“Are you alright?” he asked. She was a beautiful splash of yellow muslin and a waterfall of ebony hair. Her skin was pink and whisker-burned. Her lips were swollen. He wanted her like he’d never wanted anything. If he’d been asked about revenge in that moment, he wouldn’t have remembered what to say.
“Yes,” she said, blinking up at him.
“What’s to be done, Miss Allard?” he asked on an exhale. He dropped his head into his hands.
“Marriage, I think,” she said. “That is what’s to be done.”
Luke lifted his head. He stared down at her. She gave him a small, resigned smile. The sail in Luke’s chest was tight-to-bursting, packed with wind.
He looked away. “You’re prepared to negotiate?”
She pushed up on her elbows. “I am prepared to be married to you, if that’s what you mean.”
Chapter 9
Two days later, Dani stood on the banks of the River Len with Amelia, awaiting the arrival of Captain Bannock and Lord Fernsby. The men were due to arrive in a punting boat for an outing on the water. The sun of midweek had gone, buried by a strong, humid wind and a surplus of clouds. The unrelenting bluster snatched handkerchiefs and swung skirts. It thrashed the silk plants on Amelia’s hat into a tornado-like frenzy, the ribbons unfurling like tentacles.
“I see the future of your hat, Amelia,” Dani observed, “and it’s on the bottom of the river. You’ve chosen an ambitious number of adornments for such a windy day.”
“That hat is not the problem,” said Amelia, clasping her hands in an anxious knot. “It is the activity. What was I thinking—punting on the river? I only mentioned it once or twice, and the viscount arranged for the boat and reserved a private table for us at the tearoom in Swanley. I haven’t the wardrobe for boating, I fear. Even so, it has long been a dream of mine, to glide along a river with a gentleman. To take tea in a private room.”
“Never let it be said your dreams are not specific, Amelia.” Dani shielded her eyes from the wind to peer upstream.
“It will be ever so romantic,” her friend mused. “Even with the wind, and the four of us all together, it will be romantic.”
“Speaking only for myself,” said Dani, “?‘romance’ is not the goal of today. The captain and I will be setting out plans for a wedding. Something quick and simple. You must help with this, as it will certainly involve your father and the church.”
“In case you didn’t know it, planning a weddingisromantic, Dani. And I am at your service, of course; ‘companion and chaperone.’?”
“Oh yes. Then there’s that.”
The notion of a chaperone was new and puzzling to Dani, but Captain Bannock had been very clear. He’d said almost nothing in the hour after their interlude in the Eastwell Park library, but what he did prioritized a chaperone. Above all else. For all future encounters.
“But did the captain reallyinsiston a chaperone, Dani?” Amelia probed. “Or was it more like asuggestion? Perhaps he’s being mindful of your honor, in the end. Lord Fernsby is meticulous about propriety when he calls. My parents have been ever so impressed.”
“If propriety is important to Captain Bannock, the change of heart came on very suddenly.”
“Oh yes, the kiss,” Amelia said on a sigh. “Tell it again, Dani. Everything. Start at the beginning and carry on through his request for a chaperone.”
Dani thought back to the morning in the library—no great effort, considering how often she rehashed it in her mind.
“It wasn’t a kiss, Amelia,” said Dani. “Just to be clear. There was more.”
“Two kisses?”
“Attach your fertile imagination to the phrase ‘more than a kiss,’ multiply it by... oh, nine or ten, andthatis what happened in the library.”
Amelia shot her a scandalized look and laughed. Dani shrugged and laughed, too. Amelia viewed the world through a haze of dandelion fluff and cherry blossoms. Dani was more practical. She wasn’t without hope, but she wouldn’t believe something, just because she wanted it. She valued clarity more than her desire. The lone exclusion to this was Miriam and Whittle and their total lack of clarity about her heritage. It was a daydream she allowed them all.
And also what happened with Captain Bannock in the Eastwell Park library. Here was another absence of clarity. She’d read the news reports of the captain’s sacrifice and valor. She’d reacted with sympathy and compassion, like any person with a beating heart. He’d come upon her and seen this compassion. Instead of accepting it—or even rejecting it—he’d sort of... absorbed it. His response had been raw, and visceral, and all-consuming, and it coalesced into a kiss. The combination of her stirred-up feelings and his kiss had sparked latent desire inside of her. He’d stoked it, touching her and kissing her senseless, and Dani had been introduced to a burning pleasure that she hadn’t known existed.
“Gloves off or on?” wondered Amelia, speaking in a whisper.
“Hmmm?”
“When he kissed you, were his hands bare? Were yours?”
“Gloves off. Hats off. He removed his jacket and his cravat.” The memory of Captain Bannock peeling off his jacket was, inexplicably, one of the most exciting things she’d ever seen in her life.
