A Mistletoe Masquerade

CHAPTER SIX

She was angry with him, but she shouldn't be-she was kissing him just as much as he was kissing her. Although it was patently obvious that Lucas had far more experience than she had. Either that or he had startling natural talent.

His mouth was hot and hard and flexible enough to drive her distracted, and his tongue was quite blatantly impertinent in its exploration. No one had ever kissed Rowan with anything like this sensual impact. And she should not be kissing him. She knew she should not.

Her fingers bumped against the underside of his hat and she felt it tip and fall off, giving her unrestricted access to his hair. It was springy between her fingers, like a live thing. At her back the tree was solid, hard and uncomfortable. At her front she was pressed against his body-almost as hard, certainly as solid, but far from uncomfortable.

Her insides were feeling very strange indeed: tense, hot, aching with an almost-pain that ran from her belly

down the inside of her thighs. This must stop…now. Or in a minute or two…

Just a few moments more. Now.

Rowan opened her eyes and pulled back with enough force to bump her head against the tree trunk a few inches behind. She found she was panting slightly, and that Lucas was, too. He did not move back. He was so close she could see where his beard was already beginning to show, despite a severe morning shave, so close she could see that there was a ring of darker blue around the indigo of his eyes. So close that the mist of their breath mingling in the cold air hung between them.

'I-' She should reprimand him. Or she should just walk away. Or say something dignified about it being both their faults and it must not happen again: for of course it must not. Instead she looked him straight in the eye and said, 'That was very nice.'

'I thought so,' Lucas said gravely. 'I suspect my hat may be ruined, but that is a small price to pay.'

'Hadn't you better look, before it gets too wet?'

'Yes.'

He did not move. It was really very pleasant, standing so close. Warm, intimate, friendly. Only her toes were becoming very cold and her inner voice was demanding to be heard. Her behaviour could be excused, just, it reminded her sternly, if the man concerned was betrothed to her. Under no circumstances could she ever have such a relationship with a valet, so she had acted purely for the pleasure of kissing him. Which was scandalously wanton and she should be ashamed of herself. But she wasn't, which was even more shameful. Her conscience nagged on, relentless.

'Oh, do be quiet,' she muttered, earning a startled look from Lucas. 'Sorry-just thinking aloud. My feet are cold.'

'Then we must go in.' This time he acted on his words, turning to pick up his tall hat and brushing the snow off it as they walked towards the kitchen garden gate. 'Where were you last employed?' he asked, abruptly changing the subject.

'With a middle-aged person-more as a companion than anything,' Rowan said, with perfect truth. 'Abroad, mostly.'

'In which country?' Lucas opened the gate onto the practical formality of the kitchen garden. Within the sheltering walls the snow lay only patchily. Men were working around the glass frames, shifting covers. One lad was picking the tight button heads of borecole off the robust stalks that leaned drunkenly in the cold earth, and a man Rowan guessed was the head gardener was supervising a delivery of coals by the stovehouse door.

'Austria.' There was no point in lying about it. If he knew she had been out of the country he was not going to ask questions about English families or houses, and she was not going to have to risk an error.

'The Congress?' he asked, and she nodded in reply. 'Interesting.'

'It certainly greatly entertained my employer.' It had entertained her as well. The endless round of balls and receptions, picnics and parties, political gossip and scandalous on dits were a world away from the careful formality of the servants' hall at dinner time. 'It seems a different world,' she added, stamping her feet on the brick path to get rid of the snow.

In Vienna now she could be going on expeditions into the forest in a horse-drawn sledge, or shopping in the luxurious stores and emporia that lined the streets. But Papa was coming home early in the New Year, and she had agreed with him that it would be best if she came on ahead and got the town house opened up.

If she had not come then she would not have known about Penny's predicament until the deed was done and her friend irrevocably married. And she would not be having this insight into the parallel world of the servants, or the freedom to indulge in her scandalous flirtation.

'I'm not sorry to be back.'

