Page 73 of Indecently Daring

“By performing dares?” Harry asked sceptically.

“Yes. Sometimes the dares are just about giving confidence, sometimes they’re fun, and sometimes there really is a risk involved. It’s all the luck of the draw, but the hat seems to know who needs what.”

“The hat knows?” Harry repeated, staring at her as if she’d run mad.

“Don’t look at me like that,” Alana said with a huff. “You don’t understand, but it’s true, I swear it.”

“If you say so,” he replied, obviously humouring her. “So, what was your dare?”

“To dance in a garden at midnight,” she said, smiling at him.

“Well, we are in a garden, and it’s dark, though….” He pulled out his pocket watch and held the lamp up so he could see. “It’s barely eight o clock.”

“Oh.” Alana sighed.

Harry set down the lamp. “How about we dance now anyway, and when we go on our honeymoon this summer, we try it again? We could dance at the Boboli Gardens in Italy.”

“Won’t they be closed at midnight?”

Harry shrugged. “When did such a minor concern ever bother you? You said it was a dare, didn’t you?”

Alana gazed up at him. “You are quite wonderfully perfect.”

“It will go to my head if you keep saying such things.” He grinned, before sweeping a majestic bow. “May I have the pleasure?”

“You may,” she said, accepting his hand as he pulled her into his arms.

It was ridiculous, of course, the snow made it slippery, and they laughed and shouted as they danced and slithered around the garden. Just as they were becoming too breathless and hysterical to go on, big, silent flakes drifted down from the sky and they paused, staring up at it in wonder as icy touches caressed their faces.

Alana turned to look at Harry to find him gazing at her, his eyes soft.

“I love you.”

She sighed and leaned into him. “Just as well, really, because I adore you.”

He laughed and kissed her, then snatched up the lamp. They ran the rest of the way home, Harry towing her behind him. They burst into the vicarage, which Mrs Hogget had left cosy for them, with lamps lit and fires burning. Jeb was staying at Holbrook tonight, much to his delight, and was no doubt getting his head turned by the idea of maids and footmen at his beck and call.

With numb fingers, they helped each other with coats and cloaks, pulling off sodden boots and shivering as they ran up the stairs to Harry’s bedroom… their room now.

Alana gave a bark of alarm as she flew inside and skidded to a halt as she stared at the bed.

“Good heavens!” she exclaimed.

Harry rubbed the back of his neck, grimacing. “I ought to have warned you, I suppose.”

“Yes, yes you ought,” she said, unable to take her eyes from the monstrous bed that dominated the room. “That is… That is….”

“Awful,” he said. “Hideous and—”

“Grotesque.”

“That too,” he agreed, walking up behind her and sliding his arms about her waist. “It belonged to the last vicar. He was rather more of the, er, fire and brimstone variety. Apparently, he had the bed made for the room. I couldn’t afford to replace it, so I’ve had to live with it.”

“Are those skulls?” she asked sceptically.

“Yes.”

“And the stations of the cross. On a bed.”