Neither of them moved.
"It's just," she said, "I'm fairly certain I've injured my knee, and if I move, I might injure something of yours."
"Something of mine is already injured. My dignity may never recover."
"Your dignity looked like it needed humbling anyway."
"I'll have you know my dignity was perfectly calibrated."
"Your dignity was lurking outside my bakery at four in the morning like a thief or a suitor, and I'm fairly certain you're not here to steal bread."
The implication hung between them for a moment before Marianne seemed to realize what she'd said. Her face, already pink from cold, turned a remarkable shade of red.
"I didn't mean...that is, I wasn't suggesting..."
"Of course not," Alaric said quickly. "You were simply observing that thieves and suitors are the only categories of person who lurk outside bakeries before dawn."
"Exactly. Those are the only two options."
"No third category exists."
"Absolutely not."
"Although," he said, because apparently his mouth had decided to operate independently of his brain, "technically, I wasn't lurking. I was investigating."
"Investigating what? Whether my windows fog properly?"
"The economic patterns of rural bakeries."
"At four-thirty in the morning?"
"I'm very dedicated to economic pattern analysis."
"You're very dedicated to something, but I don't think it's economics."
She shifted slightly, trying to push herself up, and her hand slipped on a patch of ice. She came back down, closer this time, close enough that he could see the flecks of gold in her brown eyes.
"Oh, my goodness. Confound it," she breathed.
"Such language from a respectable widow."
"I'm covered in snow, lying on top of a relative stranger in the middle of the street, surrounded by the destroyed remains of four dozen mince pies. Respectability has already left for warmer climates."
"Four dozen? That seems excessive."
"They were for the fair committee breakfast meeting. Mrs. Morrison insists on feeding everyone as though they're preparing for hibernation." She paused. "Oh Heavens, Mrs. Morrison. She's going to have opinions about this."
"We could lie here until spring. She might forget by then."
"You clearly don't know Mrs. Morrison. She remembers every remotely scandalous thing that's happened in this village since 1750."
"She wasn't alive in 1750."
"She inherited the memories from her mother-in-law. It's like a family heirloom, but with more gossip."
A mince pie chose that moment to slide off the bakery's roof where it had somehow landed, hitting Alaric squarely on the forehead.
"I believe your pies are attacking me."
