Luke turned to her, “I’ll be right back. We have to finish this together. Wait for me.”
Then he took off toward the house with Chauncey trailing behind him. Adeline went back to working on the snowman, and as she did, she caught the sound of a snicker from Lady Antonia. Then a half-masked whisper, “Poor girl.”
Poor girl, indeed. Except, the only words ambling back and forth through Adeline’s mind weretogetherandwait for me.
She would wait. She would wait as long as it took.
Chapter 6
ADELINEWAITED.SHEWAITEDwhile everyone put the finishing touches on their snow-endowed men. She waited while she scrutinized each pair’s frosted balls. Clearly Adeline had one thing on her mind: one man, and certain parts of him were calling to her, even though she didn’t really understand how it all worked. All she knew was that something was awakening in her that had, up until now, always been asleep. So she continued to wait long after the guests scattered, most making their way back into the house for tea, or something stronger, as Bedford mentioned. Bedford seemed to choose to take the long way back to the house, despite his aspirations for a heavy drink, but Adeline paid it no mind.
Luke had asked her to wait. She knew she was silly to think he meant it. She shook her head, pulled her shoulders up to her ears, and then released them. If he had meant it, then she wanted to see him again. And if he hadn’t meant it, then perhaps she needed this time to herd her thoughts into a new direction.
She had kissed a duke. He didn’t know it was her, as far as she could tell. And she didn’t want him to know, did she? If he knew, then it would only cause problems. He would never marry her, but if he offered her any kind of arrangement, she was so drawn to him that she might just take it. And where would that leave her? A duke’s mistress. Always vying for his attention. Sharing him. Pining after him. He would go about life with his own wife and child, eventually. And then she would be on her own again. Sure, he would probably set her up with a house. But she would have no family, even less family, to speak of. At least now she had Margaret and Jonathan. They weren’t biologically her family, but they treated her extremely well, and they were as close as she was going to get to having a family.
Tears threatened her eyes with an irritating burning sensation that Adeline brushed away. Now was not the time for tears. She would neither cry now, nor later, for a family she would never have. This was life. This was her life. She could choose how happy or unhappy she would go through it.
Adeline studied her snowman. The judges would come by and the winners would be announced later in the evening, but she couldn’t escape the feeling that he was definitely missing something. If she couldn’t easily fix her own problem, at least she would fix the snowman’s.
He had arms, face, and buttons. She had even fashioned a stick hat for him, since no clothing props were allowed. Surveying the snowy landscape, there wasn’t much to see beyond the shimmering white crystals shielding the ground below.
There were always seasons in life. To grow, to change, to rest, to bloom. What was her current season? It was hard to pinpoint, but the kiss she had shared with Luke had certainly changed her. Was it for the good though? Was it better to know what you were missing and then never have it? Or was pure ignorance truly more blissful?
Adeline’s gaze turned from the white frost to the white skies. Everything was white. Except the trees. Several evergreens could be seen leading down a path. If she drifted their way, she was sure to smell their sweet pine scent. And although many trees had lost their leaves by now, they still stood firm. Fixed in place. Sticks and twigs cluttering the branches.
They were brittle, but they were strong. Even more so, they were persistent. To hang on to their branches for the entire dormant season was admirable. They had hope. They had heart.
Adeline strode over to the nearest tree and plucked a few twigs. As she returned to the snowman, she broke the twigs to her desired length. She placed two twigs in the shape of a V. Taking the two smaller twigs, about half of the size of the other two, she placed those in a smaller, slightly wider v above the larger V.
A deep voice turned the cold white surrounding her into a cozy, warm blanket. “You gave him a heart, did you?”
Adeline’s eyes shot up.
He came back?
***
SHE WAITED?
LUKE WOULD have never expected her to wait so long for him. He felt silly for rushing back, but he had been so frustrated with Chauncey for taking him on a fool’s errand, several of them in fact, that he needed to expend his energy in some form. Might as well run toward something that excited him. So he had sprinted back to the snowmen in hopes that Adeline would be waiting for him.
He couldn’t deny that the woman before him was the cause of an uncanny amount of movement between his thighs. Even now as he detected a flush in her cheeks, he wanted to see how deep he could take that flush. He almost wanted her to be the woman from the kiss. But a lady’s maid? What would his mother and family say about that? Deep down, he knew that they would only want him to be happy, but there would certainly be no containment of the gossip that would ensue from him pursuing a lady’s maid.
Yet here she was, with no one around, no one to impress, placing a twig-formed heart into the freezing, hard exterior of a snowman. If anyone could remind someone that they had a heart, certainly she could.
“Everyone needs a heart,” she said finally in response to his nearly forgotten question.
He couldn’t tell which was heating faster, his own heart, or his cock. He had better temper those impulses lest he take her for a roll in the snow right here and now. And oh, how he would love to see those red flushed cheeks in contrast to the white blanket of snow. He would lie his coat down under the trees. They would stay mostly dressed. He would just raise her skirts and lower his falls, and–
“Your Grace?”
“Yes?”
“You haven’t answered the question.”
Luke moved closer to her. “And what question was that?”
“Does he need anything else?”
