Max was happy to be fleeced, and Simon and the boys—not one of them younger than seventy—were thrilled to watch it happen. A chorus of chortles rose as he reached for the darts in her hand, his fingertips grazing her soft skin.
Did he imagine that small surprised breath?
He didn’t imagine the reaction he had to touching her. Tight, wanting. Just as he’d been in the field. Wanting to do more than compete with her.
Wanting to pull her close and kiss her, steal that breath for himself. Own the pleasure in it.
“Go ahead,” she said, softly, and for a moment he thought he’d spoken his desire aloud and she was on board with it.
But no. She meant the darts.
“As I am feeling magnanimous . . . and flush,” she added over her shoulder at the men watching, who groaned and jeered in unison, “you can go first.”
He raised a brow. “No concern about local advantage?”
“Not in the slightest.”
He let his first dart fly and landed it in the outer bullseye. “Oh-ho!” Paul said, brandishing his half-empty pint glass. “Well done!”
Lilah cast a critical eye at the dart before turning back. “Would you like a drink?”
Max raised a brow. “Are you trying to get me drunk?”
“Not at all,” she said with a grin. “Unless you think it will help me win.”
He laughed, the sensation foreign. When was the last time he’d been free enough to laugh? The last time he hadn’t worried about his siblings, the estate, the name, the world beyond Salterton Abbey?
What was the harm in giving himself up to it?
What was the harm in pretending to be Max, the land steward, for a little longer?
His gaze dropped to her lips for a heartbeat, soft and perfect, curved in an open, teasing smile. For him.
One night.
No harm in one night.
Tomorrow, he’d be duke again.
Chapter Three
Two hours and five rounds of darts later, giddy with triumph, Lilah toasted Max with her second pint. “I’ll say this for you, Lancelot, you gave it your very best.”
He offered her a very good-natured grin—more good-natured than anything Lilah would have been able to drum up—and said, “A man knows when the battle is lost.”
She smiled. “Wherever he falls, there shall he be buried?”
He approached, sandy brown hair falling over his brow as he waved his hand toward the scarred oak floor between them and said in perfect seriousness, “Might as well measure out my grave.”
Lilah couldn’t help her laugh. He was really very cute. Dangerously cute, if she was being honest, with his laughing eyes and his winning smile and the dimple in his left cheek that matched the dimple on his chin . . . and all that before the rest of his assets—tall and broad with beautiful forearms that she’d had no choice but to notice while they were playing darts.
But she’d made a career out of being unaffected around handsome men. Good genes weren’t what made this one handsome. He was just so effortlessly charming. Self-deprecating and funny, no trace of the gruff, unsettling farmer who’d grouched at her camera the other day. In his place, this man who was one of the handsomest she’d ever seen—Sexiest Men Alive had very little on him—and somehow, impossibly . . . easy.
The kind of easy that made a girl wonder what it would be like to wake up on Sunday mornings with him. To make Sunday dinner with him. To take after-dinner walks with him. To tumble into bed with him and do it all over again on Monday.
Lilah’s life had never made easy possible, but two hours of darts and drinks with this man and his motley collection of friends could tempt her into just that.
He was in front of her then, staring down at her, one dark brow cocked in sheepish curiosity, as though he knew what she was thinking.
As though he was daring her to reach out and try easy on for size.
Dangerously cute.
She tilted her chin up. “You’re lucky I am feeling benevolent tonight.”
He reached into his back pocket and extracted his wallet. “By my count, it’s fifty quid for the losses?”
She shook her head. She didn’t know the going rate for an English estate farmer, but fifty pounds was a lot for anyone. “The reward is the win itself, don’t you think?”
“Not if you lord it over me for the rest of your stay.”
“Aren’t we on the ancestral lands of a duke?” she asked, all tease. “Do you think he’d mind if I took on the lording for a bit?”
The words were barely out of her mouth when the pub went silent, the only sound the thud of one of the elderly men’s pint glasses on the bar.
Max’s gaze slid to the sound, and something flashed across his face. Frustration? Irritation? With her? She followed his attention to the men who had been watching their darts, rosy cheeks gone ruddy against pale skin, their eyes now trained on Max.
He didn’t look so easy now.
Lilah couldn’t tell if she’d said something wrong or if something had happened that she simply hadn’t noticed, but the air had definitely shifted. Grown cooler.
So much for flirting with the hot farmer.
Hiding her confusion and her disappointment, Lilah grabbed her messenger bag from the sturdy stool where she’d left it. “It’s late,” she said. “I should go.”
Before she could sling the bag over her shoulder, the oldest of their audience—a tall, white man, all long limbs and sharp joints, who had reminded her of the farmer from any number of British children’s films when he’d introduced himself as John—said, “Do you think he’d mind?”
The words drew her attention, but John wasn’t looking at her. He was looking at Max. As were the other men.
Lilah looked too, though she didn’t know why. Her brow furrowed as Max cleared his throat and said to John, “I don’t think he’d mind, as a matter of fact.”
Confused, Lilah tracked the conversation back to the bar, where Paul, portly and quick with a smile, raised a brow in Max’s direction. “You don’t. Think the duke would mind.”