'No. Neither am I. Although I suspect I will never get warm again. I had forgotten how cold this country can be.'

'You have been abroad, too? For how long?'

'Five years. I got back a few weeks ago.'

Thank goodness. He could have had nothing to do with Lady Danescroft's death.

'I have been in the West Indies.' That explained the faint colour his skin held, as though he had been brushed lightly by the sun.

'As a valet?' The sound of the other servants arriving back met them as they rounded the edge of the stableblock and the yard behind the kitchen door came into sight.

'No. More as an estates manager. I had not expected to take this job when I returned, but it was…expedient.'

An estates manager sounded considerably more respectable than a valet. Younger sons of quite good family became estates managers. Rowan realised she was pleased by this discovery, and then, a moment later, why she was. For goodness' sake. Slightly better breeding does not excuse flirtation! Valet or younger son of a gentry family, it does not matter. I am the only child of Roland Chilcourt, third Earl of Lavenham, and I know what is due to my name. The scandal would be resounding if anyone ever found out. Acting as Penny's dresser might be excused as a prank; kissing a valet would put her beyond the pale.

Then don't get found out. She was shocking herself. She glanced at Lucas as they mingled with the other returning churchgoers, all shedding hats and wraps and stamping the snow off their feet as they trooped back into the warmth. There had been other men in her life- attractive, eligible men whom she had liked very well. Several had proposed, and with two of them she had thought long and hard before refusing. But never had she been tempted to kiss one of them. She had not felt oddly breathless with either of them, and they had certainly not disturbed her dreams in the way this man had last night.

'What are you daydreaming about, Miss Lawrence?' Miss Mather's dresser enquired acidly. 'I would have thought Miss Maylin required all your attention.'

'What? Oh, Lord-they'll be back, of course.' Rowan gathered up her outer things and hurried to the foot of the stairs. Time to do what she could to ring the changes with Penny's limited selection of afternoon gowns-and to find out what had happened in the big box pew.

She fled up the spiral stairs to her tower room, pausing to gasp for air on one of the cramped little landings. There was a stone window ledge at just the right height to rest her elbows on while she caught her breath. The view, once she had scrubbed cobwebs off the glass, was the same as they had had just now, looking out from the orchard over to the lake.

And there was their apple tree. As she watched a tall figure appeared, hung his coat over a low branch and stood for a moment, hat in hand, as though wondering what to do with it. Then, with a shrug, he tossed it over his shoulder into the snow and swung up into the tree.

Lucas. What on earth was he doing? Then she realised: he was picking mistletoe. 'Going to work his way round all the female staff, I'll be bound,' Rowan said severely. But with a small glow inside she knew it was only for her. It took only a few seconds and then he swung down again, as lithe as a lad scrumping apples, and pushed something small into his pocket.

Penny was looking somewhat pale when Rowan hurried in, trying to keep the grin off her face. She was more composed than Rowan would have expected after having been singled out by Lord Danescroft quite so conspicuously.

'Well?' Rowan demanded, whisking round her, untying bonnet strings and shaking out her cloak. 'Were you able to put him off?'

'Put him-? Oh, the tale about wagering. I tried, and he laughed and said he would wager on how many times Godmama dropped her prayer book, if I liked.'

'He laughed?' That was bad news. 'I thought you said he never smiled?'

'I know.' Penny bit her lip. 'I don't think he has been put off me.'

'Oh dear. Well, do not despair. Mr Lucas, his valet, and I are trying to think of things, but it is very hard without inventing something so frightful about you that no one would believe it, or that would ruin you utterly if it was true.'

'It is very good of you to associate with him just to help me,' Penny said, standing meekly while Rowan unbuttoned her morning dress and lifted it over her head.

Rowan paused, dress in hand, and regarded her friend through narrowed eyes. 'Penelope Maylin, are you teasing me?'

'A bit,' Penny admitted with the ghost of a smile. 'Mr Lucas is very good-looking.'

