“Have you seen Felicity?” she demanded of Agnes, as soon as she was through the door.
If Agnes thought that Lady Esme’s outfit was strange, she did not let her opinion show.
“Aye, milady. There’s nay call to fret. She was waiting for me in here at daybreak.” Agnes chuckled. “I reckon she’s worked out where her meals are coming from and decided to settle in.” She nodded towards the back wall, where Felicity was stretched out on a blanket which had been folded onto a low shelf.
“You put the blanket out for her?” Esme lifted her eyebrows.
“Well, she’s naught but a little thing. And it does no harm.” Agnes was defensive.
Esme fought a smile. “’Tis kind of you, Agnes. I’ll make sure Flora knows what good care you’re taking of her.”
“Thank you, milady.”
Esme made to walk back to the great hall, but after reaching the passageway, she paused and retraced her steps around the corner.
“Be sure not to let her out at night,” she cautioned. “And if she comes looking for me, that’s alright. In fact, I will most likely come looking for her.”
“Very good, milady.”
Smiling, Esme walked around the corner and straight into Adam. Her face cannoned into the hardness of his chest, and she grunted with the shock of it.
“Forgive me.” He was the first to recover, but when she looked up at him, his mouth was set in a grim line.
“I believe the fault was mine.” She went to smooth her skirts and was momentarily discomfited when her palms encountered only the narrow lines of her braccae. “Are you come to collect me for my first lesson?”
Adam’s gaze was studiously fixed someplace above Esme’s head. “The weather is not ideal.”
“I believe warriors must turn out in all weather conditions,” she said innocently.
He still refused to meet her eye.
The man who had beaten her at chess, then teased her about her brothers, had retreated behind a veneer of flintiness.
But Esme’s heart fluttered all the same.
“Pray, Adam, do not disappoint me,” she persisted. “I have dressed especially for the occasion.”
His eyeline did not shift, but a color came to his chiseled cheeks.
“I still say that the weather is not ideal.”
“And I say that fresh air and exercise should be enjoyed whatever the weather.” She took his arm, as this trick had worked so well for her the night before, and boldly attempted to turn him around.
Alas, Adam was much too tall and broad to be easily turned in a narrow passageway. The two of them became crammed between the plastered walls, scarcely an inch of air separating them.
“I’m sorry,” she breathed. Without the layers of protection afforded by a chemise and kirtle, she felt the press of his body all the more. She was far too warm, and it was strangely hard to catch her breath.
Adam’s hands skimmed past her hips before settling on her shoulders. “You stay still,” he said. He held her in place whilst swiveling around and extricating his limbs from hers.
She wanted to smile at him, to share the idiocy of the moment, but she was hot and embarrassed. And Adam looked more cross than amused.
“We will continue as planned, if that is what you want.”
“It is what I want,” she confirmed.
He gestured for her to walk ahead, and she proceeded him down the narrow passage, newly conscious of the way her tunic and braccae molded to the curves of her body.
Imagining his eyes upon her.
