ELEVEN
Cecily threw the words at Lord Matthias like a blow. Like a cudgel.
Anything, really, to get him to flinch from her and leave. Anything to calm the hummingbird flutter of her terrified heart.
Instead, a frown appeared between his brows. “My list?”
“Yes! Your list! The one with your aspirations. Hansen requested help brushing your coats and . . .” She permitted her snooping to dangle off ellipses.
A blush engulfed his face, violent red and incandescent. He did his habitual odd staring, eyes focusing on a point beyond her head.
Silence.
In her experience, embarrassed men lashed out in violence or made a hasty retreat. She would place money on Lord Matthias being of the retreat variety. But her muscles tensed, as violence always remained a possibility.
He swallowed. A sharp slide of his Adam’s apple up and down before his eyes returned to hers.
She saw torment there.
“I see,” he said.
That was all. No recrimination. No accusation.
Just a quiet acceptance.
Which, Cecily discovered, was the absolute worst thing he could do.
She felt terrible.
As if she had kicked a puppy and rubbed salt in a wound, all in the same clichéd breath.
Guilt sat heavy in her lungs. This man had only ever shown her patience and kindness.
“Your goals are nothing to be ashamed of, my lord—a wife, a family, and a purpose for your life.” She hugged her arms to her chest and stamped her feet, toes numb in her boots. The chill did deepen with each passing minute. “Everyone should have the opportunity to claim such things.”
“Of course.” But his tone hung with self-doubt. Zephyrus nudged his shoulder again. Absently, his lordship rubbed the beast’s forelock.
“I c-could help,” she said, the words slipping free.
“Pardon?”
“I could help you with your list . . . if you’d like. I’ve spent time around ladies and know a great deal . . .” More ellipses.
Silence.
“Why?” he asked. “Why would you help me?”
“It’s merely . . .” Cecily rallied her courage. “. . . I know what it’s like to want something that feels unattainable. And it seems a shame for ye to not accomplish yours.”
He stared at her long enough that she worried he might ask her about her own unattainable desires.
“I am not . . .” Deep breath. “I do not think any amount of help will remedy my . . . deficiencies.”
The despair in his voice pained her. A spark of the Cecily Moulton she had been still lived within her breast, because instead of retreating, she countered him.
“If I may be truthful, my lord, I don’t think your arm is the deficiency you see it as.”
“I wasn’t referring to my arm.” He spared her a faint smile. “We both know my missing forearm is merely one drop—” He glanced to the raincloud overhead. “—in the storm that is my shortcomings.”
“I beg to disagree.”
His mouth twisted, and rather than respond to her comment, he changed the subject.
“I gather that you are reluctant to sit astride a horse with me, but I’m worried about chill and encroaching gloom. If I agree to entertain your proposition, will you climb on my horse? We can continue agreeing to disagree in front of a warm fire.”
The lack of feeling in her toes had moved from uncomfortable to alarming.
But the thought of being so close to his enormous body petrified her limbs, freezing her in place.
That old nightmare, the one she had supposed vanquished, loomed large—George’s snarl and towering rage.
How could she force her stiff limbs to willingly touch a male body?
He misread her hesitation as capitulation.
“Where would you be most comfortable?” he asked. “Before me or behind? If you sit before, I could let you hold the reins.”
“I haven’t agreed to do this,” she gritted out through her tight jaw.
He made no reply. Just waited.
Grrr.
Honestly.
His patience was equal measures remarkable and frustrating.
Fine.
Behind him, and she would be out of easy reach of his arm, but the position would be less warm. Before him, and he would surround her in heavenly warmth, not to mention that holding the reins would allow her control. However, his body would cage her.
Well, that decided matters.
“I’ll sit behind,” she said.
He nodded, as if it made no difference to him. With his same astonishing show of strength, he swung himself into the saddle and stretched down his left hand.
“If you can reach a foot into the stirrup, I’ll pull you up.”
Five seconds later, Cecily was seated behind Lord Matthias’s imposing shoulders, her heart flinging itself against her ribcage in a desperate bid to flee.
You are safe, she chanted, pushing down her fear. You control events here.
Lord Matthias couldn’t raise a fist to her from this position. She couldn’t see his face or expression.
She felt the slight shift of his weight that signaled Zephyrus to ride on. Like all exceptional riders, the reins were more a point of gentle contact and communication rather than the main source of his lordship’s control.
Zephyrus’s gait was even despite the sloppy road, but Cecily struggled to hold her body away from Lord Matthias’s torso. The ride would be easier if she leaned into him, perhaps even held on to his greatcoat.
Did she have the courage to do so?
The humble words of his list flitted through her brain, followed closely by the image of his scalding blush as she confessed to reading it.
This behemoth of a man was the very definition of an innocent.
The chasm of experience between him and Cecily slightly thawed the fear freezing her veins, and the thinnest thread of trust slipped in.
Slowly, she pulled herself closer to him, a hand reaching to clutch the heavy fabric of Lord Matthias’s greatcoat. Entreating the heavens for verve, she gently sank forward, her body closing the gap between his.
Matt barely suppressed a sharp inhale as Cecily’s fingers clenched his coat and her chest pressed into his back, cheek tucking between his shoulder blades.
The show of trust nearly unmanned him. He had expected her to remain rigidly upright for the entirety of the ride—inches from falling off, terrified, and braced for attack. But true to her courageous self, she had rallied.
