“Despite your title, ma’am,” he said, “and the impressive fact that you are the third cousin-in-law once removed of the Earl of Hardford, you seem not to have overcome what must be Tidmouth’s total disregard for women. He undoubtedly belongs to an inferior subspecies of the human race, and one must pity his wife and daughters, if there are such persons. But the fact remains that you need his services, since he appears to have no competition for at least fifty miles around. I need his services too. Without them I might be doomed to having to offer you my continued hospitality here at Hardford Hall for another year or more.”
That took the wind out of her sails. His too, actually. He was never rude to women. Well, almost never. Only to this one woman, it seemed.
“You are no gentleman, Lord Hardford,” she said.
He might not have proved her right if she had not been close—entirely her own doing, since he had not moved an inch away from the sideboard. But she was close, and he did not even have to stretch his arm to the full in order to curl his hand about the nape of her neck. He did not have to bend very far forward in order to set his mouth to hers.
He kissed her.
And he did not need even the fraction of one second to know that he had made a big mistake.
From her point of view it was certainly that. She broke off the kiss after perhaps two seconds and cracked him across one cheek with an open palm.
And from his point of view—he wanted her. But she was the most inappropriate woman to want he could possibly have chosen—except that he had not chosen. That would be preposterous. She was the marble lady.
His cheek stung and his eye watered. It was a new experience. He had never before been slapped across the face.
“How dare you.”
He owed her a groveling apology—at the very least.
“It was only a kiss,” he said instead.
“Only—” Her eyes widened. “That was no kiss, Lord Hardford. That was an insult. It was insufferable. You are insufferable. And I suppose you paid Mr. Tidmouth for half of my roof?”
“In my experience,” he said, “half a roof is more or less useless.”
“I can well afford the whole thing,” she told him.
“So can I,” he assured her. “You will note, ma’am, that I pandered to your pride sufficiently to leave half the bill unpaid.”
She stared at him. She was probably admiring her handiwork. He did not doubt that his cheek bore the scarlet imprint of her palm and all five fingers. It was still stinging like the devil. He would be wise not to provoke her in the future.
“Shall we agree to the compromise?” he asked her.
“It will be the greatest of pleasures,” she said, “to move back into my own house. For me as well as for you.”
“You see?” he said. “When we try hard enough, we can come to mutual agreement on more than one theme. How bad is smuggling in this part of the world? Would you like some wine?”
“Yes,” she said after a small hesitation.
She took her glass from him after he had poured the wine, but she did not move away toward a chair.
“My father-in-law liked his brandy,” she told him, “as do most of the gentlemen in this part of the world. He saw no wrong in defrauding the government of some taxes and tariffs. He saw customs officials and riding officers as the natural enemy of freedom and luxury, while the smugglers were heroes upholding the right of a gentleman to the best brandy his money could buy.”
“This house is close to the sea,” he said. “Its cellars were used to store smuggled goods, I suppose?”
“Close, but not close enough,” she said, swirling the wine in her glass for a moment before lifting it to her lips.
“The dower house?”
She raised her eyes to his. “You may have noticed,” she said, “that it is not far from that precipitous path to the beach. There are steps and a doorway on the side of the house facing the sea that lead directly to the cellar. I insisted upon having every item of contraband removed and the door blocked up from inside and out before I went to live there. Father-in-Law saw to it. He was fond enough of me to want me to be safe and not endangered in any way by all that viciousness. And he knew that Dicky had always been vehemently opposed to allowing smuggling on Hardford land and the products of smuggling in the dower house.”
Well. Interesting.
“Viciousness?”
“It is not a romantic business,” she said, “despite all the stories to the contrary that you parodied on the way home.” She drained her glass and set it down on the sideboard. “Good night, Lord Hardford. And if you ever try to kiss me again, I will reply with my fist rather than my open hand.”
He grinned at her. “A tactical error, Lady Barclay,” he said. “One never forewarns an adversary. To forewarn is to forearm.”
She turned and left him. She closed the door quietly behind her. Not for Lady Barclay any unbridled passion or slammed doors.
His cheek was still stinging.
What the devil had possessed him? But if that kiss had lasted for two seconds, and he believed it had, then for at least one of those seconds she had kissed him back. It was like that laugh at the Kramer ladies’ house—blink and you missed it.
He had not blinked on either occasion.
When was marble not marble? And why was marble marble? Especially when it was not actual marble but a woman. Why was she marble? There must be thousands of women who had been widowed by the Napoleonic Wars. If they had all turned to marble forever after, England would be a marble nation, or half marble anyway. There would still be human men, he supposed. Pretty frustrated human men.