asleep anywhere, at any time, and she drank like a fish. Hecuba had “fortified” herself for their shopping excursion with liberal amounts of ratafia.
“I begin to suspect that your aunt’s reputation owed less to a natural wantonness than to a proclivity for the vine,” Thomas said. “Tell me, is she often in this state at Bellingcourt?”
“No, most often she’s berating some poor housemaid for her supposed moral laxness. But then, Bellingcourt hasn’t boasted a wine cellar since we moved there.”
“Sometimes these things seem to be hereditary. I suggest that you, m’dear, stay firmly away from the bottle lest you end up giving away your trump card before even playing the hand.”
Cat gave a companionable snort. “Not likely, sir. I shall guard my suspect tendencies till after Strand is firmly delivered to the altar. Then, no doubt, I shall fall into a perpetually disreputable state. Though a properly wedded one.”
“Just so,” Thomas answered with what seemed to Cat a degree of roughness. “But you will never reach that state unless you improve your skills. Now, don’t fly into the boughs, Cat. We’ve dealt well enough together these past weeks. Too well to ruin all the groundwork we’ve laid just so you might teach me another well-deserved lesson.”
It was true. Thomas treated Cat with a fond, if sometimes exasperated, familiarity. It was a course far more comfortable then the scene played out in his library. Cat
should
have been distinctly relieved. She had no desire to fall again into his dark, burning gaze. Having always prided herself on clear thinking, the not unpleasant but decidedly unfamiliar sense of imminent abandonment had shaken her. This friendship was far better, which made it hard to account for her feeling of dissatisfaction. It was ridiculous, particularly since they got along famously whether laughing over their shared taste in the absurd or discussing the various subjects in which they shared so many interests.
Thomas had become the perfect companion. She was surprised his declaration of truce had been earnest. No other man of her acquaintance, including any of her proud brothers, would have been capable of acknowledging a woman had bested him in a game of seduction. They would have sought to repair their damaged self-image, no matter what the cost. But Thomas was unlike any other man.
He had apparently had some sort of military or diplomatic career after his brief, though brilliant, one as a London rake. He spoke French with an accent indiscernible from the haughtiest Parisian aristocrat’s. He was willing to converse on any topic, from the inflammatory subject of Home Rule to the explicit one of animal husbandry. And he honestly appeared to take pleasure in her opinions and even more pleasure in their disagreements.
Once, after reviewing a treatise on rotating crops in a scientific publication he subscribed to, she had been so excited by the implications that she had hurried out to the field to enlighten him. She had found herself standing beside him, ankle deep in loamy soil, before realizing she was inappropriately dressed in a gauzy morning gown.
Thomas had not seemed to notice. He had listened to her excited litany with an earnest expression before swinging her high up in his great, powerful arms and striding with her back to the house. His embrace had been matter-of-fact though her heart had quickened at the knowledge of his unusual strength, of how carefully his arms held her.
And then there were the “lessons.” Except for that one evening, their adopted roles were strictly as mentor and pupil. The art of seduction, Cat found, was ample ground for amusement when dissected in Thomas’s wry, sardonic manner. Even here, bumping along on the way to the famous modiste, Madame Feille, the lessons continued. Thomas was attempting to teach Cat how to flirt with her eyes.
“The idea, Cat, is to send out covert messages of invitation, not to appear as though a swarm
“I begin to suspect that your aunt’s reputation owed less to a natural wantonness than to a proclivity for the vine,” Thomas said. “Tell me, is she often in this state at Bellingcourt?”
“No, most often she’s berating some poor housemaid for her supposed moral laxness. But then, Bellingcourt hasn’t boasted a wine cellar since we moved there.”
“Sometimes these things seem to be hereditary. I suggest that you, m’dear, stay firmly away from the bottle lest you end up giving away your trump card before even playing the hand.”
Cat gave a companionable snort. “Not likely, sir. I shall guard my suspect tendencies till after Strand is firmly delivered to the altar. Then, no doubt, I shall fall into a perpetually disreputable state. Though a properly wedded one.”
“Just so,” Thomas answered with what seemed to Cat a degree of roughness. “But you will never reach that state unless you improve your skills. Now, don’t fly into the boughs, Cat. We’ve dealt well enough together these past weeks. Too well to ruin all the groundwork we’ve laid just so you might teach me another well-deserved lesson.”
It was true. Thomas treated Cat with a fond, if sometimes exasperated, familiarity. It was a course far more comfortable then the scene played out in his library. Cat
should
have been distinctly relieved. She had no desire to fall again into his dark, burning gaze. Having always prided herself on clear thinking, the not unpleasant but decidedly unfamiliar sense of imminent abandonment had shaken her. This friendship was far better, which made it hard to account for her feeling of dissatisfaction. It was ridiculous, particularly since they got along famously whether laughing over their shared taste in the absurd or discussing the various subjects in which they shared so many interests.
Thomas had become the perfect companion. She was surprised his declaration of truce had been earnest. No other man of her acquaintance, including any of her proud brothers, would have been capable of acknowledging a woman had bested him in a game of seduction. They would have sought to repair their damaged self-image, no matter what the cost. But Thomas was unlike any other man.
He had apparently had some sort of military or diplomatic career after his brief, though brilliant, one as a London rake. He spoke French with an accent indiscernible from the haughtiest Parisian aristocrat’s. He was willing to converse on any topic, from the inflammatory subject of Home Rule to the explicit one of animal husbandry. And he honestly appeared to take pleasure in her opinions and even more pleasure in their disagreements.
Once, after reviewing a treatise on rotating crops in a scientific publication he subscribed to, she had been so excited by the implications that she had hurried out to the field to enlighten him. She had found herself standing beside him, ankle deep in loamy soil, before realizing she was inappropriately dressed in a gauzy morning gown.
Thomas had not seemed to notice. He had listened to her excited litany with an earnest expression before swinging her high up in his great, powerful arms and striding with her back to the house. His embrace had been matter-of-fact though her heart had quickened at the knowledge of his unusual strength, of how carefully his arms held her.
And then there were the “lessons.” Except for that one evening, their adopted roles were strictly as mentor and pupil. The art of seduction, Cat found, was ample ground for amusement when dissected in Thomas’s wry, sardonic manner. Even here, bumping along on the way to the famous modiste, Madame Feille, the lessons continued. Thomas was attempting to teach Cat how to flirt with her eyes.
“The idea, Cat, is to send out covert messages of invitation, not to appear as though a swarm
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