Cory stopped her.
‘Do not take the trouble. It will not make the slightest difference. It is beyond saving, I fear.’ He shrugged himself into it and bent down to pick up the rifle, holding his spare hand out to Rachel. ‘Come on, Rae.’
Rachel took his hand. It felt odd to be holding hands like they had done when they were younger. The memories crowded in on her there in the dark. She was running along a white sand beach in Scotland, clasping Cory’s hand and laughing when she was eight to his fourteen; she was grabbing hold of Cory and holding him tightly with grief when her pet lizard had died in Egypt the following year; she was taking his hand in a country dance at her first ball…She interlocked her fingers with his and held him close. It felt familiar-and subtly different.
They managed to reach the stable yard without falling into a barrow and when they were at the back door of the house Cory let go of her and turned to face her, resting the butt of the rifle on the ground.
‘Goodnight, Rae,’ he said. He smiled into her eyes. ‘I enjoyed this evening.’
‘Cleaning your rifle?’ Rachel said lightly.
‘It has its own peculiar charm,’ Cory agreed gravely. He hesitated, then bent forward and kissed her. His cheek brushed hers, hard against her softness. Rachel’s skin shivered.
‘A kiss between friends,’ she said lightly. ‘One might even go so far as to say a brotherly kiss.’
For the second time that night she saw a flash in Cory’s eyes that was wholly masculine but far from brotherly. It was a look that spoke of desire and conjured wanton images of tangled bed sheets and naked skin and all the things that Rachel had read about and never associated with her own life and in particular had never thought of in conjunction with Cory Newlyn, her childhood friend. She opened her mouth to speak, though she had no notion what she was about to say, and in the same instant Cory took a very purposeful step towards her.
The door of the house opened abruptly and Sir Arthur Odell appeared in the doorway, the
‘What the devil is going on here? Can a man have no peace in his own home? I am
Rachel dragged her gaze from Cory’s face, though the action seemed to take an inordinate amount of effort.
‘There is no need to create a fuss, Papa,’ she said. ‘It is only Cory and I. We have been down at the excavation site.’
‘Oh.’ Sir Arthur looked nonplussed. ‘I thought that some knavish creature was out to rob us.’
‘Not at all, Papa,’ Rachel said. ‘And I do not believe that we can have been making a great deal of noise.’ She took his arm. ‘Come along inside now. Goodnight, Cory.’
Cory’s gaze had not wavered from her during the entire exchange; though Rachel had not been looking at him she had felt him watching her. Now he bowed slightly. ‘Goodnight, Rae,’ he said. ‘I will see you in the morning.’
He walked off in the direction of the stable and Rachel shook herself out of the strange, heated lethargy that seemed to possess her. For a second she leaned back against the door, feeling the handle cold against her hot palm. Perhaps she had imagined that flash of desire in Cory’s eyes, but she did not think so. Nor could she dismiss the answering spark it had lit deep within her. From their very first meeting that morning, something had changed between them. She did not understand it and she was not sure that she liked it. She wanted their old friendship back, with all its comforting familiarity. She stood still for a moment, letting the cool breeze touch her face and calm her mind. Cory was her friend and her parents’ colleague. He would never flirt with her or try to seduce her. Very likely he did not even wish to and she had imagined the whole thing. There was nothing to fear at all.
Yet still she wondered.
Chapter Five
‘No,’ Cory said. ‘I won’t do it, Rachel. I will not be an exhibit in Lady Sally’s book of watercolours. The idea is absurd.’ His set his jaw in a stubborn line. His silver gaze was hard. He shovelled another heap of earth out on to the pile to his right with unnecessary vigour.
He heard Rachel sigh. She was sitting on an upturned bucket at the side of the trench where Cory was digging. She had only been persuaded to sit down after the bucket had been thoroughly dusted-and after he had assured her that he was unlikely to dig up any bones, at least while she was there.
It was the day after the meeting of the reading group at Saltires and Cory acknowledged wryly to himself that he should have realised that Rachel would come back from it fired with Lady Sally’s charitable zeal. In fact, he was a little surprised that she had not broached the subject immediately the previous night. Rachel was usually extremely direct with him; once she had an idea in her head, she could not be dissuaded.
Cory had already heard about Lady Sally’s book of watercolour drawings from his host, the Duke of Kestrel, who had been petitioned to take part when he had met Lady Sally at the Langs’ card party the previous night. Justin Kestrel had laughed at the idea, but had not been opposed to it. Cory was less enthusiastic.
Rachel tilted her parasol to shield her face from the sun. She looked composed and unruffled and it made Cory smile that she was the only person he knew who could sit in the middle of an excavation and look as though she was at a duchess’s garden party.
Cory shoved his spade into the sand and rubbed the back of his hand across his forehead. Digging was a dirty business. He probably smelled of sweat already. No doubt Rachel would tell him if he needed to take a bath. She had been indelicate enough to speak of such things plenty of times in the past since they were friends and there was no artifice between them.
‘Why did you not ask me about this when you came back from the reading group yesterday?’ he asked. ‘Why put it off?’
He thought that Rachel looked a little evasive.
‘I knew that you would refuse,’ she said morosely.
Cory laughed. ‘Then why did you ask me at all?’
‘I did not wish to make assumptions,’ Rachel said, ‘but I thought I knew you well enough to guess your answer.’
‘You know me well enough to predict my reactions to most things,’ Cory observed.
He saw a tiny frown dip between Rachel’s brows as she pondered this. She looked a little uncomfortable with the thought but did not reply, and after a minute Cory returned to his digging. If Rachel knew him well, then he also knew her. She was stubborn. He had not heard the last of the watercolour book yet. In fact, he would lay money that she would return to the topic within the next five minutes. He dug out a few more feet of trench-and waited. It took two minutes, not five.
‘Why will you not agree to pose for the book, Cory?’ Rachel asked. ‘It is one of Lady Sally’s charitable ventures and all in a good cause.’
Cory looked up and adjusted the rim of his disgusting hat to shade his eyes from the sun. Rachel’s brown gaze was steady and curious on him. Clearly she saw nothing wrong in a parade of eligible men being flaunted in order to sell Lady Sally’s book. Cory set about disabusing her.
‘Rachel, I dislike the idea of being exhibited like a piece of meat, to titillate the female appetite!’ He stuck his spade into the earth in an impatient gesture. ‘I can see the description now: Cory, Lord Newlyn, six foot one inch tall, possessed of an income of forty thousand a year and estates in Northamptonshire and Cornwall…’ he made a noise of disgust ‘…and various other assets that an enterprising young lady might like to discover for herself!’
Rachel gave a peal of laughter. ‘I had no notion that you were such a stuffed shirt, Cory. You have always been willing for the ladies to examine your assets up until now! Look at you down by the river!’
Cory did not reply. He felt irritable. He disliked the idea that he was a killjoy who was not prepared to help Lady Sally in her charitable venture. Damn it, he was always prepared to contribute to a good cause. What he was not prepared to do was to pose for the book. He was well aware that it was just an excuse for what was essentially a husband-hunter’s handbook and he preferred to do the hunting himself rather than be a target for desperate females. He also preferred the whole business to be rather more subtle. This so-called book seemed to him to be a blatant excuse to parade a few eligible men before the young ladies of the
