“True. Next summer no dance lessons will be required. I would never have believed that I could be made presentable for a ballroom. You’re a remarkable teacher.”
She ignored the compliment. “The credit belongs to you and your brother. You both worked most diligently.”
“You made it a pleasure for all of us. Anyone who can convince a fifteen-year-old boy to spend afternoons indoors should be in the diplomatic corps.”
“As I recall, you first used your lordly authority toorderhis presence.” She chuckled. “But it was in a good cause. That one will be a heartbreaker when he is a few years older. Put him in a Hussar uniform and there won’t be a maiden in England whose heart will be safe.”
“I’m afraid you’re right,” the proud brother said gloomily. “Before he returns to Eton, I must have a talk with him about responsible behavior, or I’ll be having irate fathers seeking me out. This head-of-family business can be heavy going.”
“You seem to take to it well, my lord. Teaching your brother and sister to sail was inspired. Miss Annabelle is much more confident now that she has learned to do something well.”
“I think a good deal more credit goes to what you have done with her hair and wardrobe. What was all the giggling I heard yesterday morning? I would have investigated, but I was due at one of the tenant farms.”
“Oh, that!” Christa laughed reminiscently. “I was showing her how to wear a shawl gracefully. It was very long, six yards by two yards, I think. There is a real art to wearing one without falling over it or looking like a gin-soaked street woman.”
“Hmm, I can see the problem. Fashion has unsuspected hazards. Did she learn the skill?”
“Eventually. But not without some trial and error. That must be when you heard us giggling.”
“I’m sorry I missed it!” He chuckled. “London will require more dignity, I fear. But there will be another summer next year.”
Christa shrugged. “Things will have changed. Perhaps Miss Annabelle will be married by then.”
Alex was silent for a long moment, his face hidden in shadow. “It won’t be the same with Jonathan and me here in a bachelor establishment.”
“Nothing is ever the same. That is why we must live each moment we are given.”
He laughed, a warm sound in the night. “I have never known anyone else who approached life as a study in philosophy.”
“I warned you before that we French are a philosophical race.”
“Tell me,” Alex asked curiously, “are all Frenchwomen as politically knowledgeable as you?”
Christa considered a moment to find an answer that would be true without being too revealing. “My country is different from yours in many ways. For example, a third of our peasants own their own land, not like here, where almost everyone is a tenant or laborer. And if one owns something, is there not a greater desire to understand, to participate in what is happening?”
“I never really thought about it,” he answered slowly. “But it makes sense. I feel a responsibility to study the issues and use my seat in the Lords on behalf of myself and my tenants. Any man would feel the same.”
“And any woman,” was her tart reply. “Someday, perhaps we shall have the same power over our destinies as men.”
“You are a proper revolutionary, aren’t you?” Alex said admiringly. “I begin to fear that one morning I will come down and find a mob led by you and Monsieur Sabine demanding new laws and better wages.”
Christa laughed. “No need to worry, the Monsieur is a royalist. Besides, there is no one in your household who feels ill-used. Most of your servants believe themselves singularly fortunate to be in your employ.”
He turned toward her, his face suddenly serious. “And how do you feel, Christa? Are you happy to be in my household?”
Her heart accelerated its beat, but her reply was calm. “Of course. Your rescuing me from the streets of London was the best thing that has happened to me in years.”
The first time Alex had kissed her on impulse, but this time he seemed entirely deliberate. He reached out and cupped her cheek gently, then moved his hand behind her head and turned her face to his. She could easily have eluded him but made no attempt to do so. This moonlit night was for romance, not reason.
What began as a leisurely embrace flared into passion with stunning force. How could she have forgotten the taste of his mouth, the warmth of his body pressed into hers? Her gossamer-thin muslin dress and shift were scarcely a barrier, and she could feel the escalating beat of his heart, the tensing of his muscles as he fitted her curves into his angles. Christa was hazily aware that they were lying on the hard planks of the pier and Alex’s body half covered hers, protecting her from the cool sea breeze.
They lay locked together for long minutes, exploring all the subtle variations of lips and tongues. At length, Alex rolled onto his side, his arms pulling her close against him. “Oh, Christa, Christa, what am I going to do with you?” he said softly, his voice nearly a groan.
Christa buried her face against his chest, unable to reply. You fool, she thought despairingly, you unutterably smug fool! At what point in this perfect summer had respect and affection insidiously turned to love? She had been so sure that her mind controlled her heart, that a moonlight kiss with a man who could be trusted not to go too far was a simple, harmless diversion.
Instead, she found herself wracked by waves of unfamiliar emotion. Christa had always known that Alex was attractive, that he was a considerate master, a loving brother, a hero who could laugh at himself. She had enjoyed sailing and dancing and talking with him, admiring the way their minds fitted. But the feeling sweeping through her now was so much more than the sum of those things; it was a profound sense of physical and emotional attunement beyond anything she had ever known.
The loss of her family in the revolution had outweighed all other deprivations, but now Christa found herself raging against the cruel fortune that had taken her name, her wealth, and her right to meet this man as an equal. She knew that Alex cared for her and there was no doubt that he found her attractive, but that would be an end to it. It would not occur to him that he might love a maid, any more than Christa would have thought to fall in love with a footman in the long-ago days when she was a wealthy countess. Lust there might be between master and servant, but mutual love? Unthinkable.
