She fell onto his chest, her hand resting just over his heart; she felt the speedy rhythm of his heartbeat matching her own.
“Mary!” Lady Caroline said, jumping to her feet. “You could have fallen into the fire screen!”
“She could have fallen into the fire, you dolt.” Lady Anne passed her sister to pull Mary from Lord Sanders’s arms. She embraced her friend, but Mary looked over Lady Anne’s shoulder and tried to read Lord Sanders’s expression. Two small lines had formed between his eyebrows, and his eyes glittered, reflecting the flames behind her.
Had warmth flooded his body when he held her, too?
“Are you well?” he asked.
Mary nodded against Lady Anne’s shoulder, though she was shaken. “It is getting late, though. Perhaps I ought to go upstairs now.”
“I will go with you,” Lady Anne said, all solicitation. She pulled away, her worried eyes mirroring her brother’s. “Caroline?”
“I’ll come along shortly.”
Mary bid Lord Sanders and Lady Caroline goodnight and allowed Lady Anne to walk her upstairs to her bedchamber. Her feelings for the family had warmed since their carriage had stopped at her home to pick up Mary and her mother on their way to London. But the way she felt about Lord Sanders far exceeded any sort of familial affection the rest of his family incited in her. Lord Sanders felt . . . thrilling, but somehow safe and comfortable at the same time. When he was in the room, she sought his gaze. When he wasn’t, she wished him there.
Which was wrong. And must be snuffed out. Mary was engaged to be married. It was done, the papers had been signed, and she could not consider backing out of the arrangement without putting her family’s entire estate in great jeopardy.
Lady Anne left her in her room, and she sat on the edge of her bed, rubbing her temples.
She was getting a little ahead of herself, wasn’t she? So she enjoyed the feeling of being wrapped in a man’s arms, enveloped in his scent, basking in the way he smiled at her—none of that meant the earl wished to marry her. She needed to get a hold of her inflated opinion of herself and take the relationship for what it was: Lord Sanders accepted Mary as part of the family. She was his mother’s goddaughter, after all. Drawing in a clarifying breath, Mary blew it out through her nose, resolving to leave the young, impressionable, giddy version of herself in her room.
Mary was merely a woman who had not been exposed to many handsome gentlemen in her life. The first young, attractive man to show her the least kindness and she was running ahead of herself, filling her head with grandiose thoughts. Lord Sanders was kind and welcoming. He was not interested in her.
She needed to grow up and cease looking at other men when she was in a binding contract with Mr. Lockhart. She owed both him and herself that much.
Chapter 5
The smell of baking gingerbread wafted up from the kitchens and circled the parlor. Andrew stood in the doorway watching Mary and his sisters at work assembling something at the table near the windows. Mother and Mrs. Hatcher sat at the sofa on the far wall, untouched embroidery in each of their laps as they chatted quietly together.
“Andrew!” Caroline squealed, clearly delighted to see him; it did much to raise the tide of guilt in his stomach. He had made himself entirely absent the day before in the hopes that he could rid himself of his slight infatuation with Mary Hatcher. His feelings were not intentional, but he’d hardly thought of anything other than Mary since their first meeting at the Frost Fair. The distance, while keeping him from her actual presence, had done little to remove the woman from his thoughts. When he’d arrived home and joined them for the game in the drawing room, he’d realized at once that it would take more than one day’s absence to rid Mary from his thoughts entirely.
But it would be done. It had to be. She was not just promised to another man, she was engaged. That was enough to slam the door of possibility in his face as sure as if it were an iron gate, immovable and impenetrable.
“Andrew? Did you not hear me?”
He pushed away from the doorframe and crossed the room. “No, I did not.”
Anne delivered a long-suffering sigh. “I asked if you are planning to help us, or if you’d merely like to watch as we do all the work?”
“I would prefer to watch, of course.” He shot his sister a wink before he allowed his gaze to trip over to Mary. She focused on the greenery in her hands, but a soft smile tilted her lips.
