“Next!” the Duchess of Yardley called. “Miss Mary Blake.”
“I’m not sure I wish to read.” Mary had folded her arms and now wore a mutinous expression on her face.
Zach made a clucking noise. Mary grabbed the book Dimity held out, and he thought for a moment she’d throw it at him. Instead, she rose to her feet.
“Read sitting down,” Zach ordered.
Ignoring him, Mary remained standing and turned to face the gallery on the bank. Zach readied himself to grab her in case she stumbled.
“Watch her, Milton,” he warned the man sitting, holding the oars.
“I am.”
Zach did not like the expression of adoration on the man’s face as he looked up at Mary.
“Watch she does not fall, you fool.”
“Ah, right.”
“She seems steady enough,” Beth said.
Zach moved as close to the side of the boat as he could.
“Did you notice Mary looks different, Zach?” Dimity asked.
“Different how?”
“We took her to have new dresses fitted, and her hair is styled in another way.”
“As she’s wearing a coat and bonnet, I’m not sure how I would or why for that matter.”
He shot the women in his boat a glance, and the hairs on the back of his neck rose at the looks they were giving him.
“What are you three up to?”
“Nothing,” Ruby said far too quickly.
“‘I do believe it is a herd of dorcas gazelle coming toward us,’” Mary began in a very credible Lady Nauticus voice.
“Thankfully, it is not lappet-faced vultures,” Plunge said, shuddering.
“When have you encountered a lappet-faced vulture?” Freya asked him.
He waved a lace handkerchief, one of the many he clearly carried about. “I have heard stories. They are ghastly creatures.” He shuddered.
As she was reading, Zach could look at Mary, not that he wanted to, but he needed to watch her in case she stumbled. Her features were fine, her nose small and sweet, and the curve of her bottom lip sensual. He could feel them against his as they had been that night.
He dragged his eyes from her. His body felt tight with need, and he wasn’t even touching her.
“‘Perhaps if we sing, they will not come closer,’ Cerise said. ‘I don’t think they eat people, my dear,’ Captain Broadbent added, ‘but to be sure I think the noise would distract them,’” Mary read.
“I feel as if the writer is mocking us. I mean who would burst into song in a desert with a herd of dorcas gazelle bearing down on them while desperate for a drink,” Dimity asked. “But if it says you must sing, then you must, Mary.”
Mary looked down at the book and then at Dimity who in turn nodded. Mary sighed. She then began to sing. To Zach’s surprise, she had a beautiful voice, not at all like the caustic-tongued shrew who constantly challenged him. He was mesmerized and felt the tug of need that had been growing inside him for this woman, strengthen.
“I did not know she could sing like that,” Ruby whispered.
“I doubt anyone in the Blake family but Phillipa is allowed to perform,” Dimity snapped. “I loathe the way she and her mother treat Mary. But I feel as if that is changing. Mary is finding her backbone.”
