Page 50 of The Last Debutante
With a smile, Daria glanced down at Anlan and Aedus. “Stand guard, you beasts.” She pushed Aedus’s rump away from her knee as she squatted down and pulled several faded spring flowers from Dundavie’s ridiculously small garden. Some of them were so rooted that she had to pull with both hands, but she managed to fill her small basket.
Then she hurried to the mews that led to the small hothouse before Duffson could return, the dogs loping alongside her.
“Ridiculous,” she whispered as she paused at the weathered wooden door. It was insanity to do what she was about to do, but she very much desired to be kissed again. Who knew whether she would ever have another opportunity? She pulled her shoulders back, lifted her chin, and put her hand on the knob.
A rush of fetid air hit Daria as she stepped across the threshold. It overwhelmed her, causing her to sneeze so mightily that some of her pilfered flowers spilled onto the path between the wooden benches. Clay pots were crammed beside one another on those benches, some of them containing shoots, others empty. It took a moment for her eyes to adjust to the dimness, but she saw a movement at the far end of the little hothouse and said, “I beg your pardon. I didn’t realize anyone was within.” She smiled brightly.
Whoever responded to her in rapid Gaelic was not Jamie. She squinted and saw a small, wizened man with a scruffy beard, wearing a stained apron. Disappointed, she forgot her basket and dropped her arm. All the flowers spilled out onto the ground. Daria groaned just as the man raised his voice and began to jabber at her in Gaelic, his hands slicing through the air to emphasize whatever it was he was saying.
“Yes, all right, I will go,” she said, backing up. “I didn’t mean to be a bother.” She bumped into the bench and sent two pots tumbling. “For heaven’s sake,” she muttered as she righted them. “You do realize, sir, that I haven’t the slightest notion what you are saying, don’t you?” she called out over his blathering as she dipped down to pick up the flowers. “It seems you all believe that if you simply talk louder, somehow I will understand it.” She stuffed the flowers into the basket and stood up, dusting off the knees of her gown. “Unfortunately, it’s not as easy as that. I wish that Icouldunderstand it, for the loudness is very unkind to one’s ears.”
Satisfied that she had removed as much of the dirt as was possible, she folded her arms into the basket handle and looked at the man. She realized then that he had stopped speaking. “There, you see? No harm done,” she said, gesturing to the ground. “Good day.” She turned about—and collided with Jamie Campbell.
He was standing with his arms folded across his rather broad chest, and while his expression was impossible to interpret, Daria was fairly certain he was not pleased to see her.
“What are you doing here?” he asked, his gaze falling to her basket of mangled flowers. “Where is your keeper?”
“Duffson?”
Jamie waited impassively for her answer.
What had she thought, that he would greet her with open arms? “In truth, I ducked away. I was looking for... some shears,” she said, relieved to have landed on a plausible explanation.
“Shears,” he repeated skeptically.
“For the flowers.” She gestured at her basket.
“You might have asked Young John or Duffson for shears, aye?”
“Right you are. But, ah... they were occupied.”
He arched his brow dubiously. “It must be a busy day indeed at Dundavie.”
She would ignore the sarcasm and instead admire the way his voice dripped over her like honey. “This must be where you practice your botany,” she said, and averted her gaze from the hazel eyes full of suspicion. “Where is your wheat?”
“Can you no’ see it, then, what with your vast knowledge of botany and plant grafting?”
He had her there. “See it? But it’s so awfully dim.”
“Oh, aye, quite dim,” he agreed, glancing up at the noonday sunlight that was streaming in from the windows overhead. “Then allow me to show you.” He said something to the old man, put his hand on Daria’s back as if he’d done so a thousand times before, and nudged her down the path.
She was aware of him close behind her, aware of the hard length of him, the breadth of him. Warmth began to rise in her. She thought of the previous night, of the way he had so easily stretched her across his lap. She imagined his hand circling her waist now, drawing her back to his chest, his mouth on her neck.
At the end of the row she stopped walking. He leaned over her shoulder. “There you are, then,” he said, nodding to the pots on the table.
Daria looked at them and spotted two green shoots with ragged edges in a single pot. “Aha, I see.”
“Well? What do you make of it?”
“Looks to be doing very well,” she said, nodding thoughtfully. “Impressive.”
“Thank you,” he said, and leaned closer to her, his mouth at her ear. “But what do you think, Daria? How shall I improve it?”
She loved the way her name sounded when he said it. She smiled, cocked her head to one side as she pretended to consider the little shoots. It was difficult to concentrate with him so near, his cologne clouding her thoughts. “You might use more soil,” she suggested. It seemed like her parents were forever speaking of new soil mixes.
“More soil! Aye, that ought to make this little weed grow tall.”
Weed?Daria hoped that something had been lost in translation, but when she glanced at him from the corner of her eye, he was grinning. Smirking, really, his eyes shining with amusement.
