Chapter 8
Chapter Eight
The weather station turned out to be a small greenhouse, converted into an odd kind of laboratory, with tables set inside around the edges to form a U shape.
A weathervane with a running fox on the top had been positioned on the roof, and Dev glanced up at it before they stepped through the small doorway.
“Easterly wind today,” he noted.
“Is that good or bad?”
“It means we’re in for more cold weather. Ice, maybe even some snow.”
“Oh, lovely,” Livvy muttered sarcastically, stomping her booted feet to keep the blood flowing to her toes. She hated being cold. A brisk walk in the frosty air was all very well, but she much preferred being inside, curled up in a chair by the fire with a good book.
Inside the greenhouse was barely warmer than the outside, except they were shielded from the wind. The path between the tables was only one flagstone wide.
“Why try to predict the weather?” she asked. “Is it for your fields? Surely planting is a springtime thing?”
“It is,” he agreed. “But this isn’t for crops. I like to know when to expect bad weather. Traveling during a storm is stupid. The roads get horrible, and it’s not good for the horses.”
Livvy nodded, pleased that he considered the comfort and safety of his livestock. He wasn’t a complete scoundrel. “The only thing I know about weather is the old saying, “red sky in the morning, shepherd’s warning.”
“And red sky at night, shepherd’s delight,” he finished with a grin. “Although it could also mean the shepherd’s house is on fire, but nobody seems to have considered that possibility.”
She rolled her eyes at his contrariness. “Is there any truth to it?”
“There is, actually. A red sunrise usually means bad weather on the way. That’s also true if there’s a halo around the moon.”
He leaned over and used his knuckle to tap the glass of a clock-like instrument in a wooden case.
The single hand shivered, then jumped to settle between two markers on the round dial.
He leaned over to get a better look, and she tried not to notice the way his breeches tightened over his muscled thighs and backside.
“This is a wheel barometer. There’s a tube filled with mercury inside, which measures the pressure of the atmosphere. Lower pressure means a higher chance of clouds and rain.”
He pulled off his gloves, picked up a pencil from the bench, and noted the reading down in a small notebook. Livvy peered over his shoulder, intrigued by the neat rows of figures he’d recorded, and the way his strong fingers held the pencil. What would it feel like to have them stroking her skin?
She forced her eyes away. “I know this one. A thermometer.” She bent to peer at the long case propped on the opposite bench. “For air temperature. We have one in the office at King and Co. What’s this?”
He straightened and turned. His shoulder brushed hers in the enclosed space. “A hygrometer. It measures the humidity or moisture content of the air.”
Livvy snorted. “Who needs one of those? My hair tells me what the humidity’s like. It gets all frizzy if it’s hot and damp.”
His amused gaze slid to her hair, and she felt her cheeks warm. “I hardly think the gentlemen at the Royal Society would consider your hair an accurate scientific indicator. However pretty it may be.”
He gave a cough, as if to clear his throat, and tilted his head back to look at the sky above them through the glass. “Now we just have to record what sort of clouds there are.”
Livvy lifted her head and frowned upward. “Aren’t they all the same? White and puffy, like meringues?”
“Not according to a chap named Luke Howard. He wrote a scientific paper classifying them into different types.” He pointed upward, his hand almost touching the panes.
“There are four main kinds. Cumulus, from the Latin meaning heap; they’re the piled-up puffy clouds you’re thinking of, with a flat bottom, and a top that looks like a cauliflower.
They don’t usually produce any rain. Next, there’s stratus clouds—”
“From the Latin meaning layer?” she hazarded.
He sent her a pleased look. “Someone knows their Latin.”
She shrugged. “Geology, actually. It’s the same word fossil hunters use to describe layers of rock.”
“Exactly. Well, like their name, those clouds look like horizontal layers, gray or white, like fog, only higher off the ground. They sometime bring a small amount of drizzle, or light snow.”
“And the third type?”
“Cirrus.” He looked back down at her and gave one of her curls a playful tweak. “We’re back to your hair again. Cirus means ‘tendril’ or ‘curl’. They’re soft and wispy and delicate.”
His cool fingers brushed her jaw as he pushed the stray curl behind her ear with such devastating casualness that Livvy sucked in a breath. Her body flashed hot then cold.
“They’re usually the first indication that something’s about to change. That a storm is coming,” he murmured.
His words seemed to take on a double meaning as he looked down at her, and her heart began to pound. Were things about to change between them? She certainly felt stormy inside. All swirling and volatile.
She parted her lips, turning to face him more fully, praying he’d lean down and kiss her. His gaze flicked to her mouth, and the moment of stillness stretched taut . . . but he dropped his hand and stepped back.
She swallowed a groan of disappointment.
He looked up again, deliberately avoiding her eye. “And the last kind is the nimbus. They’re the rain clouds.”
“They’re the ones that make thunderstorms?”
“Almost. Howard’s system allows for combinations of the different types, so you can have cumulonimbus—layered rain clouds. They’re the ones to watch for. They’re tall, dark, towering clouds.”
“The Lord Byron of clouds,” Livvy joked, although the description perfectly suited Dev himself, too. “Brooding and dangerous. Got it.”
He snorted, amused. “Indeed. They’re the ones responsible for all the drama; hail, lightning, thunder. They’re dark at the base and have a wide, anvil-shaped top high above.”
“I don’t see any of those today,” she said. “I think we’re safe from storms.” Of the meteorological kind, at least. “Did you ever play that game when you were younger, where you find shapes in the clouds? Dragons and eagles and crocodiles and such?”
“I did. Damien was brilliant at it. He always managed to find the most inappropriate ones, shaped like breasts, or phalluses, or pigs with giant testicles.”
“What a useful skill,” Livvy said dryly.
“He had to have one,” Dev drawled, with typical brotherly disdain. “God knows, he’s useless at everything else.”
The four Hamilton siblings were always insulting one other, and it had taken Livvy quite some time to realize that far from being cruel, it was their perverse way of showing their affection.
They might mock and scorn on a regular basis, but when it truly mattered, they’d close ranks and support each other without question.
She’d never had a brother or a sister, and she’d always longed for someone to share such teasing with, for someone who’d fight in her corner, whatever the odds.
Dev huffed out a deep breath and grabbed his gloves from the bench, then indicated for her to precede him out of the door. “That’s all I needed to do here. Let’s go back via the lake.”
Livvy turned in the narrow space, acutely aware of the woody scent of his cologne and the heat of his body behind her.
She was tempted to stop and pretend to tie her shoelace, just so he’d bump into her, then chided herself for being so silly.
God, he made her feel like an eighteen-year-old, full of ridiculous schemes to get his attention.
He’d already said she could have his attention. And more. But was she brave enough to ask?