She cleared her throat theatrically and launched into a deep, melodramatic tone:
“In the year of our Lord 1802, in a crumbling manor surrounded by fog and scandal, there lived a?—”
“Porcupine!” Matilda blurted.
Cordelia didn’t miss a beat. “—a porcupine. Anobleporcupine, the last of his line, who wore only the finest waistcoats and hosted extravagant dinners for?—”
“Ghosts,” said Isabelle with her eyes alight with mischief.
“—for ghosts of course. Finicky guests but terribly well-read.”
Laughter rang around the garden. Cordelia’s voice rose with absurd theatricality, her hands gesturing wildly as she spun the tale. Mason stood just beside her, leaning one arm lazily on the back of her chair, half-crouched and watching her with amused scrutiny.
“A dinner was underway,” she continued, “with three particularly snobbish specters?—”
“Potatoes,” Mason said casually.
Cordelia paused, eyes narrowing. “Pardon?”
“Potatoes,” he said again, looking far too pleased with himself.
“Fine,” she acquiesced, resisting the urge to chuckle. “Ghosts who demanded only to be served raw potatoes, the kind that shrieked if peeled too quickly. The noble porcupine, of course, had to?—”
“Propose marriage!” Hazel called out.
“To the potatoes?” Cordelia asked, horrified.
“Obviously,” Hazel said with a shrug.
“I hate all of you,” Cordelia muttered under her breath, drawing fresh laughter from the group.
“Courage, Cordelia,” Mason said, mouth quirking. “Surely a woman of your creativity can handle a betrothed vegetable.”
“Oh, I’ll handle it,” she shot back, twisting to glare up at him, but she was smiling. “I’ve tamed worse things.”
“I’m flattered,” he murmured, just low enough that only she could hear.
Cordelia’s heart thumped wildly. She turned back to the others quickly, with her face still warm, and attempted to continue though her thoughts had suddenly become very unhelpfully focused on the warmth of Mason’s hand brushing the back of her chair.
The story spiraled into ridiculousness, including poisonous soup, musical candleholders, and a dance duel with a poltergeist, but no one seemed to care about the plot. They were laughing too hard, tossing words at each other like playful weapons.
Mason, to Cordelia’s unending surprise, was ridiculously good at the game. He was witty, fast, and unapologetically dramatic. At one point, when Matilda insisted he play a lovesick villain named Lord Slipperbottom who turned into a goose, he actually stood up, flared an invisible cape, and delivered a full monologue that ended with him honking his grief to the sky.
Cordelia laughed so hard she nearly fell off her seat. She didn’t recognize this man.
Or perhaps, she finally had.
There was mischief in him but not only that. There was also a sharp, clever playfulness that had nothing to do with courtly manners or duty or the haunted look she sometimes caught in his eyes. It was… freedom, pure and brilliant and infuriatingly attractive.
And somewhere between the porcupine’s wedding and Hazel’s impromptu operatic finale, Cordelia felt something catch inside her chest. She was madly, completely, devastatingly attracted to him. Not just his face, which was rather unfair in its symmetry, or the baritone voice or the smile that had at least five different meanings, but this, as he was now.
Because it would be so easy to fall in love with someone like that.
So easy… and so very, very dangerous.
Chapter Fifteen
The morning light was soft as it filtered through the tall windows of Mason’s study, turning the wood-paneled walls to honey and dust. A decanter sat untouched on the sideboard. Papers were arranged in perfect, deliberate order upon his desk, but Mason could barely force himself to look at them.
