“If I ever learned it, I have forgotten it entirely.”
“In any event, it is not only the fan.May I have yours?”
Clearly dubious, she handed him her fan.
And another crack.The fan was one he had given her, for her twenty-sixth birthday.He had spent ages choosing it, wishing her to have the very best he could find.“You still have this?”
“Of course.It is my favourite.”
He blinked at the fan.Focussing on the task at hand, he said, “Right.Well.This is what you do.”Holding the fan before his face, he fluttered it back and forth.
A laugh bubbled from her.“What are you about?”
Damnation, he knew there was a trick to his, but he could not get his wrist to cooperate.“I know what I am doing.”
Eyes alight, she watched him flutter the fan.“Oh, I’ve no doubt.”
Taking the fan in his other hand, he shook out his wrist and then attempted it again.This time, his wrist cooperated.With a sharp snap, he opened the fan and held it in his left hand.“If you hold it thus, you are signalling you wish him to come and talk with you.”The fan still opened wide, he shifted it before his chest.“This iswait for me.”Closing it, he carried it in his right hand in front of his face.“And this,follow me.”
El crossed her arms.“This is quite ridiculous, Benedict.Surely the earl does not know this language.It seems an amusement for debutantes.”
Maybe it was ridiculous, but he was doing this for her.“Take this seriously, El.”
“Oh, do not fear.I am.”
A smile played about her pink lips, her colour high, her eyes sparkling.It baffled him she believed she could not attract whomever she desired.The question that had been nagging him since she’d first told him of this danced on the tip of his tongue.“Are you truly set on Malvern?”
Her smile faded.“I wish someone who I will not encounter in a social sense once our liaison is done,” she finally said.“The earl does not often attend society gatherings, and he rarely engages with any in our set outside of such.I do believe he simply does not care enough to discuss anything with anyone.Tell me, apart from Mrs Morcom, can you name a single one of his lovers?”
He…could not.Damn.Who could have conceived of the Earl of Malvern being of all things discreet?“So you are set upon him?”
She lifted a shoulder.“He seems altogether perfect.”
He managed to hold to his smile even as a strange pain pierced his chest.“Let us abandon such girlish tricks, then,” he said briskly.Opening the fan, he held it before him, concealing the lower part of his face.
The laughter faded from her expression.“What are you saying now?”
He did not reply.Instead, he allowed his gaze to drift from her eyes to her mouth back again and, just this once, he allowed himself to consider what her lush mouth would taste like.She favoured mints and usually had a few in her reticule.Would she taste of that and a flavour that was wholly El?
Eyes huge, she licked her lips.“Benedict?”
He snapped the fan shut, ignoring the heat coursing through his blood.“Now you try.You be the lady and I will be the gentleman.”
She blinked, the haze leaving her eyes as she grinned.“It will be difficult, but I shall endeavour to imagine such.”
Shoving the fan into her hand, he said, “Come, El.Beguile me.”
“Very well.”She flicked out the fan and, mimicking his earlier move, covered the bottom of her face.“Is this right?”
From over the top of the fan, dark eyes arrested his.If someone had asked previous to now, he would have told them El’s eyes were brown and thought upon it nothing more.However, that was too common a word to describe their colour, umber flecked with amber and gold.With the fan covering the bottom half of her face, her eyes took on a mysterious slant, as if she held a thousand unknowable secrets.Beneath the slash of thick, well-shaped brows and surrounded by long lashes, they were innocent and alluring both, inviting him to discover her secrets.
Bloody hell, he was supposed to be instructing her, wasn’t he?Clearing his throat, he said, “Very good, El.Now, look over me.”
Those thick brows drew.“Look over you?Do you mean…over your shoulder?”
“No, I mean—” He gestured at himself, from his head to his waist.“Over me.Like I did you.”
Her brows rose in comprehension.Lazily, her gaze trailed over him, from his eyes to his mouth and back.With each breath, her breasts rose and fell, pushing against her gown.She’d compared them to Lady Fyfe’s—whose really was magnificent—but El’s were round and full, and they would more than fill a man’s palm, the soft flesh overflowing as he shaped it to his touch.
