… He was engineering an excuse to leave. He was going to leave Matthew and her alone, unless she told him very firmly that the sieve was not in the carriage.
And she was going to tell him. Absolutely. Quite why her mouth wouldn’t open and shut, saying the words she needed, she couldn’t possibly say. She glared mutely at Laurence, clenching her fists, as the cook smiled even wider.
‘Alright. Be—be quick about it.’ Even Matthew looked troubled; for a brief, wild moment, Daisy wondered if he could feel the tension crackling between them both. ‘I assume that a sieve is going to be important.’
‘Quite crucial, your grace.’ Laurence began moving towards the door. ‘I’ll return very shortly… unless, of course, that silly sieve is buried under any number of objects.’ He winked at Daisy. ‘In that case, I may take considerably longer.’
Daisy watched, mouth open, as Laurence left the room with a final, smug smile. She thought briefly about stamping her foot, before settling for a sigh.
She was alone with Matthew Benson again. More alone than before; completely alone. The kitchens were empty and silent; Amelia must have cleared them of all staff before their arrival, mindful of gossip…
… But there wouldn’t be anything to gossip about where she was concerned, would there? She, Daisy Chiltern, was the inherently sensible child; plain-speaking, plain-thinking, counted upon to do, if not say, the right thing. She certainly wouldn’t move closer to Matthew Benson, her mouth dry, until she was standing beside him as he waited by the table.
He was so much taller than her; her head came to his collarbones. His scent washed over her again, her body helplessly alert to the mixture of soap and musk. He turned as she approached, his covered eyes facing hers, for all the world as if he were looking straight at her.
Had she ever had a man look at her with such… concentration? As if he were mapping her, judging her, predicting any movement she might make? It was dizzying. Intoxicating, even.
You are here to help him. Not to ogle. With a particularly vicious stab at her own selfishness, Daisy reached out and picked up the sieve.
‘Oh, goodness.’ She rolled her eyes to herself, trying not to sound too sarcastic. ‘The sieve is here. It appears Laurence didn’t notice it.’
‘Oh.’ Matthew shifted, his brow furrowed. ‘Well… that means he’s going to take an awful lot of time looking for something that isn’t there.’
‘Yes.’ Daisy briefly wished sudden death on Laurence, before realising that a dead Laurence would never return to the kitchen. ‘I… perhaps I should go and tell him—’
‘No.’ Matthew spoke a little too quickly, his voice cracking. ‘No. I am perfectly capable of managing the situation.’
‘Good.’ Daisy spoke more sharply than she had intended. ‘Because I have very shaky recollections of how to make butter biscuits. Do you?’
‘What? No.’ Matthew’s scowl was something to behold. ‘I am capable of… managing. Whether or not there is something to manage is completely beyond my control.’
There was a brief, intense pause, followed by a burst of laughter from Daisy. Matthew’s quiet chuckle followed; the room suddenly had an atmosphere of secretive mirth.
‘Miss Chiltern, may I ask you a question?’ Matthew folded his arms. ‘You may consider it impertinent.’
‘Only if I am permitted to ask an impertinent question in return.’
‘A natural impulse. Do you think my sister likes you?’
‘No. No, I don’t think she does.’ Daisy shrugged. ‘But all of our jealousy began as children. I am sure when Amelia is a little less… harried, she will begin to feel more charitable towards everyone.’
‘Harried.’ Matthew slowly nodded. ‘Harried by me.’
‘I am not going to pretend to you that your arrival and condition has not altered the course of Amelia’s life. You know that. But it is her choice to care—you did not constrain her.’ Daisy looked at Matthew’s face, struck by the pain in the harsh lines that framed his mouth. ‘Now—I believe I am granted a question.’
‘Of course.’
‘Why…’ Daisy struggled with herself, before giving up. ‘Why are you so very bronzed?’
If she hadn’t been expecting to answer the question, Matthew certainly hadn’t expected to hear it. ‘Bronzed?’
‘You… you are not pale. Not in the slightest.’
