He blinked and shook his head. “I can. It’s not as hard as it seems. It requires finger dexterity, practice, and patience. Something my sister is in short supply of, but even she managed to master it.”
Daisy bit back a smile. “I am nothing if not patient.” Her thoughts flitted to Cliffton and the years she’d waited for him, self-doubt suddenly battering her heart. She pushed those thoughts aside. “However, I’m not certain how nimble I am.”
He snorted, then clutched his left side with his arm. “Bloody rib.” He refocused on her. “Apologies.”
Daisy couldn’t help smiling. “My tender ears are offended.”
“My apologies to your ears.”
“They accept.”
His mouth softened as he smiled at her. “You’re different from what I remember.”
Daisy shifted self-consciously. “So are you.”
He cleared his throat. “How are your parents?”
“Well enough. My father’s knees are a bother, but it hasn’t stopped him from wandering about to shoot at things.”
“So I’ve heard.”
“How am I different?” Daisy wanted this answer. She didn’t want to examine why.
“Like I said,” he watched his hands once more. “You’re older. No longer a girl.” His gaze flicked to her, consuming her in one swift sweep over her body.
Her skin warmed all over, even the soles of her feet. “I wasn’t agirlat seventeen.” That’s when Lady Claystone had begun to truly take hold of Daisy’s life, claiming it was time to prepare her to become the next countess.
“You were. These two years have done something to you.”
Daisy opened her mouth and then decided she had nothing to say to that and she wasn’t going to argue. “You look different as well.”
He smirked. “Do I?”
You’re much bigger than I remember.
Daisy fiddled with her hands. “More mature. Not the boy you used to be.”
He raised both brows and smiled, not directly at her, but that smile still affected her. That smile made her toes curl.
“A boy? You’ve never seen me as a boy.”
Daisy sucked in a breath. She needed cooler air to orient her thoughts. Better yet, she needed to leave. She didn’t know what to do with a man like Lord Alston, sitting there in his bed like some sort of wicked god.
“Well, I should be going. I promise I won’t tell anyone about tonight.”
He cast her a sideways glance and a smirk. “But you don’t want to leave, do you?”
Daisy bit her cheek. “It’s what Ishoulddo whether I want to or not.”
He began to set out the cards in rows on the coverlet next to him. “Should is only a suggestion. Stay a spell.”
Chapter Eleven
Sam tried notto stare at her, but she pulled his gaze like she’d cast some sort of enchantment on him. She turned her head to the side, tucking a loose strand of ruby hair behind her ear. His heart did not beat abnormally, but there was a throb somewhere else at the sight of Daisy Blakewood. His brain could not rationalize the girl from his memory and the goddess who stood before him now. The light from the hearth cast her in a warm glow, her hair shimmering with licks of flame, and the green in her eyes had gold flecks that caught the lamp light. She still had her freckles. Only they weren’t cute and childlike, but tempting. He wanted to brush his thumbs over them and kiss each one.
The thought, wholly inappropriate, should have cooled his ardor, but he wasn’t a man who denied himself his salacious thoughts and feelings. Not even when it was Blakewood’s sister standing before him.
She had bloomed like a rose, full-bodied and lush, soft and beguiling. Her lips were plump and pink.