Those strange emphases again, and Max, that strong, sturdy, unflappable farmer who took her teasing in stride was gone.
Strong became stoic.
Sturdy became stiff.
Unflappable became unbending.
The stark change could mean only one thing: there was something Lilah didn’t know about Max and the Duke of Weston. Bad blood of some kind, maybe? Which didn’t really explain how protective he’d been of the duke when he’d thought she was paparazzi.
Maybe the duke was a terrible boss. Lilah had certainly met her fair share of rich and powerful men who were terrible bosses.
Who were terrible, period.
And Max, out in the muddy fields with his good dog, likely with no choice but to take whatever garbage the lord of the manor doled out. She knew what that was like.
She knew the danger of not taking it too.
He looked away from their audience, and she wanted to do something. To say something. To touch him. Anything that would show him he wasn’t alone. But he wasn’t looking at her either.
“Have you met the duke, Lilah?” The bartender, this time, who’d introduced himself as Simon. He was in his thirties and handsome, and big as a house, with a broad chest and muscled forearms covered in tattoos.
She shook her head and approached the bar, opening her wallet to pay her tab. “No,” she said.
“Imagine that,” John said.
“Is that so strange?” she asked.
“Strange?” Simon said, looking to Max, who was watching him intently. “A bit, I’ll be honest.”
She set her near-empty pint glass down on the bar and plucked a leftover dart from where it had been forgotten. “Don’t dukes have things to do besides rolling out the red carpet for guests? Balls to dance at? Rolls Royces to drive? Cravats to tie?”
The men assembled laughed. All except Max.
“He doesn’t wear a cravat,” Max gr
umbled.
She smiled. “It was a joke.”
He didn’t seem to think it was funny. “She’s Lottie’s friend.”
Simon said, dry as sand, “And she hasn’t met the duke.”
“I’m not really her friend,” Lilah was quick to correct. “I’ve never even met her. Lady Charlotte and I have a mutual friend.”
“All the more reason for her to meet the duke, Max,” John said. “Not every day a girl gets a chance to meet a real live title.”
Lilah laughed and shook her head. “It’s not necessary. I’ve met plenty of real live other things, and learned not to believe the hype.”
“Right. Lottie says you’re a posh photographer,” Simon said.
Max shot him a look. “What are you doing talking to Lottie?”
The bartender shrugged one shoulder. “I like to keep up with goings-on.” He looked to Lilah. “Who’s the poshest person you’ve photographed?”
“Oh, for—” Max said, looking at Lilah. “You don’t have to answer that.”
“It’s okay,” she said with a laugh. “I’ve taken a lot of pictures. Actors, authors, world leaders, athletes.”
Simon whistled, impressed. “All right then, who’s the biggest tosser you’ve ever photographed?”
The one who got me blacklisted because I wouldn’t sleep with him.
“Simon! Christ!” Max turned to her. “You really don’t have to answer that.”
“I only ask because she’s not impressed by the duke,” Simon interjected.
Lilah let the dart fly, watching it land in the dead center of the board. The men assembled shared a collection of impressed looks before she turned back toward them. “In my experience, men who are born with money and power are more trouble than they’re worth. And considering the castle on the hill, the duke is a great deal of trouble.”
“Oh-ho!” John chortled from his seat.
“Brazen, sayin’ such a thing on the man’s land,” Paul chimed in, though it was less criticism and more delight.
“I don’t mean to sound ungrateful. He’s got a very cool sister and a beautiful estate that I’m more than enjoying—especially the company,” she added with a smile. “Let’s just say it’s not him . . . it’s me.”
“He’s not a bad geezer,” John said.
Max looked to him. “He’s not, as a matter of fact.”
“I believe you,” Lilah said.
“Ugly bastard,” Simon chimed in from behind the bar with a wicked smile that, combined with the wicked gleam in his blue eyes, probably made knees weak across the county. “Babes scream just to look at him.”
“That much is true,” Paul confirmed.
“That is patently false,” Max said. “He does all right.”
“Good thing he’s a duke, is all I’m saying,” Paul replied.
“It’s not the face I’m worried about,” John said, tapping the side of his head and looking straight at Max, “it’s the faculties.” The men assembled—minus Max—nodded their agreement as he added, “Makes brainless decisions.”
“That much is true,” Paul repeated.
“Not as a matter of course,” Max said, defensively. Maybe she’d misread the dynamic between them. Someone who didn’t like his boss wouldn’t be so affronted by criticism of him.
“Nah, but when he does, they’re big ‘uns,” Richard said. “Great fun watchin’ the fallout!”
Max let out a low grumble at the words, as though he didn’t know whether to defend the duke or agree with the men assembled. Lilah chalked it up to some kind of long-standing cultural view of the aristocracy and tried to change the subject.
“Truthfully, I’m not really a meet-the-duke kind of girl.” She looked to Max, surprised to find him staring directly at her. She tried for humor. “I’m more of a meet-the-shepherd-in-a-muddy-field kind of girl.”
Paul blinked. “The shepherd . . . ”
“Max!” John said, as though he’d just learned the fact.