She had a sense of humor—another mark in her favor.
He scrubbed a hand over his face, pulling out the chair beside Caroline and lowering himself in it. He scanned the contents of the table. Ivy, holly berries, and…was that mistletoe? “What are you creating?”
“Kissing boughs,” Anne said with relish. “Mary obtained the supplies for us as a surprise.”
Mary reached toward the greenery in front of Anne. “I need more holly.”
Anne lifted her eyebrows. “Be careful. You don’t want to add too much—”
Mary took an extra handful of holly and weaved it into her ivy. “Or I might call forth an extra prickly man?”
“What is this witchcraft, Miss Hatcher?” Andrew asked, grateful for the excuse to question her directly.
Mary paused, lowering her ivy-laden hands on the table. “You are unfamiliar with kissing boughs?”
“I would not say that.” He’d kissed a maiden or two under the spell of Christmastide, but he was not about to admit so here. His sisters hardly need know his past indiscretions, and Mary certainly wouldn’t care to hear of them.
She seemed to take his meaning, however. She was anything but naive, and he would do well to remember that. “Then you might know that the ivy, smooth and pure, is a representation of women. The holly, prickly and rough, is a representation of men.”
“And the mistletoe?” he asked.
Her cheeks bloomed with color, and she lowered her gaze to the project in her hands.
Caroline laughed. “That’s for the kissing, of course!”
“Oh, right.” He grinned, satisfied when Mary shared a smile with him. “Now put me to work. How might I help?”
The door opened, and Finch stepped into the parlor, his gloved hands clasped behind his back.
“Yes?” Andrew asked.
“There has been a delivery made, sir, and I wondered if I might have your direction regarding the placement of the evergreen.”
“Evergreen?” Anne jumped in her chair, turning to face Mother. “Oh, tell me it is true!”
Mother’s widened eyes bespoke her lack of knowledge of the situation. “I’m not sure, darling. This was not my doing.”
“It must be—” Anne paused, turning suddenly toward Andrew. “Was it you?”
It was a good thing they were not playing that wretched smiling game, for he certainly would have failed miserably. He grinned, his smile growing wider along with Anne’s and Caroline’s. His sisters shot to their feet, rounding the table and embracing him fully.
“Oh Andrew, now it will truly feel like Christmas in this dreary house.”
Mary looked startled, her gaze dancing around as though she, too, wondered what about the townhouse was so dreary. The weather was miserable, to be sure, but the house was well maintained. It was nothing compared to the wide, open rooms of Chesford Place, or the brilliantly colored walls of Brightly Court. Of all the estates the earl could claim, the London townhouse was by far the least luxurious, but it was still grand in its own way.
His sisters were clearly overindulged.
“The evergreen, my lord?”
“You must know, Finch, that I have no notion of where the evergreen ought to go.” Andrew looked to his mother. “Do you have any preference, Mother?”
“None, darling.”
“I do,” Anne said. “I can direct the servants.”
“Might I help, Andrew?” Caroline pleaded, her eyes rounding. “I will be so careful.”
His heart warmed. He could deny her nothing—but in truth, Caroline hardly a
sked anything of him. He was doing a poor job of filling his father’s shoes for his sisters. “Of course.”
Finch stepped back to allow Anne and Caroline room to pass then bowed himself from the room.
“That was a kind notion to send for evergreen boughs,” Mother said from across the room. “Whatever gave you the idea?”
Andrew’s gaze flicked to Mary, gratified to find her watching him. “Anne mentioned it the other day. She asked me to do my best to procure some, so I did.”
Mother smiled at him before turning her attention back on the embroidery in her lap and saying something quietly to Mrs. Hatcher.
“You have made your sisters very happy,” Mary said.
Andrew leaned his elbows on the table, lacing his fingers together. “It was nothing. I merely purchased evergreen boughs and holly sprigs. When we are in the country, we can go outside and cut what we please, and we are used to decorating our houses a great deal. When my sister spoke of her sorrow for missing the beautiful evergreen at Brightly Court, I resolved to rectify that for her. It is the least I could do.”