'Well, that makes two of you who think so,' Rowan said tartly. 'And for goodness' sake, Penny-as if I'd flirt with a valet!'

'I expect you would for my sake,' Penny said loyally.

'He has been in the West Indies as some kind of estates manager.' Rowan took out all three afternoon dresses and scrutinised them. 'I don't think he is really a valet at all.'

'What about the amber one?' Penny asked. 'I can wear it with the kid slippers and the paisley shawl Stepmama lent me.' They lifted it over her head and she emerged, shaking out her hair. 'Perhaps Lucas is a Bow Street Runner, employed to discover the real murderer?'

'At a house party?' Rowan asked sceptically, wondering distractedly if it was better or worse to be attracted to a Runner rather than a valet.

Penny looked downcast at this reception of her theory, and they brooded silently while Rowan found the slippers and Penny sat at the dressing table and began to brush her hair. 'Do you think it looks better down?' she asked after a few minutes, twisting ringlets round her fingers.

Rowan studied the reflection in the mirror. 'It does, actually. In fact it suits you very well. But we cannot do it that way-the last thing you want is for him to find you attractive.'

'No, I suppose not.'

Rowan took over the brush and concentrated on piling Penny's hair up into her usual arrangement.

'I might wear it like that at the ball, though. How will you dress your hair?'

'I'm not going to any ball, silly.'

'There's the Servants' Ball. Miranda Fortescue says they always have one at Tollesbury Court. Lord Fortescue lights the great Yule log in the hall on Christmas morning, then the family all go over to Lady Fortescue's family at Deddington Manor a few miles away, to spend the whole of Christmas Day, and the servants have a proper ball in the evening. Lord Fortescue even hires in waiters, so the footmen and butler can join in. And then on the twenty-sixth the Fortescues have a St Stephen's Day Ball here and invite all the neighbouring families.'

'Well, I haven't got a thing with me, and you haven't got a second-best ball gown I can borrow.' Just for a second Rowan had seen an image of herself dancing with Lucas, the expression on his face when he saw her in all her finery…

'But your things are just down at the inn in the village, aren't they?' Penny demanded. 'Along with Alice and Kate.'

'Of course!' Rowan pushed in the last hair pin. 'How on earth could I have forgotten? And there I was fretting about how to get that red wine stain out of the cuff of your white organza while all the time we have our own highly accomplished dressers just down the road. It is very remiss of me. I do hope they are comfortable there.'

'Well, it seemed a good inn when we dropped them off with your luggage,' Penny said, slipping a plain gold bangle over her hand. 'And Dorritt and the carriage have gone back there-he would be sure to come and

let us know if it was not respectable. It would be good if they can do something about that stain.'

'I'll walk down tomorrow, taking a basket, and see what they can do with it. If I take a big basket I can bring something back to wear at the Servants' Ball.'

'A very big basket,' Penny observed, pinching her cheeks to get some colour up. 'There's the gown and your petticoats, and silk stockings and slippers, and a shawl and some hair ornaments and jewellery…'

'Nothing too fancy-and not jewellery,' Rowan said. 'This is the Servants' Ball, don't forget.'

'You will look lovely, and your Bow Street Runner will lose his heart to you.'

'Don't joke about it,' Rowan said, with more force than she'd intended. Penny blinked in surprise at her tone. 'Sorry. But really it is too ridiculous. Now, remember this afternoon to be as insipid as you possibly can. If we cannot think of anything to shock him at least let's try and bore him into thinking again.'

'What the hell have you done to that hat?'

Lucas looked at it. It was sodden and the brim was beginning to buckle. 'Thrown it in a snowdrift a couple of times.'

'And the state of your trousers and waistcoat! If I didn't know better I'd think you'd been climbing a tree.' Will reached for the clothes brush and attacked the streaks of lichen and bark on his valet's legs.

'I have been. Ow! Give me that.' He finished the job off himself, only too aware that he was doing it in order to avert his face from his friend's bemused scrutiny.

