Page 58 of The Ladies Least Likely
“They want you at Greenfield for dinner tonight, Miss Gwen.” The messenger boy sat at the table next to Ifor, who pulled a steaming plate of cakes their way and offered him one.
Gwen spoke above the sudden roaring in her ears. “They can’t want me to harp.”
Gareth licked a finger. “They’ve guests from Llanfyllin and want you to dine with them. A fancy pair, they are.”
The prickle along her neck told Gwen that every eye in the large kitchen was fixed on her. She felt Pen’s stare like the heat of full sun in summer.
Dovey swooped in, scolding the boys as she slid the plate away from Ifor’s nimble fingers. “Mypicau ar y Maen, is it! I made those cakes for Mr. Evans and Mr. Pen to take to town today, and if you eat them all, then you feed two hungry men when they return.”
Gwen kept her voice level, despite the wild skitter of her heart. “Lady Vaughn can’t pay me enough to return to Greenfield. I’ve no interest in meeting her guests.”
“None?” Dovey questioned. They still needed money, after all, to buy St. Sefin’s from Pen.
Gwen shook her head. Calvin Vaughn would leer at her. She couldn’t bear facing Anne after all that had happened. And if Anne’s brother had come with her?—
“No.” She struggled for air.
Gareth sighed. “Mr. Vaughn won’t like that answer,” he said.
“Calvin Vaughn knows why it’s a no.” Gwen reddened and dragged a brace of bottles towards her.
Mathry slid her basket onto the table. “Ah, Gwenbach.Did he?—?”
“Tried to put a slip on your shoulder, didn’t he?” Pen ducked out from beneath Cerys’s shears and shook off the towel,ignoring her outcry. In two long strides he came to the sink to Gwen’s side and with a warm finger under her chin turned her face toward him. His brows lowered as he read her expression.
“I knew he was a dirty dish,” he swore softly.
Alarm rose from the rush of soupy heat that filled her at his touch. “How did you know?”
“Er—gathered. From Mathry’s tale of woe.” He dropped his fingers from her chin and ran a hand through his damp hair. She wanted to take his hand and draw it back to her face. She wanted to put both his arms around her and lean into him like he could be the only thing she needed, the pillar that held up her world.
“What’s a slip on the shoulder?” Cerys asked.
“Nothing you’ll let a man give you,pwt,” Dovey said. “All right, Tomos, take a seat.”
“Who’re the grand folk that want Gwen?” Mathry asked.
Gwen flinched. She’d tried so hard to run from her past, and now the shadows were reaching out to swallow her. How had they found her, after all this time? And what did they want with her now? It couldn’t be to make amends. The time for that was long past.
“Vaughn thinks to marry Anne Sutton,” Gwen said, eyes on her task. “That’s the girl I was companion to before her family turned me off. Can you believe the cursed luck? Of all the families in Wales, he’s settled on her.”
“The gentry world’s a small world, and the great world smaller still.” Pen said this as if he knew the great world, and alarm prickled Gwen’s scalp.
“Does she know of Mr. Vaughn’s reputation around here?” Dovey draped the cloth around Tomos’s neck as he settled in Cerys’s chair.
Gwen’s shoulders slumped, and Pen lifted a hand to rub the back of her neck, loosening the knot of tension. She sighed and leaned into his warm, strong fingers. Those clever, clever fingershad been on every part of her body, mapped every inch of her, and yet this small, intimate touch was just as thrilling.
“She deserves to know,” Gwen said. “But she might have to marry him just the same. I’ll wager her parents decided the match, and Anne would never go against them.”
Men of means were not expected to limit their affections. The higher the class of man, the more businesslike his marriage. His wife provided pedigreed heirs, and he searched elsewhere for pleasure. Her throat ached and she reached unthinkingly for the water heating over the stove. She forgot to wrap her hand with a cloth and cried out when the searing pain registered. Stifling a curse at her stupidity, she crammed her scalded fingers in her mouth.
Pen would expect a similar arrangement in his marriage. He wouldn’t marry a girl from the Welsh hills. Though he might offer to make one his mistress.
Pen tugged her hand from her mouth and examined the reddened tips. “Shall I call Vaughn out and maim him for you? Geld him, perhaps.”
Dueling was illegal, and only gentlemen had the right to call each other out in a supposed matter of honor. Rougher men used their fists to settle an insult. Was Pen remembering he was a gentleman?
But why would he remain here with them, if that were the case? A rush of helpless longing weakened her knees as he kissed her burned fingertips.