Tender admiration flooded his veins.
Thankfully, the rain had stopped entirely, but a chill breeze had kicked up. He burrowed into his coat and cleared his throat. “If your hands are cold, you are welcome to slip them into the warmth of my pockets.”
The words had scarcely left his lips before her wee fingers slipped into the deep pockets of his greatcoat.
She was all but hugging him—touching him of her own volition.
He swallowed and momentarily closed his eyes against the sensation.
Not once in the entirety of his existence had he held more than the gloved hand of a woman who was not a relative. To feel so much of a woman’s body at once . . . and Cecily Moulton of all people . . .
The Matthias of a decade past would have toppled from his horse in stupefaction at Cecily Moulton riding behind him, clinging to his waist.
As the minutes wore on and she sank deeper into him, he feared his heart would give out, it pounded so fiercely. The pillowy softness of her body against his spine. The squeeze of her wee hands at his side. The scalding heat of her touch.
That same hunger stirred within him, twining along his limbs. A lost creature smelling water after years in a desert.
This might be the only time in his life he experienced the embrace of a woman, but how he wanted more!
A true embrace of affection and love. To feel the press of her body and sense the lift of her lungs and to understand with a visceral knowledge that she too lived—skin warm, pulse quickening at his touch.
More specifically, he wanted to experience it with his Cecily, as he was coming to think of her.
But even as the thought and yearning filled him, he knew the dream to be impossible. The reasons were legion.
She was his housekeeper. Any familiarity between them, even of the most innocent variety, would threaten her reputation.
This horse ride back to Avoch already hovered at the edges of propriety, as she had noted.
More importantly, the uneven balance of power in their relationship meant she could not truly acquiesce to a friendship.
The risk of her possible termination would prohibit an equal connection.
And even if she were no longer in his employ, her fear of men remained an obstacle. This afternoon had certainly proved it. Though her face as she had spoken that word—unattainable—had hung with longing. So perhaps there was hope.
But supposing, by some sword-edged miracle, he managed to woo her in a clumsy but ultimately effective manner, marriage would still be unthinkable. Gray would see to it. A duke’s son did not marry a widowed housekeeper, no matter her station at birth.
No. Cecily was lost to Matt before they even had hope of a beginning. He would need to set his sights on another lady. Who and how . . . he had nary a clue.
His skin flushed hot anew when he contemplated Cecily reading his list—the humiliating simplicity of his meager goals and the ineptitude they implied.
But if he wished to succeed in wooing a lady—any lady, Cecily or otherwise—he would need help improving his manner and conversation.
And her assistance might be an acceptable way to establish a more true friendship between themselves.
But such an undertaking would need to be transactional. The imbalance of power between them demanded it.
“I should like to help ye.” Her words were muffled at his back.
The lass must have sensed his thoughts.
“I would need to give you something in return. A boon of your asking.”
“Whatever for? I am already in your employ.”
That was precisely the problem. “Yes, but assisting me in this matter plays no part in your responsibilities as housekeeper. You might feel your attempts to reform my manners could jeopardize your employment. Or, at the very least, I am taking advantage of your expertise. And I would dislike that.”
Had he truly decided to do this?
She shifted against his spine. “Perhaps I wish an excellent letter of recommendation for any future employment.”
“As I said, I would never hold your employment hostage. I shall provide you with a letter tomorrow, if it will ease your worry.”
Questions tickled his tongue: Do you anticipate a future need for employment? Why haven’t you attempted to return to your old life? My sister says the scandal of your leaving isn’t well-known. Why is that?
He swallowed back each query.
“A letter of recommendation is hardly adequate compensation for your help in reforming my manner,” he said. “You must request something more substantial.”
A pause.
“Can I ponder it before I give an answer?”
“Of course.”
He would agree to anything she asked.
She fell quiet, her weight settling more firmly against him. They rode on in silence, her torso swaying against his.
Evening had arrived by the time Matt and Cecily rode into the stable courtyard of Avoch Castle. Matt feared for Cecily’s health, she was so still at his back. They were both damp and chilled to the core. But as soon as the castle appeared, she rallied and sat upright.
Forbes came running when he heard hoofs on the gravel, an undergroom at his heels.
“We were about to saddle up and go looking for ye, my lord,” Forbes said.
“Never fear, my good man. I stumbled upon Mrs. Armstrong with Jura, who had gone lame. It took us a moment to return. We’re both rather chilled.” An understatement that. He had lost all feeling in his toes.
Matt offered his arm to Cecily behind him. She looped fingers through his elbow and half-swung, half-slid off Zephyrus into Forbes’s reaching hands. Her knees buckled when her feet touched the ground, but she righted herself quickly and stepped away from Forbes.
“Thank ye for the rescue, my lord,” she said to Matt through lips gone blue from the cold.
“I’m glad I happened along.” He swung from the saddle, flexing his stiff knuckles.
“As for the other matter . . .” She waited until he looked at her. “I think hosting a dinner party would be a lovely idea, my lord. Perhaps, we could meet tomorrow to go over possibilities?”
Matt blinked, as they certainly had discussed no such thing. But looking into her pleading eyes, he realized she was indirectly asking to speak with him alone . . . to perhaps begin his training.
“Excellent.” He nodded on a swallow. “We shall speak tomorrow then.”