Louise Allen - Moonlight And Mistletoe

Something had got in. Or it had already been inside. Hester realised she was scanning the corners of the room as if expecting some spectral presence to be lurking there. That was as terrifying a thought as her first assumption of an intruder.

She ran her tongue over lips that were completely dry. She could not leave that sinister bouquet there; she must move it before the others saw it. Cautiously Hester gathered it up, just as there was a brisk knock at the front door.

‘I will get it!’ It was Susan, running along the hall before Hester could slip out of the dining room door. ‘Oh. Goodness… I mean, good morning, my lord. I’m not sure if Miss Lattimer is receiving yet.’

‘I would not wish to disturb Miss Lattimer, only to return this handkerchief, which, from the initials, I believe must be hers.’

‘Thank you, my lord, yes, it is Miss Lattimer’s, I am sure of it. Will you not step in and I will see if she-oh, there you are, Miss Hester.’

Left with no option but to put a good face on it, Hester stepped out into the hallway. ‘Good morning, my lord, how kind of you to take the trouble.’ Conscious of her unpleasant burden already crumbling into brown flakes in her hands she chatted on determinedly. ‘Such a pleasant dinner last night; I meant to ask you if you had lured your London chef down to the country or whether you have been fortunate in finding local staff.’

It was hopeless. The blue gaze was fixed on the roses as he said lightly, ‘I am glad you enjoyed it, I will tell Maxim; he insists on accompanying me, apparently in the belief that I would starve else. Not that that devotion to duty prevents him from moaning almost continuously about the conditions into which I have dragged him.’

‘That must be very tiresome,’ Hester said.

‘It is not I who has to listen to him,’ Guy responded. ‘You appear to have an admirer with a very strange taste in flowers, Miss Lattimer.’ Was it her imagination or was there an odd note in his voice?

‘They are dead, my lord.’

‘I can see that.’

‘Flowers do die,’ Hester stated briskly.

‘Let us crown ourselves with rosebuds, before they be withered,’ Guy murmured vaguely. ‘I wonder where that comes from? The Bible, possibly. But flowers in water do not die like that; these are uniformly crisp and brown and have been deliberately set to dry, or possibly hung up.’

‘These had been put aside and forgotten,’ Hester retorted, knowing she was becoming flustered. ‘Susan, take them, please, and throw them away.’ She thrust the tattered bunch into her maid’s hands and confronted Guy as Susan made her way down the hail, trying to keep the crumbing stems intact.

‘As I was saying, my lord…’

‘Guy. I thought we had agreed on Christian names when we were alone. Hester, those flowers have been dead a long time, in a house I know you have been turning out very thoroughly indeed-and you are afraid of something. Where did they come from?’

His voice was very gentle and his eyes concerned. Hester found herself being drawn in, taking one step towards him. She was a little frightened, it would be foolish to deny it. To tell him, to be held safely in those strong arms as he had held her in her bedchamber-the thought was powerfully seductive. And, after all, she knew where he had been all the time.he had been out of the Moon House. It could not possibly be any doing of Guy Westrope’s.

‘I found them in the dining room just now…’ she began hesitantly. Something sparked in that deep blue gaze and she realised that she did not know where he had been for every minute of yesterday evening; at least one of the men had been strolling in the darkened gardens after the ladies had retired. It would have taken a matter of minutes to cross the road in the glimmer of moonlight and leave the dead bouquet, provided you had access to the house. And someone had, of that she was increasingly convinced; thoughts of ghosts were absurd. Someone could come and go in the Moon House, just as they wished.

And no one else had any reason for wanting to scare her away. Something of her thoughts must have shown on her face, in her unfinished sentence. Guy’s eyes narrowed and he said almost roughly, ‘If you will not confide in me, then take care, Hester. I do not like the symbolism of those roses.’

She gathered her tumbling wits, her voice cool. ‘And I do not like attempts to scare me away from my home. I told you Guy. I will not be bought out, and I would tell whoever is behind this that I will not be scared away either.’

He caught up her meaning with a directness that astonished her. ‘You think that I would attempt to frighten you away?’ Those expressive blue eyes showed nothing but concern that she could misjudge him.

Flustered to be taken up so directly, Hester returned to the attack. ‘I did not say so. But who else wants this house?’

‘No one who has made their wishes clear, apparently.’ His voice was dispassionate. ‘But that does not mean they do not exist.’ He had moved towards her slightly and Hester stepped back into the dining room. ‘I would remind you that I made my intentions perfectly clear-and made you a generous offer of compensation.’

‘Because you thought I was an elderly lady who might be cozened by a gentleman of your standing into complying with your desires,’ Hester retorted. Her breath was coming very short and for some reason she felt quite uncomfortably hot.

Guy chuckled. ‘I thought perhaps you would be a middle- aged widow,’ he admitted. ‘But as for my desires…’ Hester knew she was blushing. Of all the foolish words to have used! ‘Within one minute of seeing you I formed a strong desire to do this.’ And he took her very firmly in his arms and lowered his mouth to hers.

Hester gasped, then realised her mistake, for he took instant advantage of her parted lips to deepen the caress. Her hands clenched against his chest and she realised faintly that she might as well be pushing against the wall. Without her conscious volition her fingers opened and her palms pressed against the fine broadcloth of his coat.

He seemed to consume every sense; the taste and the scent of him were novel and dangerously male. Her hearing was blurred by the sound of her own heartbeat, fast and excited. The feel of his mouth gently, but inexorably, roused her to trembling, yielding surrender in his arms. Her eyes fluttered open and she was hazily aware of the texture of his skin, the curl of his hair at the temple.

