Redeeming the Reclusive Earl - Virginia Heath Page 0,58
ear to ear. ‘In case you were wondering, I understood your initial statement perfectly, Effie. Without the need for all your hilariously inappropriate descriptive clarification. Your big brain makes them feel emasculated in the inadequate sense rather than the literal.’ To vex her he also pointed south, his lips twitching as he struggled to hold the laughter in.
‘Then why didn’t you just say so and put me out of my misery, you wretch?’
‘Where would the fun have been in that? I thoroughly enjoyed watching you flounder and that unflatteringly blotchy blush was the icing on the cake.’ He snorted again when her hands automatically sought her cheeks to feel the apparently unflattering blotches for herself.
‘You’re a miserable, reclusive curmudgeon. You’re not supposed to have fun. And certainly not at my expense when I am one of the few people who can tolerate you.’
‘That’s true.’ He jumped into the trench beside her making the six-foot-by-three-foot space feel overwhelmingly small. ‘I shall try to curb the urge in the future. Although to be fair, it would be much easier to do if you stopped giving me good reason. You are the one who used the words wither and castration in the same sentence and then dug yourself a bigger hole trying to correct them.’
‘You know the words fly out of my mouth before I’ve had time to consider them.’
‘Then try breathing in between them, Effie, darling.’ He was too tall. Too broad. Too everything while smelling sinfully too good. And he had called her darling, when no one had ever called her darling, and the endearment sounded wonderful on his lips. It all had a devastating effect on her pulse. ‘It might help prevent unnecessary embarrassment in the future.’
‘Good advice.’ And because it was and she was more mortified now than just embarrassed, and because he already had his back to her, she inhaled deeply and slowly blew it out. She didn’t usually allow herself to be so flustered with a man. Not any more at least. She blamed the fact she was today on three long days of not seeing him despite knowing full well he had always had the power to fluster her. Although bizarrely, as much as Max flustered her, he also liberated her, too. With him, she gave her big brain free rein and never pretended to be anything but what she was. He was her friend. Which was lovely and she should be content with that seeing as she had never had many of them. Except increasingly she wasn’t.
‘Do I intimidate you, Max?’ So much for breathing before she thought aloud.
He paused and she held her breath, unsure she truly wanted to hear his answer, but desperate for it all the same.
‘No.’
‘Why not?’
Another pause. Strangely loaded and significant this time as his answer mattered so much to her. ‘Because it is hard to be intimidated by a woman who cannot match a pair of shoes.’
Had he tempered his words? Sidestepped the question as he was prone to do when he did not want to honestly answer? Was he placating her, or worse—paying her lip service because he was kind beneath the bluster? He didn’t seem intimidated ever—but then their friendship had always been strictly platonic. Perhaps that had a bearing? Or was she reading more into the pause and his answer than he had ever meant because her feelings for him weren’t entirely platonic any longer and probably never had been? The feminine part of her was attracted to his physicality and the temporal part was attracted to the man beneath. Was she trying to read more into his words because she wanted more than friendship? Did he?
Of course not! This was all Eleanor’s fault. Because Eleanor had set her reading Gothic novels again and the unrealistic romance in them was doing strange things to her cynical brain and reawakening her curiosity of men. Every heroine looked remarkably like her in her odd head and every hero bore a striking resemblance to Max. This was exactly why she had stopped reading the rubbish!
Max had never flirted with her. Or flattered her with effusive compliments. Never given any clue that he saw her as a woman as well as an irritant. All clear