“I won’t ask your intentions because Tess must make her own decisions.” He leaned across the table closer to Dom. “She doesn’t trust herself, you see, and the last thing she needs is a man like me judging her choices or pontificating.”
Dom leaned closer too, shoving his cold plate of food aside. “Why doesn’t she trust herself?”
“She’s been burned, man.”
“Burned?”
“By a blackguard, of course.” Tristan edged back, settling against the chair as if stunned that Dom could be so thick. “The man wooed her, then hied off when he got what he wanted.” He ducked his head and mumbled, “He was a charmer. A libertine, not unlike me.”
Then he lifted his head and gave a hard stare back at Dom. “Not unlike you.”
Tess shoved her foot into one long boot and then searched for the other in her wardrobe, all the while mumbling curses at Dominic Prince under her breath.
The riding skirt that Wellsy had sewn into trousers fit inside the boots, so she was careful to put them on just right, despite how angry she was.
Once she found the other, she made short work of slipping into the boot, then swiped up her straw sunhat from where it hung by her bedroom door.
When she emerged, Wellsy watched her warily as she cleared the table where they’d shared Sunday lunch.
“You’re storming over there then?” she asked as she wiped the table.
“They’ve started without me!” Tess huffed out a breath and tempered her tone. “This is high-handed nonsense, and he needs to know it’s not acceptable.”
“Tristan did explain—”
“I know.” Tess resisted the urge to curse her brother too, though he was just as complicit as Mr. Prince.
And it would beMr. Princefrom now on. She’d made a mistake by allowing herself to be as drawn in as one of those panting ladies at the Walcotts’ party. So what if one look at him made her belly flutter and he kissed like a dream?
He would never have an ounce of respect for her if she could not maintain a professional distance. And that’s what she intended to do going forward.
“They just wanted to get down far enough that your work tomorrow would be fruitful.”
“Do you think me incapable of digging a hole, Wellsy?”
She shook her head decisively. “Not a bit of it.” Then she turned an amused look Tess’s way. “But do you want to dig a hole, Tessie? Hasn’t this American hired you for your knowledge of the history?”
Tess closed her eyes, inhaled and exhaled thrice, willing her anger to ebb. “He did,” she acknowledged. “But LordFenbridge wants to know what happens on his land, and it’s my duty to report to him.”
“Could they not note it all down and share it with you?”
Tess sighed. “I want to be there. I want to be a part of every step. And if he thinks that just because he—”
Mrs. Wells arched a silver brow. “Just because he...?” she prompted.
Tess had told no one about the kissing, which was a small miracle in and of itself, seeing as she’d hardly gone an hour without replaying every single second in her mind.
“I’m going to the dig site.” Tess shoved her hat on her head. “Enjoy the rest of your Sunday, Wellsy.”
“Be safe, my dear.”
Tess cut straight across the back garden toward Fenbridge’s field, not bothering with the village lanes. It slowed her pace, as she pushed through tall grasses, but the movement eased a bit of the tension in her body and the sun on her skin did wonders for her mood.
Then, within a few minutes, she caught site of them in the distance. They’d already made quick work of removing the sod and the first layer of soil. The men stood in a line, stretched out at nearly equal intervals. An organized dig, and she had to admire that at least.
She kept marching toward them and gasped when she saw him.
He stood speaking to Tristan, the wind whipping at his dark hair. He’d rolled his shirtsleeves up high and even from the distance where she stood she could make out the corded muscles of his sun-kissed skin.