‘I sit in the garden and enjoy the sun. The scents of the flowers. You…’ Matthew paused. ‘You walked down the lavender path to arrive here, for example. As you did before. You brought the scent with you.’
Oh. Daisy cleared her throat, unsure as to how to reply. He remembered their previous meeting, then… all the way down to the scent she had carried with her on her clothes.
They were back to the strange, deeply-felt silence that seemed to contain so much more than she could fathom. She was back to looking at his face, his body, trying to interpret just what it was that drew her ever closer to his side…
Stop!
‘Come now. We have a lesson to attend to, and we are being very bad children.’ She turned to the bowl, her practical nature asserting itself. ‘Our teacher told us to sieve the sugar, and we shall sieve.’ Placing the bowl, sugar and sieve gently in front of Matthew, she wondered how to instruct him without appearing either patronising or overbearing. ‘Shall I place the sieve in your hand?’
‘In truth, I feel a little lost.’ Matthew’s shy words brightened the room. ‘It appears I require a sort of guide. Someone to approximate the movement. Or I fear I’ll spill sugar all over the table.’
‘It is a kitchen table. Some would say that is its purpose.’ Daisy bit her lip as an idea came to her. ‘I could act as your hands, your grace, but—but I am somewhat at a loss as to positioning.’
‘Positioning.’ Matthew’s voice sounded a little hoarse.
‘Yes.’ Daisy wondered why her cheeks felt so hot. ‘Positioning.’
‘Yes. Stand as you see fit.’
As she saw fit? Daisy had no idea what would fit. She paused, attempting to map out a position that would please both Matthew and her own sense of propriety, before realising that pleasing both was all but impossible.
‘As you wish.’ Trying to move calmly, aware of the complete absurdity of her idea, she moved behind Matthew. At least his broad back was less distracting than his face—although the scent of him, that peculiar mixture of clean and musk, remained compelling. If she slipped her own arms through the crooks of his arms, peering around him, perhaps she could—
‘This is ridiculous.’ Matthew’s voice, full of equal parts laughter and weariness, brought her back to reality. ‘I cannot work at all with a pair of shadow-hands at my sides. I doubt you will even reach the bowl with ease. You… you will need to stand in front of me.’
‘I see.’ Daisy spoke evenly, trying to ignore the way her heart jumped in her chest. There was comedy in the way they were currently positioned; she could manage comedy. Comedy was comforting. But standing with Matthew directly behind her, his body a hair’s-breadth from hers, his mouth close enough to trail along her neck… well, that was a different matter. One she didn’t feel like laughing about.
It was also deeply inappropriate. Daisy had never come close enough to impropriety to develop a feeling for it; neither for, nor against. Now that she was faced with a request that bordered on scandalous, from a man with a former reputation for rakehood, she was more than surprised to realise that she was going to let it happen.
It was the slight hint of vulnerability in his voice that did it. A rawness; a silent acknowledgement that he, like Daisy, was not entirely calm about the arrangement. Daisy’s good sense put up a last, valiant defence, telling her to stop her nonsensical thoughts as quickly as possible.
‘Please.’ Matthew cleared his throat. ‘If you please.’
That was it. All was lost.
Swallowing, removing herself from behind Matthew’s back, she waited until he moved slightly to one side. Putting he
rself in front of the bowl, suddenly unsure as to what to do with her hands, she stifled a sigh as Matthew moved behind her. Blindfold be damned, scars be damned, sister be damned; Matthew Benson was more thoroughly distracting than any man she had ever met.
‘So.’ Matthew’s voice rang with the same exquisite tightness she felt in every nerve. ‘Show me, as before. Use my hands.’
Use my hands. Of course. Daisy realised she was holding her breath as she lightly, shyly brushed her fingers against the backs of his hands. She felt Matthew tense again; gaining confidence, she guided his hands to the sieve. Keeping her grip firm but gentle, struck by the welts she felt on his knuckles, she helped him raise the sieve to the correct height.
It was as if he had half-reached his arms around her, and merely needed to complete the action. As Daisy began to shake the sieve, a white mist of sugar slowly settling onto the cubed butter, she realised that it was all she could think about. Matthew Benson, taking her in his arms and holding her.
