Page 41 of Sinfully Mine
It might have once been true, when he first arrived at Blackbird Heath. But Drew had been taking a much bigger interest in the estate, as evidenced by Jake asking Hester just this morning if Mr. Sinclair planned to walk the field of sugar beets today. He’d been doing so on a regular basis though no one had informed her.
“You have so little faith in me, Hester. Of course, I can find a barn. I managed to find an assortment of sensitive spots on you with my tongue last night, didn’t I?”
She felt the heat on her cheeks and cursed it. Looking up at him, she took in the clean-shaven jaw, the tailored coat and trousers and polished boots. Perfectly dressed, as always. “How do you manage to turn yourself out so well without a valet? Surely, you should have brought the poor soul with you from London.”
“I’ve never had a valet, Hester. It isn’t so difficult to button a shirt or pull on your own boots. A grown man should be able to dress himself without help. I’m not an infant. The cravat,” he gestured to the snowy white silk at his neck. “Now that, took some time. Not at all the same, say, as…taking off a corset.” There was a mischievous twinkle in the green of his eyes.
The heat flowed down her cheeks to her neck.
“I do so adore how you blush, Hester. Do you recall, last night, when I put my mouth—”
“Stop.” Her hands fell away from Tabby.
He shrugged, the smile still in place, as he strolled back and forth across the barn with interest.
“I take it you’ve never been in a barn before.”
“How little you think of me, Hester. First, I can’t find the barn and now you think I’ve never been inside one before. I thought I had redeemed myself. And would have this morning had you not crept out like some thief while I was sleeping. But to answer your question, I’ve been in a barn before, though not one as fine as this.”
“At Dunnings? Worth mentioned it to me. Is it a place?”
Drew’s eyes widened just slightly in surprise, before he smiled again, but this one didn’t reach his eyes. “I’m glad I had the foresight to send him back to London. Along with everyone else.”
“Even Lady Downing?” Hester asked.
“EspeciallyLady Downing. Though it pains me after—I explored every inch of you with my tongue, Hester.” His voice hardened just a bit. “That you would assume I’d allow her to stay.”
“You are rather blunt when speaking of such things.”
“I like watching you blush.” There was something indefinable lurking in his gaze as he regarded Hester. An intimacy shared between them. “And more shocking, Mrs. Ebersole was so pleased to be relieved of my London friends, shemayhave smiled at me. Or she was having a fit of apoplexy. Difficult to tell.”
Hester’s entire being felt as if a lamp had been lit inside her chest. A glowing, warm sensation that stretched out along her limbs making her fingers tingle. His doing.
Drew paced once more, pretended to examine the stone walls, then returned. “I tire of our continued hostility towards each other. I’ll admit, as foreplay, it was immensely enjoyable, but—no longer. We need to move forward in a different manner,” he said in a somber tone.
Did that mean he meant to keep Blackbird Heath with Hester as his land manager while Drew returned to London?
I don’t want him to go.
The thought of him leaving her in the countryside to resume his life, albeit as Worthington’s partner, made her stomach lurch unpleasantly.
Hester jerked up from the stool, taking hold of the pail which was only half-full of milk.
Drew took a step back. “Are you going to throw that at me?”
“And waste all this milk?” She shook her head. “Perish the thought.” Hester walked across the barn to deposit the milk. Dobbins would be by in a bit to take the large vat to later be churned to butter. Mary had three sisters who did the churning in return for a share of the butter and cheese.
“Hester.”
She emptied the pail and took him in, handsome and beautiful against the light in the barn. When had Hester decided that Drew was important to her? Well before last night, only she hadn’t wanted to contemplate what their attraction to each other might become. All she’d thought of for so long was Blackbird Heath.
“I want you.” The husky, rich words echoed against the stone walls.
The pail fell from her hands, the bits of milk still left inside spilling across the floor. There was such longing in that simple sentence, one that did not only speak of physical desire. The feeling had been there last night, but Hester hadn’t trusted it. She’d been alone for so long, it seemed impossible that now she was not.
“Now is where you say something back.”
“Have you ever explored a hayloft?” she whispered across the barn to him.
