“Would a hand be asking too much?”
It was a joke.
Even the sort of joke spoken between friends.
Yet she couldn’t quite conjure a smile.
Wordlessly, she extended her hand, and he took it.
A frisson of anticipation purled up her spine and crawled through her veins. Her lungs forgot how to draw breath.
“May I remove your glove?”
Her brow crinkled. “Is that necessary?”
“We’re lovers.”
Beatrix suppressed a gasp.
Lovers.
Except…forming an umbrella above that word and all her interactions with the man before her hung another word.
Pretend.
All this was a game of pretend.
She nodded.
He took white silk between forefinger and thumb and tugged—one finger, then another, until the glove slipped loose and free.
He had strong, capable hands—hands accustomed to work. She’d felt them upon her that day in Hyde Park. But not likethis—his skin bare and warm against hers.
Truly, she’d experienced his hands upon her in more intimate places.
Except did the touching of two hands lack intimacy?
One experienced the world through one’s hands.
So, to touch the hand of another person…
To know they felt yours, too…
What could be more intimate?
Further, she understood in a way not born of experience, but rather instinct, why women wantedthisman’s hands upon them.
In the distance, her mind registered applause. The first half of the musicale had concluded. Guests would start stretching their legs and mingling and wandering through the manse, possibly—probably—toward the conservatory.
Her heart hammered in her chest, and she grew suddenly too hot. Deverill stepped closer. Space remained between them, but with her hand in his and the positioning of their bodies combined with the seclusion of the setting, no doubt would linger in the mind of the casual observer as to the goings-on between Mr. Blake Deverill and Lady Beatrix St. Vincent.
A small group of ladies strolled past the open conservatory doors, and Beatrix braced herself for what was to come in the next second. The ladies glanced their way…
And kept moving without sparing even a second glance.
Surprise, along with a hefty dollop of indignation, swept through Beatrix. Was it so far beyond the realm of possibility that she would indulge in a bit of impropriety?
“I believe we need to be more obvious,” said Deverill.