Hardly the thoughts of a nursemaid, or a friend. She bit her lip, trying to concentrate on the matter at hand, but her mind refused to submit. Matthew Benson, holding her tightly, his heart beating oh-so-close to her own…
‘So this is sieving.’ Matthew shifted behind her; Daisy closed her eyes as he brushed against her skirts. ‘I had expected it to be more laborious.’
‘I don’t think anyone has described sieving as a torture. Or a garden of delights.’
‘Yes.’ Matthew tensed; Daisy winced at the sudden, awkward note in the silence. ‘I suppose no-one would say that.’
‘No.’ Daisy frowned. She had certainly never considered sieving a garden of delights before this exact moment. Now, with the heat of Matthew’s body at the back of her neck, she wondered if she would ever want to do anything else again.
‘How many sweet dishes will we be making, with our absent pastry cook?’ Matthew’s voice had returned to easy, deliberate lightness.
‘Well. There are these butter biscuits. Then, from what I can remember, there will be apple cake, rose comfits, baked pears, strawberry tarts, lavender syrup… oh, and mincemeat.’
‘I see.’ Matthew swallowed behind her. ‘Your hands will be very busy teaching mine.’
Yes. Daisy briefly closed her eyes, his touch burning as her palms covered his hands. Lord knows how I’ll survive it.
Butter biscuits, apple cake, rose comfits, baked pears, strawberry tarts, lavender syrup, mincemeat. Matthew repeated the words to himself at night like a litany, hardly able to believe by the end of the week that he had made each and every one of them with his own hands. His clothes stank of butter and sugar, they owed a large bill to the egg-woman, and he was probably going to get gout... and oh, how alive he felt. How strangely, intoxicatingly alive.
He was, as it turned out, very bad at making cakes. He had expected not to be very good, but it was still something of a blow to his pride to hear Laurence tutting, or taking the bowl out of his hands to mix something more effectively. Still, the fact that it was a new skill took a little of the sting out of the whole mess—and just as Daisy Chiltern had predicted, the results were always delicious if imperfect. Matthew had never before had the particular pleasure of eating something freshly baked, warm from the oven, painstakingly constructed by his own, slowly improving hands.
Laurence was exactly as good as all of the gossip had promised when it came to making cakes. What he was terrible at, as far as Matthew could tell, was remembering things; the man had been forced to leave the room at least twenty times or so over the course of the week, often for long stretches, in order to locate a particular spoon or pot or whisk. How he had managed to become quite so good at his chosen art while being so terribly absent-minded was a mystery Matthew couldn't quite fathom—but at the same time, he knew he wasn't putting all that much energy into fathoming it. Because every minute that Laurence wasn't in the room... well. He, Matthew Benson, was alone with Daisy.
Daisy wasn't terribly good at baking cakes either. He knew that from the soft, half-exasperated way she laughed at herself when something didn't turn out quite right, or the annoyed bang of a bowl on the table when a dough wouldn't come together. She wasn't good at saying things gracefully, or being coy, or flattering him... but how he longed to talk with her all the same. How time flew by as they talked, speaking of everything under the sun, from favourite ballads to old wives' tales to cherished childhood memories.
What Daisy did very well indeed was create a space. Not a silence, exactly, but a clean, airy space in which anything at all could be discussed, if both parties were willing. It was rather like the confessional of a church, if the church were warm and comfortable and smelling faintly of beeswax and sugar; an intimate place that hovered somewhere between reality, and fantasy. A place that could be filled with any number of words.
It was addictive. Matthew had tried all sorts of mind-altering substances during his rakish years before joining the regiment, and had found all of them wanting. Nothing had really succeeded in pulling him from the morass of boredom, anxiety and the pressures of aristocratic life; opium had almost done the trick, but it was far too expensive and had made him constantly drowsy. Now that he had spent a week in the kitchens of his home, talking to Daisy Chiltern, he bitterly regretted having ever spent a single penny on those foul-smelling pipes. Nothing he had ever tried had ever made him feel so soothed, and so excited, all in one deeply confusing bundle of sentiment that he could barely attempt to unpick.
