“We shall have to soldier on and consider this cloud’s silver lining.” Lara paused, entertained by her pun.
“There is no silver lining in this cloud, Lara. Only a flooded road and a man who is far too observant for his own good.”
“Nonsense!” Lara said. “This means he will have additional time to work in the statuary! Perhaps this turn of events will speed his process!”
Isabel doubted it.
“And you forget the most important part,” Jane added.
“Which is?”
“As long as the road is flooded, we are free of Viscount Densmore.”
Isabel considered the words. Jane wasn’t incorrect. There were not many worse things than Lord Nicholas being trapped at Townsend Park … but Densmore’s arrival was one of them.
“Perhaps Lord Nicholas can provide us with information on the viscount?” Gwen’s whisper echoed through the stables.
“I would rather Lord Nicholas not have any further insight into our troubles,” Isabel said. “It is bad enough that we are stuck with him for the evening.”
Particularly bad for her.
“They seem to be good men,” Lara said, drawing the attention of the rest of the group.
Gwen said, “Do they? ”
“Well, I have not spent any length of time with Lord Nicholas …” Lara hedged, “but Mr. Durukhan … seems charming.”
“Charming,” Kate repeated.
“Yes. Charming. Well, nice. Nice enough, at least.”
They all studied Lara for a long moment, until she turned away to give her attention to one of the large horses that had arrived with the objects of their discussion. The movement betrayed her, and the women looked to one another, each confirming the others’ suspicions.
“Lara,” Isabel teased, happy for the distraction from her own troubles, “has the giant captured your attention? ”
Lara looked back at them, wide-eyed. “I did not say that!”
“You did not have to,” Kate said. “It’s clear from the rose in your cheeks.”
And it was. Isabel watched as Lara opened her mouth then closed it, and immediately understood her cousin’s struggle. She knew precisely what it was to be so turned around by a man she had met merely a day earlier.
“I heard Lord Nicholas call him Rock yesterday,” Kate said. “It seems an apt name for such a massive creature.”
Lara thought for a while before responding, simply, “He has kind eyes.”
Isabel grinned at the description of the enormous Turk, wondering how long it would be before her guests had ensorcelled every woman in the house. After all, these were not the same kind of men that the residents of Minerva House were accustomed to—they were charming and handsome and intelligent…
And superior at kissing.
No. She would not consider the positive aspects of the man. In order to retain any semblance of sanity while he was in her house, risking everything for which she had worked, she must remember his overpowering arrogance, his flippant challenges, his absolutely unacceptable behavior in the attic.
Of course, she’d had no trouble accepting it at the time.
Her experiences with men were spare; aside from the shopkeepers in town and the vicar, there was little reason for her to interact with the opposite sex—particularly unmarried, eligible Londoners with wide shoulders and arms like steel and eyes bluer than any should be.
No.
She had spent her life eschewing wealthy, charming men-about-town who captured the eye of every female in the vicinity with their perfectly tied cravats and quick, easy smiles. Men who delighted in robbing others of their happiness.
Men like her father.
Men who ultimately ruined everything. Who made mockeries of their marriages, who turned starry-eyed women who had once loved them into desperate, self-loathing females who would do anything to find a reason for the loss of their husbands.
And then Lord Nicholas St. John had arrived, all handsome face and imperious arrogance, and she had expected him to be one of them. And, instead, he had agreed to help her, he had put himself in harm’s way to ensure her safety, had assured her that her problems could be overcome—all in the span of a few hours.
No wonder he made her so nervous. There was nothing about this man that was normal. Nothing that even came close to what normal meant to Isabel.
Now he was stuck in her house. A guest. Among two dozen women, hiding from any number of evils that might come down around them.
And, to make matters worse, he’d kissed her.
Not that she had stopped him from kissing her. Or even considered doing so.
For years, she had dreamed of what her first kiss would be like. She had considered it in countless places, with any number of faceless, nameless men, each one a hero in his own right, as part of professions of love, proposals of marriage, and other fantasies that plagued young, innocent girls.
And all the while, she’d known there was no point in the dreams. Because heroes did not exist. And there was no truth to the idea that love completed women. Indeed, in her experience, love only lessened women—made them pained and desolate and weak.
She did not want that.
And yet, in Lord Nicholas’s arms, she had glimpsed that ephemeral promise—that temptation—that came with being the focus of all his attention. And in that moment, she had been a girl again, dreaming of her first kiss.
She had never imagined, however, that her first kiss would be with a virtual stranger, in the musty attic of her ancestral home, after nearly toppling off a roof.
To be fair, she also hadn’t imagined her first kiss would be quite so very wonderful.