'Why?' Will demanded, not unreasonably. He went back to paring his nails and looking as relaxed as only a blameless morning in church listening to a soporific sermon could make a man.

'Picking mistletoe.'

'You don't need to pick it. You simply manoeuvre the young lady underneath it.'

'I'm damned if I'm going to freeze in the orchard every time I want a kiss.'

'You'll leave the entire female half of the servants' hall in blind despair when you leave,' his friend remarked.

'Just Miss Daisy. And I doubt if she ever gets into blind despair about anything. She is far too determined.'

'You should not, you know,' Will said reprovingly. 'This is not like you-to get into a serious flirtation with a servant girl'

'This one's different. She was brought up in a gentleman's household-family by-blow, I've no doubt. It's like being with a girl of our own class, but one with spirit and independence.'

'Makes it worse.' Will tossed aside his knife and put his prayer book in a drawer. 'You'll forget the rules and she'll not know whether you're serious or not. Unless you are going to offer her a carte blanche? You haven't got a mistress in keeping at the moment, have you?'

'No.' Lucas felt decidedly snappy. Of course he was not going to offer Daisy a carte blanche. Of course he

was not going to get any deeper into this than he already was. But there was the sprig of mistletoe in his pocket, and the memory of her curves and warmth and sweetness to make his body ache and his groin tight.

He bent and picked up Will's discarded boots. 'Do you need anything else?'

'No. Thank you. Go and get some luncheon while you can. But, Lucas-what are you going to do about the Servants' Ball?'

'They have one here?'

Will nodded.

'When?'

'Christmas Day. You need to pull back, Lucas, let her down lightly. If the pair of you spend all evening dancing and making sheep's eyes at each other there'll be hell to pay in the morning.'

'I won't hurt her,' he said tightly, wondering if it was himself who was going to get hurt. His mind seemed all too full of Daisy Lawrence for comfort. 'She thinks me an amusing rogue, I believe. She's too bright to fall for my blue eyes, Will.'

And Daisy certainly did not appear to be inclined to pay him much attention when he reached the kitchens. She was patiently helping one of the lads unravel a skein of Cook's knitting wool the stableyard cat had knotted into a tangle while the kitchen maids bustled about them laying the table for the upper staff to eat their luncheon.

'Get along out of here.' It was the under-butler, his arms full of bottles, arguing with someone unseen at the back door. 'There's nothing we want here.' The person outside must have been persuasive, for eventually he turned and called, 'The potter's here with a cartload of stuff if anyone's interested.'

The young women, apparently uninterested in any hawker not selling ribbons and furbelows, turned back to their tasks by the warm fire, but Cook, arms floury to the elbow, and several of the men braved the cold to look.

The potter had a flatbed cart laden with baskets and pulled by a skinny nag. 'Presents for your loves,' he wheedled. 'Fine serving dishes for your table.'

'I want a good big ashet, and nothing that' 11 chip and crack at the first hot thing that goes on it, either,' Cook said, peering into the biggest basket.

The men went to dig amongst the mugs and bowls, gaily painted with mottoes and flowers.

Idle, Lucas looked over their shoulders, smiling at the naive vigour of some of the decoration. There was a little brownish-green mug, almost the colour of Daisy's eyes. Lucas stretched a long arm and hooked it out, twisting it in his fingers to read the slipware motto. 'I'll take this.' He handed over a few coins, starting a flurry of buying, and went back indoors, asking himself what had possessed him to buy something like this.

'Is there anything interesting?' It was Daisy, right by his side.

'No, just kitchen wares and crude stuff.' The little mug was small enough to slip into his pocket, where it made an inelegant bump.

'Oh.' She turned away to admire Cook's new ashet, and he took the opportunity to slip away to his room to hide it.

Like a lovesick ploughboy with a fairing for his girl, Lucas sneered at himself as he set it on the dresser. On impulse he found the battered sprig of mistletoe in his pocket and dropped it in, then, shaking his head at his own foolishness, ran back downstairs to eat.