Amelia did not know how to feel about any of it. He could tell from the way she deliberately never spoke of the lessons, never asked him about his progress, or asked for a demonstration of the new flexibility in his hands. There was also the way in which she managed not to eat a single bite of any cake, sweet or candied piece of nonsense that he had made, instead leaving them for Caesar to bolt down like the happiest of spaniels. Even Lady Benson had eaten some of the strawberry tart he and Laurence had painstakingly put together, before returning to her room to lose herself in whatever pastimes an ageing widow of means spent her time indulging in. It was strangely joyous, totting up small victories with actions that seemed inconsequential—cubing butter, crimping pastry—but formed a pleasant, harmonious whole, that could please others long after the actions themselves were complete.
Please everyone, it seemed, apart from Amelia. Matthew knew that he should ask her about how her wardrobe was coming along, with the mysterious new dressmaker—but he was distracted. Distracted, and excited.
Pleasing people was joyous, in its way. Gaining mastery over his rebellious hands also brought him excitement, as did learning the layout of the kitchens; it was a small flame of independence in a life where freedom was no longer guaranteed. But Matthew knew that he was lying to himself, lying quite enormously, if he pretended the greatest part of his new-found happiness came from anything other than being with, and talking to, and touching, Daisy Chiltern herself.
Was happiness the correct word? No; happiness spoke of ease, and Matthew felt anything but easy when Daisy Chiltern was close to him. The more he became accustomed to her presence, to her calm voice and ready laughter and the space she made, warm and full of acceptance, the more he felt a tension in parts of himself he had long given up for lost.
She pitied him. He kept telling himself that, late at night, when desire crept beneath the covers to torment him. She despised him, secretly; she thought him a crippled wretch, not worth treating as a real man, capable of taking her in his arms and showing her what pleasure was... but oh, he grew hard as a rock all the same, thinking about touching her. Dreaming about bringing that soft, sweet laughter to her lips as he discovered all the secrets of her body.
He imagined her in his mind's eye a thousand times. How could he not? He had made her blonde and slim, dark and curvaceous - even red-headed and smiling kittenishly, beckoning a finger. But as brazen as his imaginings were, complete with moans and sighs and fingers curled around his stiffening cock, they still could not co
mpete with the quiet, solid reality of her presence in his kitchens. The way her hands and body brushed against his as she showed him how to roll, or press, or mix to a satisfactory conclusion. The way she laughed when he attempted to joke, or told him jokes that made him laugh quite helplessly.
Something was building inside him—building between them both, if he listened to his primal instincts instead of his fear. Something that he was powerless to prevent, and equally powerless to halt if anything should occur. It was wrong; he told himself a thousand times, when he lay spent and panting in bed... but God help him, he couldn't stop.
He wouldn't stop. If she wished it, he would take her as far as he could go.
Sugar plums. The most feminine and foolish of desserts. Matthew woke with the word on his lips, as if it were a spell sent to lure him from his bed. He had to make sugar plums with Daisy Chiltern for an entire afternoon, with naught but his own conscience and a very absent-minded chaperone to keep him from ruining her.
A terrible turn of events. Pity, then, that he simply could not stop smiling. His heart raced, reminding him that he was being idiotic beyond measure, even as his heart told him to hope.
It took him a shorter time than usual to wash and dress; his body was hoping to make time move a little faster. After spending the morning sunning in the garden—he rather thought Daisy liked his bronzed complexion, given that she had mentioned it—he hastily lunched on a leftover piece of cold pie before making his way to the kitchens. As he moved along the corridor, one hand held lightly to the wall, he heard the rustle of skirts and light footsteps that could only mean his sister.
‘Amelia.’ He smiled, wondering if she were feeling a little left out of proceedings. ‘I really must come and visit you during one of your consultations with this marvellous modiste. Laurence is most tight-lipped, as are you.’
His sister’s answering laughter had a slightly hysterical edge, even for her. ‘Oh, come now, brother. It’s hardly urgent.’
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