How long she might have stayed there in Guy’s arms she had no idea. There was a crash from the kitchen region and a wail from Susan and the next thing she knew Hester was standing unsupported against the dining-room door frame. Guy regarded her with eyes that seemed to spark sapphire fire and she hastily dropped her gaze to find herself staring at his mouth. The sensual curve of that was even worse. Anger seemed the only way to retrieve the situation.

‘My lord! That was outrageous!’

‘I thought it delightful,’ Guy remarked, taking a precautionary step backwards as Hester advanced towards him wrathfully.

‘I know exactly what you are about, my lord,’ she snapped, now too angry and flustered to be cautious. ‘You think you can flirt with me until I become too befuddled to resist your proposals and agree to sell the Moon House to you. Or else until I compromise myself in the eyes of local society and have to sell.’

‘Hester, I promise I would never do anything to compromise you. And if I were intending to seduce you into selling to me, I would not do anything so fatal to my chances as kissing you in your own front room. See how angry it has made you.’

‘Oh, you are insufferable,’ Hester stormed. ‘Out!’ She stood, elbows akimbo while Guy opened the front door and, with a slight bow, removed himself.

He stood for a moment on the doorstep, reviewing the last few minutes. So much for his idea of seducing Hester Lattimer out of the Moon House. He had thought that a discreet flirtation might awaken her to the idea that life in London would, after all, be pleasant. He had no idea what it was that had sent an attractive and well-bred young lady hastening into rural seclusion, but he had some confidence that talk of balls and parties, fashionable shopping and promenades, combined with flattering male attention, would persuade her to change her mind.

Guy jammed his hat on his head with some force and strode down the garden path. And what did l do? he demanded inwardly. Kissed her straight out. Idiot. ‘Idiot,’ he repeated out loud, fortunately to an empty street. No wonder she was angry, she was a virtuous young lady. And an enchantingly sensual and responsive one at that.

Guy turned and strode across the Green with no destination in mind, but a pressing need for action. That flash of feeling as his lips touched hers… as if her mouth was made for his. Angrily he kicked a stone out of the road. Dalliance with respectable young ladies was not in his plans.

And this particular respectable, sensual, angry young lady was also, he now realised, a very brave and stubborn one. Those roses had shaken her but she was not going to give into her fear-which was a dangerous choice to make. Money, fear, seduction had all failed: what did that leave? Kidnapping?

H ester retreated into the living room in a state of shock. ‘You let him kiss you,’ she scolded herself. Then, with unquenchable honesty, ‘You kissed him back.’ She had been unnerved by those roses, of course, but that was no excuse for positively wanton behaviour. What would Guy think of her now? She smiled grimly-that was all too easy to answer.

She had been kissed before by amorous young officers when she had been in Portugal. She had always found those hopeful advances both easy to repel and equally easy to forget; this was different. Her relationship with John had been, whatever his indignant family might choose to believe, entirely platonic and gave her no yardstick to compare Guy’s caresses against. Trying to ignore the sensations that were assaulting her body, Hester forced herself to think about the dead flowers instead.

Someone was trying to frighten her and, she had to admit, they had succeeded. Now, with the distance of time and a shattering kiss between that first discovery and now, Hester was ready to believe that there was some human mind at work here. Resolutely she pushed all thoughts of the numerous Gothic novels she had read behind her and tried to concentrate on who might wish her out of the Moon House.

Lord Buckland-she refused to think of him more familiarly-was the obvious, in fact the sole, candidate. Yet her instincts were telling her to trust him, if only in the matter of the Moon House.

‘Miss Hester-breakfast is ready. I called ten minutes ago.’ It was Susan, looking hot and flustered; so flustered, in fact, that she was unlikely to recognise signs of agitation in her mistress.

‘Did you?’ Hester asked vaguely. Her fingers were against her lips; she removed them hastily. ‘I did not hear you. I did hear a crash.’

‘I dropped the platter,’ Susan admitted. ‘Ham and eggs. And it’s the devil… I mean, it is very hard to get the grease up off those flagstones.’

‘I am sure it is,’ Hester agreed, following the maid out.

Jethro and Miss Prudhome were already seated at the kitchen table, but it was obvious that more was wrong than a simple accident with the food. Miss Prudhome was sitting poker-backed on her hard chair, obviously under the influence of powerful emotion; her sharp nose was pink and her eyes looked suspiciously damp behind their sheltering pince-nez.

Jethro was flushed and embarrassed and Hester’s entrance interrupted him in mid self-justification. ‘…mean to criticise you, Miss Prudhome, I just said there was talk in the village. I never meant you to overhear me.’

‘What is going on?’ Hester demanded. ‘Susan, please pour the coffee, it seems we all need it.’ Certainly I do, she admitted inwardly, pressing her fingers to lips which she was sure must be betrayingly red and swollen.

‘I am a failure,’ Miss Prudhome blurted out. ‘I should never have presumed to think I could be a fitting companion.’

‘Nonsense,’ Hester said, more robustly than she felt. In truth, her heart was sinking; unsatisfactory as she was, Miss Prudhome was all that stood between her and scandal, for no young unmarried woman could set up home without chaperonage. ‘Now, drink your coffee while Jethro repeats whatever it was he said to start this.’

Jethro went redder, shot a sideways look at Hester and muttered defensively, ‘Of course, you’d expect a bit of talk with a new arrival.’

‘Yes?’ Hester enquired with a sinking feeling. ‘Talk you heard at the Bird in Hand, I suppose? Go on.’