He sipped his brandy.
He turned a page of his book.
He wasn’t looking her way.
“Perhaps we shouldn’t let you drink more than a sip or two of sherry in the evening,” Angelique said finally.
“I think that would be wisest,” Delilah agreed, somewhat glumly.
She reached for her embroidery.
She held it in her lap for a moment, staring at it as if it were a crystal ball.
“It’s just that he’s so very irritating,” she said rather vehemently, in a low voice. “One wants to combat his certainty.”
“Youdo.Idon’t. I know better. And byirritatingI think you meandesirable in a frightening way.”
“Nonsense.”
It was exactly what she meant.
She rather resented that Angelique knew what she meant better than she did.
But then Angelique apparently knew the costs, too, of that sort of thing.
And yet she wanted to know what Angelique knew.
And what Captain Hardy likely knew.
But as her ruffled feathers settled and her dazed thoughts coalesced into reason once more, her thoughts were pulled, as if by a magnet, to that moment he’d gone utterly still in the drawing room the day he’d come to stay. The moment he’d seen her.
As if he’d finally found due north.
Captain Hardy referred to his watch, closed his book, stood, and politely, dispassionately, bid them all good-night.
His eyes brushed hers as he left the room.
She would warrant that Captain Hardy found her desirable, too.
Possibly even frighteningly so.
Chapter Fourteen
For several weeks now, Delilah had been in the habit of dropping off to sleep nearly immediately after days of rigorous household work. Tonight she was watching her ceiling. Her body was humming as though each of her cells harbored a little choir singer.
Are you flirting with me, Lady Derring?
She’d promised herself she’d be truthful in all things from now on, but as it turned out, she was a rank coward when tested.
Because she feared the real answer was, in fact, yes.
She tossed and turned and cast off her blankets as if her skin was too sensitive for their weight.
Well. So this was desire, she thought, none too pleased. It wasn’t entirely convenient, given the maddening object of it.
Even in the midst of Derring’s... attentions... something in her had stirred, somewhat hopeful, not entirely disinterested. She did know it had a vague resemblance to pleasure.
She had long suspected there had to be more to all that nonsense, otherwise men and women wouldn’t behave like such fools about it.
