Page 27
She refused to be drawn into another argument. Furious with herself for such improper conduct, she reached for her rapier, determined to leave before she disgraced herself any further.
Too fast!
The room swayed, and she caught her breath.
Cordelia blinked and waited for the floor to remember its proper place beneath her feet. Apparently, the brandy had been considerably more potent than she had anticipated. She took a breath and attempted to straighten. Before she could steady herself, George was already moving.
“I will accompany you home.”
“I assure you, that is entirely unnecessary.” She took a step, but her balance faltered.
His hand closed around her arm before she could fall, warm and firm through the thin fabric of her borrowed shirt.
Cordelia sucked in a breath.
“You cannot be seen escorting me,” she protested breathlessly.
“You are dressed as a lad,” he replied dryly. “Should any carriage pass, no one would think twice about two men walking together.”
Two men.
Cordelia glanced down at herself, then at him. One of those supposed men was presently clinging to the other to remain upright. She nodded nevertheless and carefully withdrew from his hold. “Very well.”
She turned away and managed only two steps before her balance betrayed her again.
“Hell,” George muttered.
Then the world abruptly shifted. Cordelia gave a startled gasp as one arm swept behind her back and another beneath her knees. Without further hesitation, George lifted her into his arms.
“Mr. George!”
He did not so much as stagger. Cordelia instinctively caught at his shoulder, her cane trapped awkwardly against her side. “I can walk.”
“I have witnessed compelling evidence to the contrary.”
“I merely lost my balance.”
“Twice.”
“That hardly constitutes compelling evidence.”
“It does when the consequence of ignoring it is allowing you to fall upon your face.”
She opened her mouth to argue, but George was already carrying her toward the side door. Sir Charles stirred at the movement, opened one eye, and yawned sleepily.
“Traitor,” she muttered at him.
The cat closed his eye again. George carried her through the side door and into the garden, keeping to the shadows as they moved along the narrow pathway leading toward the front of the townhouse. The cool night air brushed against Cordelia’s flushed skin, bringing blessed relief after the warmth of the music room. Darkness wrapped around them in a hush broken only by the soft crunch of gravel beneath George’s boots and the distant clatter of a carriage somewhere beyond the garden walls.
She ought to have been mortified by this too.
She was being carried through the darkness in the arms of a gentleman she scarcely knew, dressed in her brother’s clothing after drinking his brandy and kissing his cheek.
There could hardly be a more complete catalog of impropriety.
Yet her awareness of scandal receded beneath an entirely different sensation.
George was warm.
