"Mr. Fletcher is the duke's steward. He's here to work, not to... whatever you're suggesting."
"Courting," Mrs. Martin supplied helpfully. "We're suggesting courting."
"No one's courting anyone."
"That's not what it looked like this morning."
"This morning was an accident involving gravity and ice!"
"And passion?" Mrs. Morrison suggested hopefully.
"And pies," Marianne corrected. "Gravity, ice, and pies. No passion."
Alaric had been trying to remain invisible during this interrogation, but the land steward turned to him with a grin.
"What do you have to say for yourself, Mr. Fletcher? Compromising our Marianne on your second day in the village?"
"I didn't compromise anyone. I was compromised by pies."
"Is that a metaphor?"
"It's a statement of fact. I was attacked by pastry."
"Marianne's pastry is usually better behaved," Mrs. Ironwell said.
"It was having a rebellious morning," Marianne explained.
"Like its maker?" Mrs. Morrison suggested with a wink.
"Its maker was trying to deliver breakfast, not create scandal."
"Sometimes the two go hand in hand."
"Not in my bakery."
"What about outside your bakery?"
"That was the street, not the bakery."
"Technicalities."
"Important technicalities."
The committee meeting devolved into discussions of fair logistics, but Alaric noticed that every few minutes, someone would glance at Marianne and him with barely hidden speculation. The morning's incident had clearly provided enough gossip fuel for weeks.
"I should go," Marianne announced once the pies had been distributed and consumed. "The lunch bread won't bake itself."
"I shall walk you back," Alaric offered without thinking.
"It's across the square. I think I can manage."
"There might be ice."
"It's the same ice I've been navigating for thirty years."
"But now it has a taste for causing compromising positions."
"The ice doesn't have taste."
