Page 50 of The Trouble With Dukes
“St. Just took years to come home,” Anwen said. “I’ll visit you in Scotland. That’s a warning. You will marry Murdoch, won’t you? You’re not just using him to bring Sir Fletcher up to scratch?”
“Sir Fletcher is not what he appears to be, Anwen. Keep your distance from him.”
Anwen played a right-hand C major scale, the one that used only the white keys. That seeming simplicity actually made it one of the harder scales in Megan’s opinion, the fingers having no black keys to create a tactile frame of reference.
“This instrument needs tuning,” Anwen said.
“It always needs tuning when Beth gets in a Beethoven mood. The season drags on forever when a woman approaches thirty.”
A soft tap sounded on the music room door.
“Enter,” Anwen called.
The season could drag on forever when a woman approached twenty-six too.
Hamish followed the butler into the room, Lord Colin at his side. Anwen was off the bench and dipping curtsies mid-scale, though Megan would have gone musically mad rather than finish on any note other than C.
“Just the gentleman we were discussing,” Anwen said, twining her arm with Colin’s. “I’ve been meaning to ask your lordship’s opinion regarding a certain volume of French poetry. Won’t you accompany me to the library? I have difficulty reaching the highest shelves.”
Anwen would cheerfully scamper up any ladder or climb the very doorjamb to get to a book of her choosing. She led Colin from the room, blathering about French and Latin and Megan hardly knew what, for Anwen—dearest of sisters—had left Megan alone with her intended.
Who did not look pleased to find himself alone with her.
“Lock the door, Your Grace,” Megan said.
Hamish crossed his arms. “Meggie Windham, what are you about?”
Megan veered around him, rather like dodging behind an oak, and locked the door. “What areyouabout, Hamish? You’ve treated me like somebody’s wallflower auntie this week. I can understand a man needing to polish his waltzing, but you are wickedly skilled with kisses. Your embraces are fierce and tender, your very scent beguiles my knees into fluttering. If reducing me to begging for your favors is a foretaste of your husbandly stratagems, then we are about to have a very heated discussion.”
His brows twitched down. “Beguiling, you say? Myscentbeguiles your knees?”
Megan got hold of the leather belt holding his sporran about his waist and tugged. “Spare me your maidenly vapors, sir. You carry the scent of heather and open skies, fresh sea breezes, and warm peat smoke. No gentleman has ever smelled as enticing as you do. I dream of your scent and wake up with my pillow between my knees.”
“Blessed St. Andrew, Meggie. You mustn’t tell me such things.”
Hamish didn’t smile often, but he was smiling now. A great beaming wonder of a smile—aimed at his boots.
Megan pushed him onto the settee, and he took a seat. Obliging of him, when he’d likely stood against entire French regiments.
“We are all but engaged,” she said, straddling his lap. “Why aren’t you stealing kisses? Why aren’t you meeting me behind hedges and in the mews, sampling my charms?”
She stole a few kisses, lest he forget the joy to be had in such larceny.
Hamish tasted of mint and patience. The mint was lovely, while the patience … Megan had had enough of patience.
“Meggie, dearest darling, you’re setting a match to a powder magazine.” He had a hand on each of her biceps, and that was not where Megan wanted his hands.
“Your sporran has to go,” Megan said, kneeling up and working at his belt. “Sporrans are lovely in their place, and I understand they hold a flask, a comb, funds, but now is not the—Get this off, Hamish.”
She wasn’t accustomed to giving orders, but it occurred to her that Hamish was accustomed totakingorders. Why hadn’t she grasped sooner that he waswaiting for herto show some preference in the matter of his kisses?
He unfastened the sporran with a gratifying economy of movement. “Has anybody told you that you have a latent streak of ducal command about you?”
Uncle Percy had dragged Hamish to a levee two days ago, a ducal command Megan approved of.
“I am the granddaughter of a duke, and I’m about to become a duchess, I hope.” She set the sporran aside and settled onto his lap. “That’s better. Iamabout to become a duchess, aren’t I?”
Hamish kissed her, sweetly, patiently, adoringly.
