“We can’t have that,” Zachary teased, his voice intimate and cordial, making her blush.
She raised her eyes, observing the man. Dark brows slanted over quizzical eyes. Her breath was taken away by such maleness. He seemed to take overlong in removing the thicket. Her insides began to churn like a northern sea, and he stood next to her as if he hadn’t a care in the world. But even as she tried to ignore his proximity, his deep voice and the warmth of his breath on her neck sent shivers down her spine—although not of fear. Of something primal…and dangerous. He managed to free her. Elizabeth exhaled.
“I’ve performed a successful surgery, separating you from Amanda’s roses.”
He brushed tendrils of her hair away from the nape of her neck in a gesture like a caress and she lost her balance, grasping for equilibrium and found instead of steadying him, it was he who braced and balanced her.
“Forgive me.”
“Are you hurt?”
He looked at her, passed his hand idly down the silk of her sleeve, and then more intently, as if smoothing the fabric were an interesting and absorbing occupation. His subtle smile, so improbably beguiling, seemed to focus all the controlled energy of him into a ray of light on her heart.
“You didn’t hurt me. You recovered well.” She stepped back, her cheeks burning, stared at him silently for a moment, then cleared her throat. “You-you took liberties. You made that happen?—”
“You shouldn’t be ungrateful for my sacrifice nor shame my efforts. I was scarred by the thorn.” His lips curved up in an amused, yet gentle smile that made her heart race as if she’d run for miles.
Elizabeth snorted. “There is speculation in that.” She put up a great show of indifference, but some link…some invisible thread tugged her toward him. Strange things happened to her when he was close. Why didn’t she go to the drawing room with the other ladies?
He turned suddenly and looked heavenward, hesitated as if gleaning something from the cosmos. “I respect your ambition to help single women and children.”
Elizabeth widened her eyes. “You do? I thought you’d be like most naysayers.”
“What has prompted this objective?”
She took a breath. “Having Caroline and perhaps facing the same possible social fallout compels me to champion the most vulnerable.”
“You have an uphill struggle with your family—and society.”
“The aristocracy of New York are blinded and sympathetically bankrupt. Someone must act. I’ve viewed a different world along Fifth Avenue above the thirties and other places in the city. The tumbledown shacks and sprawling dwellings that house hundreds. Rookeries everyone calls them, huge barracks-like structures where landlords cram in as many of the working poor as could pay a few dollars rent. Everywhere half-dressed urchins line the streets, starved and helpless to survive crime and disease. The women stare vacantly, widowed, beaten or abandoned by their husbands, and then crushed by the monster of poverty. Work or bread is the cry. Hope is futile. The response is a demand for patience, and the customary diatribes about the evils of too much charity. If I can aid one woman, I’ve saved her and her children.”
“You have saved your daughter, Joseph and many in the Fitzgerald Orphanage. You are unique among women.”
His cobalt eyes brimmed with approval, making her spirit soar. He was silent for a moment, and then said, “While you’re off to save the world, I thought you might help me with a problem.”
“A problem?”
With his arms behind his back, he meandered farther into the gardens, swiveled sharply, looking straight at her. “I’m in need of your advice.”
“Advice?”
Zachary tilted his head. His mouth flexed faintly as the serenade of crickets vibrated. “I need advice on courting a woman. She’s a little obstinate, even pig-headed.”
“And you feel I’m an expert with mulish women?”
“As a gentleman, I have no sense in dealing with the fairer sex.”
Elizabeth blushed and glanced at him suspiciously for any sign of mockery. He didn’t appear to be ironic in tone, and the way he looked at her make her feel rather silly and weak inside, full of giddy pleasure at the compliment of asking her counsel. She took a seat on the bench, looked up at him expectantly, weighing his improper request. “Mr. Rourke, I don’t believe I understood you correctly.”
He looked straight into her eyes. “You understand.”
“But surely…your intentions…that is a private matter. I don’t believe you desire me to make your courtship my affair.”
“I’d be obliged if you would make it your affair. I’m a rough frontiersman and not well-versed in how it is that ladies wish to be wooed. I don’t want to make any blunders.” He smiled on the side of his mouth.
She cleared her throat before continuing. “I doubt there’s a woman alive you couldn’t have if you put your mind to it.”
“You exaggerate my abilities.”