Simon chimed in. “Course it’s Max! What else would he be?”
Someone was drunk. And Lilah was certain it wasn’t her.
“Lilah was taking photographs of the herd the other day,” Max said, approaching, his wallet still in hand. “We met and I was a . . . ”
“Prat.”
“Numpty.”
“Wally.”
“Knob.”
The descriptors were offered in unison, in myriad tones of sheer delight.
Suddenly, Max wasn’t so stiff anymore. His lips quirked in a small, sheepish smile that made her insides do strange things, especially when paired with the gleam in his brown eyes. “Right.”
Lilah couldn’t help her own smile. “You really take a beating, don’t you?”
“Deserved, innit?” He lifted a noncommittal shoulder, one lock of shaggy hair artfully draped over his brow, like he’d just stepped out of a rom-com. Easy.
Would he kiss like that? Easy?
She imagined he would, slow and smooth, lingering like he had a lifetime to explore. And when he did explore? His hands on her? His body against her?
Lilah’s heart skipped a beat thinking about how easy it would be to slide a hand up his chest and into that soft hair. How easy it would be to fit herself to him and forget that the rest of the world could be so difficult.
She should leave now. Before she tumbled into something that could only end up a bad idea.
She set her empty glass on the bar with a smile for Simon before looking to the rest of the men who had kept her company for the evening. “As much as I adored this evening, gentlemen, I am out far past my bedtime.”
She’d reached into the side pocket of her bag to find a few pounds when Max set a hand on her arm, electric heat shooting through her at the touch.
“At least let me pay for the pint.” The words were low and soft, like a promise, and it occurred to Lilah that she might have agreed to anything he’d offered in that particular voice, close enough for the words to vibrate around her.
“That, I’ll allow,” she said, wondering how her own voice had gone so breathy. “Thank you.”
He opened his wallet and tossed several twenty-pound notes onto the scarred bar. Simon straightened lazily to collect the money and the glass. “Lilah, you shouldn’t walk back alone.”
A chorus of elderly masculine agreement followed, including Richard’s excited addition, “Absolutely not. Too dangerous.”
“Dangerous?” Lilah laughed. “What, precisely, is dangerous out here in the middle of nowhere?”
“Can’t be too careful. There’s tales of marauders.”
Her brows shot up. “Marauders.”
“Tales of ‘em, yes.”
“Tales from when, 1700?”
“And more recently,” Paul said, all expertise. “We had a highwayman in the 1820s. He took one look at the young duchess and thieved her right out from under the duke.”
“Max, tell her,” Richard said, hefting a pint in their direction.
She looked to Max, who’d shoved his hands in his pockets and grinned. “It’s true. She was never seen again. Legend had it she became a highwaywoman and they terrorized the countryside for years.”
“Are we afraid that this nineteenth century Bonnie and Clyde might rob me on the walk home?”
He tilted his head, rubbing a hand up around the back of his neck and over his hair, ruffling it in a way that made her insides do those strange things again. “You never know.”
Lilah laughed. “I think I’ll take my chances.”
He leaned down, his lips close to her ear, and the temperature in the pub was instantly warmer. “There are no marauders.”
The words were a rumble of pleasure, and Lilah shivered at his nearness, her heart pounding. If she turned her head, he’d be right there. His lips would be right there. That easy kiss would be right there.
“But it is dangerous.”
She sucked in a breath and pulled away, using all her willpower to do so. “What’s so da
ngerous?” she asked, softly, even as his lips curved in that slow smile that made her want to do very bad things.
She didn’t think anything was more dangerous than what she suddenly wanted very much to do to this man.
“The sheep are still out there, Lilah.”
The laugh came, full of surprise and delight. Easy.
What if she took easy?
There was no harm in one night.
“All right, Lancelot. Walk me home.”
Chapter Four
Max closed the door on the Fox and Falcon and the censure of the men inside. Exhaling, he looked to Lilah, turned to him in the warm golden glow of the pub’s windows, a curious half-smile on her lips.
“They can be a lot.”
Her smile widened. “They’re perfect. If someone asked me to close my eyes and describe the contents of a pub in the Devon countryside, those men would be it.”
He gave a little laugh. “Three men who’ve been in those exact chairs for as long as I can remember?”
She nodded. “Fixtures.”
“They are that,” he said, waving a hand in the direction of the dark road that would lead them back to the estate.
She fell into step beside him. “You’ve really known them your whole life?”
“Feels like more than that,” he said.
“So you grew up here.”
The question was so casual. Just conversation. One thousands of other people answered without hesitation on any given day. One he could answer without hesitation. And still, he hesitated.
She looked at him, enormous brown eyes clear and patient, like she’d wait forever for him to tell her the truth.
I’m the duke.
She was going to find out eventually. He should say it. Get it out of the way, before he decided he liked more than the curve of this woman’s smart mouth.
But he didn’t want to. He didn’t want to feel the air shift between them. Didn’t want to hear her voice slide into a higher octave when she said one of the things people always said when he referenced his title for the first time.
Oh!
A duke!
You are?!
Naughty Brits: An Anthology Page 3