Page 14 of A Flaming Lady's Secret Valentine
They arrived before the stables when Raphael finally released her hand. It fell to her side like a plum as she watched him peer inside the building. The rain showed no sign of letting up, and the stable workers had been smart enough to take refuge elsewhere. She shielded her eyes and glanced up at the rooms above the stables. The windows were illuminated with light.
Cecilia had rarely frequented this corner of her father’s estate. There were three buildings dedicated to the horses, facing each other with a small courtyard between them. They had landed in the oldest structure, with wooden beams that creaked and groaned. The other two buildings had been recently constructed in brick.
“Where are all the horses?”
Raphael glanced over his shoulder. “Over there, I assume.” He pointed to one of the newer buildings. “There’s no doors here, so they probably moved them.”
“So that their hooves do notget wet?”
He crouched down to extinguish an oil lamp that he been left atop a bale of hay. “No. Some horses are frightened by storms.” She heard him laugh. “They do nothave much regard for their hooves.”
Cecilia looked around, rubbing her eyes.
“Does your head hurt, my lady?”
“I am not so frail, Mr Travers. There’s no vinaigrette in my reticule. A little downpour will not hurt me.”
“What about the ratafia last night?”
She guffawed. “I shall have to thank Edward for that later. I had no idea my brother told tales about me, especially not to you.”
“Was he lying?” Raphael dragged a small hay bale over for her to sit.
“He was not, but I am not a lush.” She winced as a particularly sharp blade of hay pricked her thigh. “If we are to wait out this storm, we may as well gossip. What else did my brother tell you about our evening in Cromer?”
Raphael leaned back against a beam and crossed his arms. At least the rain had washed the muck from his garments. He looked dashing, his hair falling into his eyes, his shirt damp and see-through. He removed his cravat and wrung it out.
Cecilia’s cheeks burned red.
“Are you sure that is wise? What if you do notlike what he had to say?”
It was unladylike to pry, but they had thrown decorum out of the window when she had fallen in that ditch. “My brother loves me, though he is reluctant to admit it. It cannot have been anything overly cruel.”
“I did not mean what he had to say about you.”
“Then who?” Cecilia thought back to Radcliff’s party. “Oh.”
Raphael shrugged. “Is it too early to say congratulations?”
Lightning flashed across the sky behind him. The storm was worsening by the minute, but Cecilia was thankful. There would be no other opportunity for them to speak candidly with one another, and she still had Daphne’s task to undertake.
“The sentiment is a bit premature, perhaps.” She tore off her wet gloves, crossing them on her lap. “It is Lord Radcliff’s intent to court me.”
“You sound chuffed.” A beat. “My lady,” he added as an afterthought.
It seemed Mr Travers was a dangerous character. It was too easy to spill her secrets to him, though she could not fathom why. She supposed it was the way he held himself with natural nonchalance, like anything she said would go in one ear and out of the other anyway.
“The Earl of Radcliff is a well-rounded gentleman. He is an old friend of the family. In fact, the Elgin family possessed the duchy before we did some centuries ago, though through some entails it landed in our lap, if you can believe it. He is a great patron of the arts, and he is fiercely loyal, and…” She stopped massaging her fingers. “And we have nothing in common, and our spirits do notalign, and I am rather convinced he only wants to marry me as a favour to my father, but he is too proud to admit it.”
Her eyes flickered up. She had half-expected Raphael to have run away, but he was still leaning against that load-bearing beam, still watching her.
“I am sorry,” she said.
“Do notbe sorry.”
“It is wrong for me to burden you with my problems.”
“What has your family said?”
