Louise Allen - Snowbound Wedding Wishes - An Earl Beneath the Mistletoe / Twelfth Night Proposal / Christmas at Oakhurst Manor

But what about Hugo? Whatever she thought of, she was going to have to make it right under his nose…Nose! Of course. There was that fine white cotton she had bought for summer underwear. There was a good yard left, more than enough for handkerchiefs with his initials in the corner. She could whip those up without him noticing she was doing anything other than her usual sewing.

She had the fabric spread out on the table when he came back from seeing the boys off after luncheon. ‘What are you making?’ He hitched a hip on to the corner of the table. Big, relaxed, male. Gorgeous.

Emilia felt the blush rise and turned it to her advantage. ‘Female underthings.’

‘Ah.’ He was off the table and over by the hearth at once, just as she had hoped.

‘Thank you for helping the boys.’ She took up the scissors and cut along her markings, careful to get the edges straight. For some reason her hand did not seem quite steady.

Hugo sat down on the arm of her armchair. ‘My pleasure. They were fretting about not being able to finish their shopping.’

‘It seems very quiet without them.’ She had ruined that square—oh, well, it would make a smaller handkerchief for her. With an effort of will Emilia completed the six squares, folded them all into her workbasket and cleared up the scraps.

‘In the summer they must be out a great deal of the time,’ Hugo observed. He did not move as she came and set the basket down by her chair.

‘Yes. Of course. It is just that…’ Her normally fluent tongue seemed to be in knots.

‘That having me in the house when no one else is here is disconcerting?’ Hugo asked with devastating directness.

‘Yes.’ Emilia found she had no idea what to do with her hands, which appeared to want to tie themselves into knots.

‘Why? Do you feel unsafe with me?’ He stood up and she found they were almost toe to toe. ‘Is it because of yesterday?’

‘No! It is just that I want…I mean I…’

‘You want me to hold you?’ he asked softly.

‘Yes. No,’ she corrected with desperate honesty. ‘I want you to kiss me.’

‘What an extraordinary coincidence,’ he said. She glanced up at him, confused. ‘I was just thinking how much I would like to kiss you.’

It was not tentative, or gentle or subtle. Teeth bumped, she trod on his feet, his hands were so tight around her waist that she was breathless. It was wonderful and life-affirming and dangerously exciting.

When they fell apart, Hugo’s eyes were dark, deep blue and he looked faintly stunned. ‘I am sorry.’

‘Why? I am not.’ She wasn’t. She should be, but she couldn’t find a whisper of regret anywhere.

‘My technique seem to have become inexcusably clumsy.’ His grip on her waist loosened, but he did not let her go.

‘Perhaps it is a while since you kissed a woman?’ she suggested. The sudden calculation she could see in his eyes was amusing.

‘A month or two,’ Hugo admitted. ‘I am not in the habit of wantonly kissing my way around, you understand.’ He cocked an eyebrow quizzically, but Emilia sensed he was concerned with how she replied.

‘No, I can tell that.’ His hands were still warm on her waist, she was no longer treading on his toes, so she reached up, curled her fingers around the strong column of his neck and drew him down. ‘We could try again?’

‘I would appreciate a second chance. You disconcert me, Emilia.’

Disconcert him? Me, plain ordinary Emilia Weston? Then his mouth closed firmly over hers and his tongue swept along the fullness of her lower lip and she let herself sink into the sensation. It was strange to know what she was doing, to know what to expect, and yet to be experiencing it with a different man.

And any memories were lost almost immediately. Hugo tasted different, felt different, kissed differently. She had thought that to make love with any other man would feel like disloyalty to Giles, although she knew he would never want her to be alone after he had gone. But this felt right and wonderful as sensations she had almost forgotten about tingled and throbbed and ached deliciously from her lips to her thighs.

Hugo explored deep into her mouth as though he wanted to drink her in and she responded with as much boldness, learning the taste of him, teasing him with nips and licks, digging her fingers into his broad shoulders.

When he lifted his head finally they stared at each other until he released his grip on her waist and she dropped her hands from his shoulders. Emilia groped her way to the nearest chair and sat down on it with a thump. Her breasts felt heavy, as sensitive as if he had been caressing the naked flesh, and between her thighs the pulse of arousal beat a distracting, insistent rhythm.

‘I did not send the boys to the carpenter’s so I could do that,’ Hugo said abruptly. ‘It has just occurred to me that you might believe I had schemed to get them out of the house.’ He put one hand on the mantel and stood looking down into the fire, then abruptly swung the kettle over the heat.

‘No. It never occurred to me that you would do such a thing.’ Was she being hopelessly naïve and trusting? But did men set on selfish seduction raise such concerns? Perhaps they did if they were very subtle. Emilia gave herself a mental shake. Every instinct had told her to trust Hugo from the moment she set eyes on him. ‘I asked you to kiss me.’ She ought to feel shame at being so bold. She certainly should feel alarm at what she was doing.

‘I am honoured. And flattered. And I think we should stop this right now while there are only kisses between us.’ He began to spoon tea into the pot as though the banal domesticity of the act would somehow disperse the tensions that thickened the air between them.

What is this? she wondered, but did not ask. Hugo was apparently too decent to seduce her and leave her and she was impossible as a mistress—no man, certainly no aristocrat, offered an alehouse keeper with children a carte blanche .

‘That would certainly be sensible,’ she agreed, dredging up remnants of common sense from wherever they had vanished to. ‘It would also be a saving on the housekeeping if you stopped heaping tea into that pot.’

‘Oh, Lord!’ He peered into it and began to spoon tea out again. Emilia laughed and for a minute or two while she fetched mugs and milk it was as though those kisses had never happened. Then Hugo looked up, straight into her eyes and said, ‘I have never met another woman like you, Emilia. I doubt I ever will again.’

What could she say to that? What did it mean? He seemed blurred somehow and then she realised it was not her emotions playing havoc with her eyesight, but the light dimming. ‘Oh, no, here comes the snow again.’

‘I’ll go and get the boys.’ Hugo swept his heavy cloak from the peg, clapped his hat on his head and went out, snowflakes swirling into the room in his wake.

They melted in the warm air and all trace of him was gone, only the two mugs standing on the table left to mark that she had not dreamed the last half-hour.

‘You are going to break my heart, Hugo Travers,’ Emilia said. But hearts had been broken before and no one died of it, not while there were stockings to darn and boys to feed and ale to brew. She swirled her big white apron around her waist and went to survey the larder shelves in search of inspiration for supper.

‘Have you done your Latin exercises?’ Hugo felt the concerted power of two sets of eyes on his back, but he did not look round from grooming Ajax.

‘Yes, Major. And we’ve done our chores and Mama says we are under her feet because she is trying to sweep. Is it ever going to be Christmas?’

‘Today is the twenty-third. Christmas Eve is tomorrow. How are the shelves coming along?’ He sponged Ajax’s muzzle and the big horse sighed gustily, spraying him with water. He was bored, standing in this stall. The deep, narrow paths through the snow were unfit for anything but walking, but he would take him out in a minute.