Page 16 of Marry Me…Maybe?
‘You shaved,’ she said, sounding surprised.
‘I have been known to behave like a human being sometimes.’
‘It suits you. Your face. It’s a good face.’
He gave her a baffled smile. ‘I’m pleased to hear it.’ Despite his reluctance to let her get to him, he found her overt appreciation of him uplifting.
‘I mean, stubble looks great on you, but you have a strong, manly jaw, so you look good without it too. Very good, in fact.’
He shifted uncomfortably, not sure what to do with the compliment. ‘Okay, well, if you’ve finished assessing my face, perhaps we should get on with this thing.’
She flashed him a grin. ‘I’m finished.’
‘Are you ready to meet my mother?’
She jumped off the stool and straightened her skirt. ‘As I’ll ever be.’
‘Okay, then, let’s do it.’
As they strode together towards the house Emily couldn’t help but take another sneaky look at Theo out of the corner of her eye. He looked so different without his stubble – younger and brighter somehow, as if the devil had left him.
Not that it made him any less attractive.
Once he’d inserted his key into the lock and pushed the heavy door open, she slid her hand into his and held on tightly so he couldn’t shake her off.
‘We’re a devoted couple, completely in love, remember?’ she muttered when he scowled at her in annoyance.
He had to be the least tactile person she’d ever met – something she felt compelled to work on with him. No wonder his mother thought he’d never settle down with a woman if he treated them all as coldly as he did her.
They both looked up as a figure appeared at the top of the stairs and began to make her way down towards them.
‘What do I call your mum?’ Emily hissed at him. They’d forgotten to discuss it, she realised, and she didn’t want to get a simple detail like that wrong right at the beginning. It could sow a seed of discontent, which would be hard to uproot.
‘Start with Lady Berkeley and let her correct you if she wants to. But don’t hold your breath that she will,’ he murmured back, his breath tickling her ear and making her stomach swoop with nerves just before his mother reached the bottom of the stairs andmade her stately way towards them, a look of cool interest on her face.
Emily smiled warmly. ‘Lady Berkeley, it’s wonderful to meet you at last. Theo’s told me so much about you.’ She held out her hand to the woman, who looked at it with slightly affronted disdain before offering her own.
‘Has he?’ she stated dispassionately, barely giving Emily’s hand a touch before dropping it.
‘All good things, I assure you.’
‘I doubt that.’
Ouch. The woman was as cold as ice.
Emily felt Theo shift beside her and forced her mouth into a wider smile. ‘I’m Emily,’ she said, to cover the tense silence that now hung between them all.
‘Yes, I know. Theo told me all about you.’
‘All good?’ She gave the woman a hopeful look.
The dowager countess’s mouth moved up a millimetre at each corner.
Oh, goody, another tough nut to crack. Not that she’d expected anything different from Theo’s mother – he’d given her enough warning about her.
‘What he didn’t tell me was how you’ve managed to get him to forgo his determined bachelor ways,’ Lady Berkeley said finally, pronouncing the word as if it horrified her.
‘I charmed you – didn’t I, darling?’ Emily cooed, turning to Theo and giving his hand a squeeze, appreciating the comforting strength of his solid presence next to her in the face of his mother’s unfriendliness.
