Page 16 of How to Court a Rake
He skipped another rock.
‘I am sorry, I didn’t mean to dredge up difficult memories,’ Mary apologised. ‘Perhaps you might show me how to throw a stone? Mine always sink.’
It was a very nice peace offering and Caine accepted it. ‘I think it’s all about stone selection. The right stone matters.’ He passed her one of his remaining stones. ‘See how this one is flat and smooth? Try it, hold it in your hand.’ He studied it and shook his head. ‘No, it’s too big. You need something that fits your palm.’ He bent down and poked about until he found one suitable. ‘This will be better.’
Mary laughed. He liked the sound of her laughter, so genuine, as if she laughed because something truly pleased her. ‘I had no idea size mattered.’
He gave a wicked grin, unable to resist the opening. He leaned close and breathed her in as he whispered in her ear, ‘Size always matters, Mary.’
‘You are wicked,’ she murmured, her cheeks flushing with knowledge.
‘Yes, I am.’ It was a promise, a warning of who she was doing business with. He reached for her hand that held the stone and slowly closed her fingers, one by one, around its smooth surface, his voice low as he continued instruction. ‘Hold the stone jagged side up. Now, this is where it gets tricky. Folks think the toss is all in the wrist and most of it is. We have to whip and release.’ He let go of her hand long enough to demonstrate with his own stone. ‘But it’s in your stance, too. Bend at the knees to help with the backswing.’
He moved behind her then, encircling her with his arms, his mouth at her ear, his body spooned about hers as they bent together, her hand in his as they went through the motion of whip and release. The stone sailed out across the water, bouncing once, twice, three times. ‘You did it,’ Caine complimented, stepping back from the warmth of her before his own arousal became unconcealable. Not that he was embarrassed by it, he’d long ago comes to terms with his body and its functions, but because she might be and because erections could be complicated, especially with a well-bred girl.
The closeness had affected her, too. Her cheeks were still flushed and he’d smelt the beginnings of arousal mingled with the lily and vanilla of her before he’d stepped away. ‘We should go, Mary. Your maid is waiting and I am sure your mother will be anxious to have you home.’
She took his arm although he sensed reluctance on her part to leave their bucolic surrounds. ‘It’s as if we’re returning from a holiday and with every step we take reality gradually creeps towards us like an incoming tide.’
Yes, a very apt description. Too apt. Reality called. But they held it at bay, driving back in silence. Mary clutched her wildflower bouquet in her hands and hemighthave taken a less direct route.
***
At the town house, a footman was on the lookout for her and came down the steps immediately to assist her. ‘Welcome back, my lady.’ The gesture and words made it clear that Caine was to leave Mary at the kerb.
Mary slid him an apologetic look for the implied rudeness. ‘Thank you for a wonderful drive. The fresh air has done me well, my lord.’
‘Perhaps we’ll do it again some time soon.’ Caine mustered the appropriate response, suppressing a smile at the coy apology flashed his way, as if it were them against the world. She’d grown quite bold in their short time together, or perhaps she’d always been bold and he’d merely brought it to the fore the way a gardener coaxes a rose to bloom.
Guilt pricked at him. She would need all her boldness in the weeks to come if his concerns over her father bore out. He’d never so fervently wished to be wrong as he did now. She had enough on her plate with her own problems. She did not need him to add another. Nor did she deserve his betrayal. The more he encouraged her interest and indulged his, the more deceived she would feel if…if her father had betrayed his friends and in some ways his country and Caine was forced to be the bearer of that bad news.
Chapter Nine
Curiosity was one thing. Encouragement was another. Mary was in danger of overstepping that carefully drawn boundary. She could allow herself some private curiosity about Caine Parkhurst in the solitude of her bedchamber. But she should not encourage him in public.
Yet today had been spectacular. The ordinary had become extraordinary all because of a vase of flowers and a tool through the park—things she’d experienced many times over her Seasons. She was used to bouquets and callers, used to rides through the park and strolls with gentlemen. But nothing had prepared her for Caine Parkhurst’s way of doing things.
She hummed a bit under her breath, twirling the little wildflower posey in her hand as she climbed the stairs to her chamber, the thrill of the afternoon still lingering. How dashing he’d been in the drawing room, pushing aside the protests of the Earl’s heir with his words to establish his place at her side. She’d felt as if she was at the centre of a fairy tale, special, swept off her feet.
Normally, when a man looked at her, she could see him calculating the pound notes. When Caine Parkhurst looked at her, there was something else entirely in his eyes—secret promises, mysteries to uncover, decadence to explore and an invitation to traverse all of it together with an experienced guide beside her. What a temptation he posed against the backdrop of her current circumstance.
She must choose a husband, but they all seemed lacklustre when measured against Caine. None of them made her pulse race, her blood heat, her mind challenged. Yet she could expect nothing from him. He did not wish to marry, a wish he clung to so strongly that he was willing to forgo a hereditary marquessate. The universe was playing games with her again. Of course she was attracted to the one man who had no intentions of marrying when she must absolutely marry and soon.
‘You’re happy, my lady.’ Her maid came up behind her, having stopped for a moment downstairs to exchange a word with a footman. ‘Shall I take your wildflowers and find a vase for them?’
‘No, no vase for these. I’ll see to them myself.’ Mary already had a container in mind for them. Once inside her room, she took a clear glass jar down from a shelf and poured some of the fresh water from her washing ewer into it. ‘There,’ she pronounced, putting the flowers in the jar and setting it on her dressing table. Like magic and fairy tales, they wouldn’t last long, a day or two at most. She would dry them and press them later to keep as reminder of the day she was a princess for an afternoon with a most inappropriate man and how she’d thrilled to it, how she’d felt alive perhaps for the first time.
‘They’re pretty, my lady…’ Minton paused to appreciate them ‘…especially the deep pink ones.’
Mary studied the posey of Sweet William. ‘Hmm, there’s something missing.’ She opened a drawer and pulled out her box of ribbons. She held up one length and then another, considering, before she settled on a dark rose. ‘This one, I think.’
‘Very nice, my lady,’ Minton complimented. ‘You’ve got so many interesting gentlemen.’ She stepped into the wardrobe and Mary could hear her rummaging through the gowns.
‘Just one interesting gentleman,’ Mary replied absently, still allowing her mind to exist in the throes of the afternoon, replaying every word, every nuance of their conversation which had been as scintillating as last night’s kiss. She’d never talked with a man the way she’d talked to Caine Parkhurst. ‘The others in the drawing room were just the same as always.’
Minton reappeared with two gowns in hand. ‘And the one coming to dinner tonight, my lady. Your father’s special guest. Do you prefer the cream or the pale pink? There’s the theatre to follow dinner, so perhaps the pale pink and the opal set. We can do your hair with the tiara.’
Mary hardly heard Minton’s suggestions. Her mind was fixated on the first announcement. Her father had a guest for dinner? Just one. There was no one else invited. It was the first she’d heard of it. The implications were unnerving. A single man coming without his wife meant only one thing: he was being invited explicitly to meet her. Going on to the theatre with them meant he was also being encouraged to spend time with her. This man was meant to be one of her father’s candidates for her hand. The realisation was horrifying.
