the rest before the evening was out; she probably already was.
Emily stabbed her beautifully cooked chicken. Freddie never flirted with her. Not that she would want him to. It was just that Society was so unfair. Freddie, who had squandered his education, could breeze through life, remaining unmarried until he found someone he liked above all others. At the rate Emily was going, she would have to accept the first man who asked, if she even got that lucky. As the son of a duke, Freddie had no money problems and was free to live independently. Emily would never have that luxury. Yet the cosmos had seen fit to bless him with the looks and the charm and not her, who needed them so much more.
‘You managed to avoid that nicely.’
Emily cut a slice of chicken, moved it from one side of her plate to another and then put her fork down. She glanced at Freddie, hoping that his last comment had not been for her, but she found him gazing back at her, his eyes sparkling with a peculiar type of mischief he seemed to reserve just for tormenting her.
‘Avoid what exactly?’
‘Whether or not tile drainage was worth the cost. I could see you were hanging on Baron Mothchild’s every word regarding thedevelopment of farming at his estate, but perhaps your mind wandered when he discussed the merits of tile over clay.’ Freddie’s smirk showed he knew exactly how involved in the conversation she’d been, but she would never give him the satisfaction of admitting she hadn’t been enthralled by Baron Mothchild or that now, thanks to Freddie, she knew the man’s name.
‘Yes, Baron Mothchild is a very interesting gentleman.’
Freddie’s dark eyes glimmered. ‘Oh, indeed.’
‘And I was listening to his fascinating discourse. There is a lot to be learned from someone who knows what they are talking about.’ As soon as the words were out of her mouth, she wanted to cram them back in. She’d given Freddie an easy opening to discover that she was lying. She would be able to answer a question about what Freddie had been talking about to his dinner companion over anything Baron Mothchild had said for the entirety of the evening.
‘Ah.’ For a moment, she thought Freddie was going to let her off. She watched as his long fingers traced a pattern on the tablecloth. ‘So, what is your opinion on the best way to drain a field?’
‘Clay obviously.’ She had no idea.
He nodded sagely. ‘Slow to make though, wouldn’t you agree?’
Emily had once heard two women discussing how kissable Freddie’s lips looked. Although she would rather run naked around this very dining room than admit it, they did look very full and soft. She could almost feel them brushing against the length of her neck. She took her hand from the stem of her wine glass as ice flooded through her. She must be deep in her cups if the idea of kissing Freddie was entering her mind. She straightened, resting her hands in her lap to stop them from reaching for her wine once more. ‘Of course they are, but anything worth doing should take time, as I am sureyouwould agree.’
‘On that I am afraid I would not, not having spent a long time doing anything very much at all and yet somehow managing to find plenty of things of worth to fill my time.’
Emily didn’t know what to say to that. She had no idea how Freddie spent his life. She could well imagine him doing very little aside from enjoying himself with his many friends. ‘What is it that you do all day?’ she blurted out before clapping her hand over her mouth. ‘I do apologise. That was incredibly intrusive of me. Please forget I asked.’
Freddie leaned his forearms onto the table, tilting himself slightly so that he was mostly turned towards her. Over his shoulder, Emily noticed the slight pout of the woman seated to his left at this gesture. ‘You do not need to watch your words with me, Miss Hawkins. We are old friends.’ She raised her eyebrow and he surprised her by chuckling. ‘You dispute that we are friends?’
‘To be so, I think we need to be consistently civil with one another.’
He shook his head, his dark hair falling over one eye. He pushed it away from his forehead impatiently. ‘On the contrary, the better one knows someone, the less polite one has to be.’
‘Then you are right, we must be the best of friends.’
Freddie flung back his head and laughed and something fizzy erupted in Emily’s stomach, spreading quickly through her body as if a champagne bottle had been opened within her and all the joy of the bubbles was racing through her.
Heads turned towards them and a few eyebrows were raised. Emily guessed that they were surprised that a woman such as herself had made Freddie Dashworth, darling charmer of Society, laugh that hard. She caught a glimpse of her mother’s faint frown. She didn’t need to presume whatshewas thinking. Her mother had made her thoughts on the Dashworth family very clear. The Duke of Glanmore was aprize: the ultimate marital one. In the unlikely event that any member of the Hawkins family found themselves in the vicinity of him they were to do everything in their power to engage him in conversation. Mrs Hawkins did not believe that her youngest daughter possessed any qualities that would entice such an eminent husband, but she would give her left arm for the merest hint of a possibility.
In her mother’s opinion, the younger Dashworth brothers were interesting to her in terms of their wealth, but their reputations as men whose prime concern in life seemed to be enjoying themselves made them unsuitable in her opinion. Her mother disliked Freddie most of all, mainly because he gave off the air that he found nothing serious. Although Emily thought it was more to do with the fact that Freddie didn’t bow down to her mother enough. The Hawkins may not have a title, but theywerean eminent family with centuries of wealth behind them and most people treated her parents with the respect and deference that Mrs Hawkins thought was their due. Freddie did not.
Emily didn’t want to admire Freddie for anything but she did for that. And perhaps for the shape of his hands, but that was something she would not admit even if her life depended on it, which it never would.
‘I do enjoy sparring with you, Miss Hawkins,’ said Freddie, his laughter quieting. ‘You always seem to know exactly what to say.’
She contradicted him with complete silence, not knowing how to respond to such a surprising statement. It was the closest thing to a compliment he had ever given her.
‘And of course—’ he added, leaning closer so that she caught a whiff of his cologne. The delicious scent muddled her mind and for a moment, she leaned towards him too. The sounds of the dining room seemed to fade into the background as she gazed at the length of his jaw. She wondered whether the skin there would be soft to the touch or whether the shaved hairs would prickle under her fingertips. Shewas so entranced with her thought that she almost missed the end of his sentence ‘—friends also have shared secrets.’
