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His nostrils flared with the strong intake of air, one hand lifting to adjust his round spectacles unnecessarily, which drew her attention to his darkened irises. “Evidently,” he murmured. “I made notations of other botanists’ observations.” He rummaged in his notebooks and pulled a sheet of paper from inside one of them. “They’re here.” He extended it to her.
She reached for the paper, making their fingers touch. Both froze. The sheet transferred to her hand, leaving his free. In the brief moment it took for her to react, she felt his forefinger twitch as if it wanted to test the texture of her skin. Their gazes clashed, her breathe stalled. The air around them almost sizzled with
pent-up energy. Still locked in each other, he slid his hand slowly from hers, causing a trail of lightning to climb up her arm, goose-bumps in its wake. Her breasts puckered, her middle fluttered, and she thanked the fact she was sitting, or her knees would not have offered a secure support. Seeking to disguise her reaction, she lowered her head to the paper. “What about your own observations?”
“I never took measurements myself.” The hand that had wreaked havoc with her skin hid under the desk.
He had told her that there was the one sample in the hot-house in the campus. Those dimensions he had written down had come from the specialised literature. “Why not?” she asked, blue eyes still glued to the sheet.
“I…failed,” he answered in a hoarse tone.
Naturally, hot-houses plants had a different development from those blooming in their own environment. The list he had produced contained data regarding the latter.
Her head whipped up to him. “How could you possibly have done that?”
The pencil rolled around his fingers restless. “I took it out when it was big,” the pause stretched as his Adam’s apple bobbed. “But I had no time to—”
Narrowed eyes studied his every move. Were they even talking about a plant any longer? “You should do it when you next go there,” she suggested.
“Certainly. I’ll do so before it spurts—I mean, before it wilts,” the ruddy colour on his face and the pressed lips told of a slip. And not hers this time.
Goodness gracious! Her mushed brain fumbled for something to say but fairly got stuck in the process. Utter silence grew like a huge snowball that took up all the space between them.
The housekeeper knocked and announced luncheon, breaking the stillness and giving Harriet the chance to jump to her feet and leave before tension rolled her insides into a knot.
After the meal, Sam headed to the campus’s green-house in large, heavy steps. The weather was crisp despite it being the end of May. Not even the view of Radcliffe Camera, his favourite place in Oxford, soothed him.
What the hell had happened just now?
Better. What the hell was he thinking to say those clumsy things in there? After the words were out had he realised the double entendre meaning they could have.
He would measure the plant and he would do well to finish the paper while he could still claw an inch of control. The last he had. No. He must hide in the college library and write it himself to avoid the risk of giving in to his unlawful instincts. And sleep in his very cosy lodging, staying away from her as much as possible. The strength to do it was sadly lacking. How would he dredge enough single-mindedness not to enjoy her company, not to see her? Not to gobble the beauty of her inch by painful inch? The craving was killing him, but he found it impossible to put distance between them.
When Professor Hayley came back, he would resume his usual life and would not be seeing so much of her. The thought brought no solace. Not seeing her caused more anguish than the excruciating effects of her nearness on him.
Forget it, you lunatic, he admonished himself as he stopped at the steps to the green-house. Unlike his rampant body, his mind needed to build a barrier between decency and these primal desires pulsing in his blood.
“Hey, McDougal,” Turning, he saw Michael Trent, one of his former classmates.
“Trent,” he answered absently. The other man stood to inherit a Marquisate and hung around Oxford more for carousing than for academic interests. “I was looking for you,” he said and patted Sam on the back.
“I’ve been busy with a paper.” He had joined the other man and his crowd for a pint a few times as an undergraduate, but his studious habits kept him away from them.
Trent smiled carefree. “You should take your nose off the books. Life is raging out there.”
Life for Samuel had a whole different meaning though he was not about to digress on philosophical matters with his shallow colleague. “If you say so.”
“Madame Drummond opened a new place in town.” Said Madame had a famous—or infamous, if you prefer—bawdy house in London. The woman must be branching out by the looks of it. University cities presented infinite opportunities for such ventures. “Care to join us there tonight?”
The idea disgusted him to be sure. The impersonal quality of this sort of transaction did not appeal in the least. “I don’t think so,” he replied and made to walk away.
“Come on, McDougal. Once in a lifetime won’t hurt,” with a smug expression Lord Trent spread his arms. “Too much study and no fun will make you, you know, explode.” ‘Explode’ being the exact term, in all its senses.
Sam wondered if he should not do exactly that to overcome this infatuation. Perhaps, all he needed was a mighty tumble to appease his…urges. “Alright, then,” he yielded, not too convinced.
“Excellent, man! I’ll see you there.” And left Sam with a wave.
Dressed in breeches, clean white shirt and hessians, Sam clattered down the stairs in the middle of putting on his coat. At the landing, he met Harriet in the drawing room. Something pierced him at the sight of her holding a cup of tea with a book on her lap. It felt too much like guilt. For what, he had no idea.