Her brows knit together. “The least you could do? What do you mean by that?”
He meant that he owed his sisters much more than evergreen boughs after his marked absence of late. His father would be ashamed, had he still been around to witness Andrew’s negligence. But he did not need to divulge the length of his failings to Mary. “Nothing of import.”
She picked up a length of twine from the table and tied the end of her kissing bough, her delicate fingers working to avoid the small berries. “You must have gone to great lengths for the surprise. It was difficult for my servant to locate enough supplies for this pitiful bough. But then again, she is not used to London.”
“I may have traveled a good deal to find a proper vendor,” he said, a blush warming his neck. “But my sisters’ happiness is worth the effort.”
“That is admirable. It makes me think I would have enjoyed having a brother like you.”
He shook his head. His increasing absence these last few years was a fault for which he had hardly made a dent in the recompense thereof. He could purchase flowers daily for his sisters, and that would be naught but a pittance of what he felt he owed them. “Admirable is an exaggeration, but I will take the compliment.”
“But you do not feel it is enough?”
“I am aware of my faults, Miss Hatcher. My family prefers the countryside, and they frequently invite me to join them, but I prefer my isolation. I am often left to my own devices here in Town, and I enjoy it that way.” He lowered his voice, afraid his mother would overhear him. Judging by her chatter, she only had a mind for Mrs. Hatcher, but he could not be too safe. “I cannot remember the last time I spent Christmastide with my mother and sisters. They do not enjoy Town in the wintertime, but they sacrificed their beloved country Christmas in order to spend the holiday season with me, here in London.”
“You do not believe they came to help me build my trousseau?” she asked, amusement glimmering in her eyes.
He lowered his voice, leaning further on the table. “I am certain that was a great motivator, but my mother has been trying to convince me to join them for the holiday these last few years. I should not be surprised that she found a way to be with me one way or another.”
Reaching across the table, Mary laid her hand on top of Andrew’s, sending a shock up his arm and straight to his heart. His chest warmed, his pulse racing, as he lifted his gaze to meet hers. “It is clear that they love you as dearly as you love them.”
“But it would be better if I showed it more.”
“Be grateful you have love, my lord. Many people go without that most basic, important necessity.”
She was being inordinately bold, and it bolstered his courage. He swallowed. “Do you?”
Mary nearly snatched her hand back after Lord Sanders’s question, but she had brought this topic upon herself. The rough feel of his hand under her own was warm and comfortable, and she was loath to lose the connection.
But she must. She slid her hand off his, pretending to arrange the leaves of the finished kissing bough to give her fingers something to do. “My Mama loves me a great deal.”
The sound of Lady Anne and Lady Caroline chattering happily with the servants drifted up into the parlor, and Lord Sanders looked toward the door.
She relaxed a fraction, believing it to the end of the topic.
“That is all?” he pressed, to her surprise. “I seem to recall hearing about an engagement.”
“Which is none of your concern, my lord.”
He chuckled, leaning back. “You’ll forgive me. I have a very curious nature.”
“That is not a fault, exactly. As long as you curb your desire to yield to that curious nature.”
“And how do you suggest I do that?”
She raised an eyebrow. “Perhaps you might start with refraining from asking impertinent questions.”
“I shall,” he agreed, dipping his head, but his eyes locked on hers. She wondered if he meant it. “Will you forgive me?”
“Of course.”
Lord Sanders’s mouth quirked into a smile. “Friends?”
Were they? Mary would like to be, of course. And she imagined now that their mothers had been happily reunited, their families were bound to see more of one another in the future. Indeed, she needed that to be the case if she was to accomplish the task which Father had given her. But looking into Lord Sanders’s guileless countenance made her agreement with Father seem dishonorable. She shook the thought. What did it matter? She hardly had a choice now but to follow through.
