Deborah Hale - The Wedding Wager

After a leisurely breakfast he returned to the library and found it deserted. For lack of any better diversion, he did read a few pages of Hudebras. When it failed to stir his interest, he got up and walked over to the window.

The bright winter sunshine and the steady drip of water from the eaves told Morse the day must be mild. Reasoning that a bit of fresh air might revive his powers of concentration, he called for his hat, greatcoat and walking stick.

Ambling along the path between high cherry laurel hedges, Morse found himself able to bear more and more weight on his injured leg. With a bit of regular exercise, perhaps he would regain his former easy stride.

By the time he returned to the house, he was in a better humor than he’d enjoyed since coming to Laurelwood. Whatever he had done to disrupt the endless routine of lessons, it was well worth trying again. If compliments flustered Leonora so…Morse chuckled at the very thought of how she’d respond if he called her by that name. Surely she had other features he could admire the next time he needed a respite from his studies.

Her slender, graceful neck, for instance. If he nuzzled her sensitive nape, she might take to her bed for several days with a fit of the vapors.

Morse grinned to himself, anticipating her reaction.

Immensely pleased at the cleverness of his plan, he took up his book again and devoured nearly a hundred pages of it by teatime.

He had kissed her hand.

Several hours later it still tingled faintly and the memory of Morse’s lips on her skin continued to prompt a most ridiculous blush in Leonora’s cheeks. She had retreated to the sanctuary of her bedchamber, not trusting herself to face him again that day. On no account must that man see the foolish reaction he’d excited in her.

Pacing the carpet runner beside her bed, Leonora tried to dismiss the whole episode for the silly trifle she knew it to be. No doubt Morse Archer had kissed the hand of many a woman. More than their hands, too, unless she missed her guess.

Through the window she spied him striding the grounds of Laurelwood, his limp much less noticeable than when he’d first arrived. Some unaccountable force kept her rooted to the spot, watching Morse Archer until he disappeared from view.

Quite against her will, Leonora found herself slipping into a shameful reverie. Unbidden images cascaded into her mind, piquing her senses. Of all the places on women’s bodies where the attractive sergeant might have bestowed kisses.

On their lips, of course. Perhaps a bare neck or shoulder had enticed him to nuzzle. Might he have dropped one, delicate as a whisper, upon some pretty ear? Or pressed his face into a head of tousled tresses?

As each notion took hold of her, Leonora’s hand—her kissed hand—strayed to that part of her own person. Setting her lips aquiver as one fingertip brushed over them, gliding from shoulder, to neck, to ear. Extracting the pins from her hair.

When at last it fell in a fine, ebony billow around her shoulders, her strangely possessed hand reached up and threaded her fingers through the strands. Feeling and appreciating its delicate, silky texture for perhaps the first time in her life.

Catching sight of herself in the looking glass, Leonora almost did not recognize the face that stared back at her. That woman had a strange softness about her features. It made her look far younger than Leonora’s twenty-seven sensible years. Even her severe little spectacles could not disguise the dreamy shimmer in her gray-green eyes.

Leonora had seen that look before. Her stomach curdled and her throat constricted at the memory of it.

Mother.

Downy and pensive. Humming a little tune to herself. Fondling a nosegay of posies from her latest admirer. Such looks had meant only one thing. Clarissa Freemantle had welcomed a new suitor into her life. To Leonora, it had always spelled trouble.

Setting her mouth in a taut line, she squared her shoulders and willed that mooning creature in the mirror to vacate the premises forthwith. She would not repeat her mother’s mistakes, least of all over a shiftless, insolent ex-Rifleman that circumstances had forced upon her.

Leonora thrust her spectacles back up to the bridge of her nose. Plucking a hairbrush from the top of her dressing table, she coerced her locks into submission, plaiting them into such tight braids they made her head ache.

Dickon, the footman, almost dropped his water kettle the next morning when he arrived at Morse’s door to find the sergeant already awake.

“Don’t just stand there gaping, man.” Morse plucked the steaming kettle from Dickon’s hand and splashed a generous measure into his washbasin. “Lay out my clothes while I shave.”

“I didn’t reckon to find you in such fine fettle this morning, sir.” The burly footman rubbed his forehead. “Not after the quantity of cider you put away last night and how merry we was making.”

Morse worked his shaving soap into a good lather and smeared it on his face, inhaling the tangy aroma. “I’ve been up before dawn and in the thick of a battle after far worse debauches than last night’s wee tipple, man.”

He whistled a few bars of a Portuguese drinking song, the words of which he had never understood. “Sometimes a fellow’s all the better in the morning for a spot of revelry the night before.”

“If you say so, sir.” Dickon did not sound convinced. Clearly, he was paying a somewhat higher price for their evening’s merriment.

“I do say so, Dickon.” Morse rinsed his face and dried it off, flashing his reflection a wolfish grin. He wasn’t certain what had brought about his sudden bout of energy and high spirits. Perhaps his congenial evening with Dickon accounted for it. Or perhaps yesterday’s unscheduled holiday from his studies.

Or could it be…?

The fellow in the looking glass grinned more broadly still. Had he guessed the truth? That, at last, Morse had found himself an effective weapon in his running conflict with Miss Leonora Freemantle.

Until yesterday she had possessed all the artillery, not to mention strategic field position. His only recourse had been a dogged refusal to capitulate. Then, just when he’d thought himself all but beaten, Morse had discovered his own tactical advantage—Leonora’s agitated reaction to a little harmless flirtation.

This set them on even ground at last. The prospect of a well-matched contest stirred Morse’s blood as nothing had since the rout at Bucaso.

He eyed the suit Dickon had chosen for him. “Don’t suppose you can find something more colorful by way of a waistcoat? If a fellow has to act the gentleman, might as well look the part, eh?”

With a glance that questioned if he truly could be Morse Archer, Dickon rummaged in the wardrobe and produced a brocade garment of forest green shot with gold.

Once he had donned his gear, Morse looked himself over in the mirror, approving what he saw. Even that tiny hint of green in the waistcoat reminded him of his Rifle Brigade uniform. It heartened him for whatever battles might lie ahead today.

He let Dickon give his coat a final brush, then Morse descended the stairs to the drawing room as rapidly as his injured leg would allow. Finding the place dark and deserted, he rubbed his hands with gleeful anticipation.

If Sir John Moore had drummed one precept into the minds of the Rifle Brigade, it was the benefit of being first to arrive on the field of battle. One gained superiority of position together with the element of surprise.

Morse lit several candles and picked up the volume of Hudebras he’d been reading the previous day. Settling into his chair, he affected an air of one who had been in the throes of diligent study for some time. Fortunately, he did not have to keep up the pose for long before he heard Leonora’s footsteps.