A Mistletoe Masquerade

decidedly restless night that it was only the novelty of such unchaperoned freedom that was making her lightheaded enough to flirt with Lucas, and that if she avoided him she would soon feel her old self again.

'I am going back. It is too heavy for you.' He set off up the lane, leaving Rowan glaring at his retreating back. She picked up her skirts and ran to catch him up.

'You are bossy.'

'So are you.'

For some reason this made her smile. They walked on in amicable silence, Lucas swinging the basket, Rowan hopping over frozen puddles. The lane went down a slight slope, then levelled out. Heavy, wide-

wheeled farm carts had cut deep ruts that had filled with water and now made long, parallel ribbons of ice, perhaps eighteen inches wide apiece.

Lucas set the basket down on a tree stump, took a run, and slid down one shining length of ice, arms flailing to keep his balance. When he got to the end he turned, took another run and did the same thing, arriving back, grinning, in front of her. 'Sorry-couldn't resist that. It has been a long time since I have seen ice.'

One thing two winters in Vienna had done for Rowan was to teach her how to skate. She held out her gloved right hand to him. 'One, two, three!'

It was a ragged start: she tried to lengthen her stride to match him; he shortened his. They were already laughing when their feet hit the ice, and Rowan was screaming with a mixture of delight and terror as they skidded down the icy ruts. There was no room to move their feet. The only way to balance was by waving their arms about, and they staggered off at the end, breathless and whooping with laughter.

Lucas pulled Rowan into his arms and they clung together, shoulders shaking, as their mirth subsided. It left them standing there, locked together, tears glistening in their eyes and suddenly in no mood to laugh, only to stare. She seemed to be drowning in the blue of his eyes; he seemed no more willing to unlock his gaze from hers. Something was happening. No, something had happened. Something wonderful… and dreadful.

Slowly she raised her hand, clumsy in its thick woollen glove, and stroked it down his cheek. He turned his face into it, the strong jawbone rubbing along her fingers, then he caught the tips in his teeth and dragged the glove off. The air was cold, but his mouth, as he pressed it into her palm, was hot.

His hat had fallen off again. She stared down at the dark head, bent so intently over her hand. The exposed nape, the vulnerable softness of the skin at the base of his skull, the virile curl of the hair there, the strength of the muscle. So male, so strong, so gentle. Something inside was hurting, as though pressure was building in her chest.

'Lucas?' She hadn't meant to whisper, but that was how it came out. But he heard it and looked up, and she wondered that the word gentle had occurred to her for a moment. The blue eyes blazed, his face was hard with something that reflected the baffling pain inside her, and his mouth when he pulled her hard into his arms and kissed her was savage.

She needed it. Gentleness would have made her cry. Rowan kissed him back without inhibition and the pain dissolved into something dark and urgent and-

'Come on, bor! You going to stand there all day, rutting with that there wench?' The thickly accented bellow brought them apart as effectively as a bucket of cold water thrown over fighting cats. Rowan caught a glimpse of a red-faced yokel perched up on the box of a wide farm wagon, two shaggy horses steaming patiently in the shafts.

With a gasp of mortification she turned her back. Lucas stepped onto the verge, drawing her with him, feet crunching in the snow. 'Sorry to keep you waiting, friend.'

'Ah, well, bor, you needs be doing your courting inside this weather. Fine wench like that'll soon warm you up,' the carter advised cheerfully as the wagon trundled past, shattering the ice on their impromptu skating rink.

'Oh!' Rowan emerged red-faced and flustered from the shelter of Lucas's shoulder.

He looked at her for a long moment, then went back for the basket. 'This won't do, will it?' he observed as he rejoined her and they began to walk on to Tollesbury Court.

'No,' Rowan agreed bleakly.

'Tomorrow is Christmas Day and the Servants' Ball. We will talk after that.'

'Not now?' They had reached the gates; soon there would be precious little privacy.

'Do you believe in magic, Daisy?' Lucas was looking away from her, out across the frigidly still parkland.

'No.' She shook her head.

'Neither do I. But let's pretend, until tomorrow at midnight, that magic does exist-for us.'

Common sense said End it now. The warning voice inside her agreed. You'll get hurt. Rowan listened to them, to the voices of duty and reality. But I am going to be hurt anyway-better tomorrow than today, she thought defiantly. I love him and it is quite impossible.

'Until the stroke of midnight on Christmas night, then I believe in magic'

'Give me your arm. No one can object with this slippery surface.'

They walked in silence. What Lucas's thoughts were she could not guess, but her own, circling, came up with a bump against a mystery.

I know it is hopeless, because I'm not really a dresser and I could not possibly marry a valet. But why does he think it won't do? Oh my God-he is married.

'Are you married?' Rowan demanded, stopping dead outside the kitchen door.

'No!'

'All right. I just wanted to be sure.' She took the basket from his grip while he was still staring at her and went inside, exchanging greetings with the kitchen maids and Cook as she hurried past.

I know this won't do. The Viscount Stoneley cannot marry a servant-even one with illegitimate blue blood in her veins, even one raised gently. But how does she know? Lucas was frowning over the conundrum as he let himself into Will's bedchamber. His friend was sitting in the window seat, gazing out idly, a book in his lap.

'Not downstairs socializing, Will?'

'Thinking. I can't get a moment to myself down there. If I'm talking to Miss Maylin, Grandmother is hovering, hanging on every word. If I'm not, she's at my elbow trying to get me back.'

'Maddening. Still, you are seeing enough of the girl to convince yourself she won't do, I imagine?'

'She is terrified of me.' Will dropped the book on the floor and swung both feet up onto the window seat, leaning forward to rest his folded arms on his knees and presenting Lucas with the uncommunicative barrier of his shoulders.

'You see-impossible for a countess. The girl's a mouse.'

'A very sweet mouse, and a very kind one. She would be wonderful with Louisa.'

'Do you want a woman who is frightened of you? Of the life you must lead?'

'No. But-'

'I'm sure she would make a wonderful governess, but that is not what you need. You need a Society hostess and an exciting woman in your bed to give you sons.'

'God! Do you not think I have had enough of exciting women? One was enough.'

'You need one who loves you.' Lucas stayed where he was, wondering, with a flash of pain, who he was arguing with.

'I loved Belle. You have no idea what it is like to love and to lose, Lucas. None.'

'Oh, yes, I have.' But he said it too quietly for Will to hear, turning his back to begin laying out his evening clothes.

'How did the music go?' Rowan asked.

Penny shrugged. 'As usual. I played adequately.'

'And the singing?'

'I whispered-as usual.' She fidgeted with her reticule, finally tipping it out on the bed and sorting through the spill of trifles. Rowan tried to study her expression, but Penny would not meet her eyes. 'How are Alice and Kate? And Dorritt and Charles, of course.'