And if she could become friends with Lord Sanders, securing a coveted invitation to his summer house party next year, for Mary and her betrothed, would be infinitely easier.
“Yes,” she agreed. “Friends.”
Lady Caroline barreled into the room, a length of evergreen in her arms. “I want to put this on the mantel, Andrew. Will you help me?”
He rose at once and moved to aid his sister. Mary took advantage of his distraction to slip from the room, carrying the mistletoe with her. She found that the greater the distance she put between herself and Lord Sanders, the more easily she could breathe. He was kind, thoughtful, handsome, and intelligent. And she needed to remember that he would forever remain her friend—but nothing more.
Lady Anne’s voice carried, making her easy to locate, and within a few minutes, they were discussing the best location for the kissing bough.
“I think the archway that leads into the drawing room would be splendid.” Lady Anne wrinkled her nose in thought. “Or perhaps along the ceiling at the base of the stairs?”
“Either place would look lovely, of course,” Mary said.
Lady Anne grinned impishly. “The base of the stairs, then. I’m more likely to catch one of Andrew’s friends that way if they ever come visiting.”
Mary laughed, hoping the servants hadn’t overheard. “You don’t want to be caught kissing a man before you are fully out in society, Lady Anne. Or even after you are out. You have your reputation to consider.”
“Don’t say such things,” the girl said with a pout. “You sound very much like Miss Bolton when you do.”
Mary didn’t appreciate being compared to the Bright girls’ governess, but she owned that it was rightfully earned. She could only hope Lady Anne understood the importance of protecting her reputation, that she did not feel it was a duty which could easily be dismissed.
Without a good reputation, what did a woman have?
“We need Andrew’s help. One moment. I shall fetch him.”
Mary held the kissing bough to her chest, descending the stairs to await her friend. Or was it friends now?
Lady Anne returned shortly with Lord Sanders and Lady Caroline; the gentleman watched her so closely, she longed for a looking glass. Had she something in her teeth? Or a spot on her cheek?
“Where am I hanging this lovely creation?” he asked, reaching fo
r the bough in her hands.
“Just there.” Lady Anne pointed to the exact place she wanted it to hang, and her brother craned his neck to see.
Reaching up, he was a few feet shy of the necessary height. “I’ll need a chair.”
“I’ll fetch one!” Lady Caroline ran from the room, returning shortly with a ladder-back chair precariously wobbling in her arms. She placed it at the base of the stairs with a thud.
Lord Sanders stepped onto the chair and reached up, his height an added benefit in this scenario. He paused and glanced down at the women. “How are men supposed to take a berry when the mistletoe is out of their reach?”
“Oh, drat.” Lady Anne’s forehead scrunched in thought. She brightened. “The doorway to the drawing room, then?”
“The doorway is a perfect location, and entirely reachable.”
No one seemed to find fault with the idea that men would actually be plucking berries from the bough. Who did Lord Sanders expect to come kissing his sisters? Or who did he expect to kiss?
Lady Caroline removed the chair, and the women followed Lord Sanders upstairs to the drawing room, watching as he hung the kissing bough on the wall above the doorway.
“It is so lovely,” Lady Caroline said softly.
“I do hope we have gentlemen callers soon,” Lady Anne added, a wistfulness to her voice.
Lord Sanders looked to his sister with startled disgust, and Mary quickly strung her arm through Lady Anne’s. So perhaps he was jesting about the berries after all. “But we shan’t kiss any of them, shall we?”
Lady Anne’s lips fell into a flat line, and she shook her head. Mary shared a look with Lord Sanders and imagined he felt the same way she did: there would be no stopping Lady Anne. Perhaps they ought to refrain from having any men visit in the next fortnight until Twelfth Night had passed and the mistletoe was removed.
“Shall we play the smiling game now?” Lady Caroline asked, bouncing on her toes.
All is Mary and Bright: A Christmas Regency Romance (Belles of Christmas: Frost Fair Book 2) Page 5