The Way to a Gentleman's Heart - Theresa Romain Page 0,4
White—Christian name Sally, Jack now gathered—looked as if she found this highly entertaining. Shaking out her skirts, she practically danced from the long kitchen. Off to put together a luncheon for a school full of, as the academy’s name told Jack, Exceptional Young Ladies.
“If her enthusiasm is anything to go by, she’s a good assistant to you,” Jack observed once they were alone.
“She is, and better every day.” Marianne rubbed the doughy mass in the bowl between her hands. “We’ve a little less than half an hour before the boy returns, and you’ve all those apricots to cut up. If there’s something you want to say, say it now. While you work the knife.”
“I like a woman who knows her own mind,” Jack decided, settling himself in the chair vacated by Sally. “I’m not intimidated by things like apricots, you know. They’re little and cute. Not frightening enough to scare a fellow away.”
“I’m not trying to scare you away.” Wiping her hands, Marianne scattered flour over a few square feet of her giant worktable, then heaved the mass of dough onto it. “I’m trying to get on with my work. And I sincerely hope your ‘little and cute’ comment was only referring to apricots.”
“What else could I have possibly been referring to?” he said blandly. “I don’t see anything else little and cute in this kitchen.”
No, Marianne had never been cute, nor was she exactly little. She was of medium height, and he thought her striking, a woman of frank eyes and a straight nose and a full mouth and a stubborn chin.
Now she used that full mouth to frown at him. “First you don’t intend to apologize. Then you say I’m not little and cute. You could have kept all that to yourself. You could have stayed in Lincolnshire.”
“Probably.”
“Then why the devil are you here, Jack? Are you trying to win me over again?”
He hadn’t prepared this answer; he spoke on instinct. “I’m not apologizing because I can’t say I’m sorry for the life that brought us to this moment. And I didn’t say you’re little and cute, because you’re so much more than any word I could apply to you.”
For a moment, she only stared. Then she sighed, her shoulders relaxing. “So glib. As always.”
“It was rather good, wasn’t it? And it’s even true.”
“Cut the apricots,” was all she said, though to his ear, it sounded like, Fine, you’ve won a bit more of a reprieve before I boot you out.
Instead of cutting an apricot, he reached for a strawberry from the basket. They’d been ungodly expensive, probably forced in a hothouse, but he’d never forgotten Marianne’s yearly delight when strawberries appeared for a scant few weeks in the kitchen gardens.
Taking the large knife up in his other hand, he carefully cut the little green leaves from the top of the fruit.
Marianne was watching him, lips parted. “What are you do—”
He held out the strawberry to her. She looked down at her hands, covered in flour and what he realized now was pastry dough, then returned her gaze to Jack. He kept holding out the strawberry to her.
Maybe, he realized, he had come to apologize after all. But not in words. In strawberries.
At last, she relented, opening her mouth so he could pop the berry between her lips. The gesture was familiar, friendly, intimate—yet strange. They’d done this so many times in the past—first as childhood friends feeding each other berries and later as lovers sharing the sensual fruit. Now they were strangers.
But some things remained the same, such as the bliss on Marianne Redfern’s face as the taste of a strawberry spread across her tongue.
She allowed herself that moment of pleasure, then snapped back to work. It happened so suddenly Jack was caught by surprise. One second, her eyes were heavy-lidded and her lips berry-wet. The next, she was taking a rolling pin to the pastry dough before her.
He set down the knife, leaning forward. “Marianne, don’t you—”
“Cut the apricots.” Under her rolling pin, the dough became an even, flat sheet. “And did you know you’re still wearing your hat?”
He cursed, then tossed it onto a chair beside him and raked his fingers through his hair. “How do I look? Handsome?”
“Wash your hands,” was all she said as she turned to a shelf and took down a stack of tart cases.
He grumbled his way to the pump in the scullery, then back. Seating himself again, he took up the knife and applied it to the first apricot.