The Lady Most Willing

“She’s good at this game!” Taran hollered.

“I’m good at many games,” Marilla murmured.

That was when her hands found his chest.

It was all very amusing.

Until it wasn’t.

Catriona had been standing on the table, clutching on to Lady Cecily’s shoulder for balance as she watched Marilla stalk the duke. They’d all been laughing, because it was funny, it truly was. Even Lord Oakley had started to chuckle, and he never laughed about anything.

But then Marilla attacked.

“Who could this be?” she asked, placing her hands on Bretton’s chest. “Remember, you have to hold still while I guess your identity.”

Catriona frowned as she watched Marilla move her hands to Bret’s shoulders.

“Someone very athletic,” Marilla purred.

Catriona’s arms began to tingle. And not in a good way.

“Let me see,” Marilla continued. She trailed her fingers up to Bret’s face, lightly touching his lips. “It’s definitely a man,” she said, as if that hadn’t already been obvious, “but—”

“Enough!” Catriona roared.

“Miss Burns?” Lady Cecily said.

But Catriona had already vaulted off the table and was halfway across the room. “Unhand him!” she yelled, and before Marilla could make a response, Catriona had grabbed her by the shoulders and wrenched her away.

Marilla let out a shriek of surprise and would have crashed into a table had not Taran leaped forward to save her.

“Here now,” Taran said accusingly. “That’s not very sporting of you.”

“She was mauling him,” Catriona growled.

“It was just a game,” Marilla sniffed.

“It was—” But then Catriona stopped. Because Marilla hadn’t been doing anything wrong. She’d been playing the game precisely as it had been meant to be played.

Catriona’s stomach clenched, and all of a sudden she realized that everyone was looking at her. With pity. With shock. With—

She looked at Bret’s face, terrified at what she might find there.

She looked at Bret’s face, and she saw . . .

John.

John Shevington, the man with whom she’d fallen crazily, spectacularly, and apparently quite publicly in love.

He would never be the Duke of Bretton to her again. He would never even be Bret. He would always be John. Her John. Even if they never saw each other again, if he left Finovair and refused to ever take another step in Scotland, he would be her John. She would never be able to think of him as anything else.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered. Because she’d made such a scene. Because now everyone was looking at him, and he was going to be forced to save the situation, to find a way to laugh it all off.

Because she couldn’t. It was taking her every ounce of strength not to burst into tears then and there.

“No,” he whispered. “Don’t be sorry.”

She swallowed, then looked down at their hands. When had he taken her hands in his?

“You are magnificent,” he said.

Her lips parted in surprise.

And then he smiled. One corner of his mouth tilted up, and he looked so boyish, so handsome, so just plain wonderful, that she thought her heart might burst.

He dropped to one knee.

Catriona gasped.

Marilla gasped even louder. “He is not proposing to her!”

“He is,” John said with a smile. And then he looked up, right into Catriona’s eyes. “Catriona Burns, will you do me the indescribable honor of becoming my wife?”

Catriona tried to speak, but her words tangled and tumbled in her throat, and finally,