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Chapter Three
“Good afternoon,” Mason called out with a tip of his hat as he met Nora in the drawing room of Whitwell House the next afternoon.
Her pulse spiked at the sight of him, remembering the stolen kiss he’d given her yesterday. The caress had taken her breath away. She prayed she wasn’t blushing like some cake of a school girl. “Good afternoon, Mr. Granger.”
“Mason, please,” he encouraged in a low voice that she didn’t dare imagine meant intimacy.
Brutus stopped at his heels, promptly sat, and stuck out his tongue to greet her with a rapid pant.
As she picked up her gloves, she nodded toward the shaggy hound and muttered, “I’m beginning to think that dog goes everywhere with you.”
“No,” he corrected, deadpan, “I go everywhere withhim. His social calendar’s absolutely brimming over.”
On cue, the dog barked his agreement. Nora blinked to keep from rolling her eyes.
“Today’s carriage ride was his idea,” Mason explained.
“Attemptedcarriage ride.” She finished pulling on her white kid gloves. They were embroidered with pink and red flowers that matched the floral trim of her long driving coat, one that buttoned up the front all the way to its high collar. She’d purposefully chosen it because it flattered her figure, because a foolish part of her wanted to see his reaction when he saw her. The heated appreciation in his eyes made her belly flutter. “I don’t think it’s going to work.”
“Don’t disappoint Brutus,” he warned in sotto voce. “He’s been looking forward to this all day.”
The dog sat up and begged.
Her lips twisted with a suppressed smile she didn’t dare show for fear of encouraging both of them.
As she reached for the wide-brimmed straw bonnet resting on a nearby chair, Emmeline rushed into the room. From the excitement glowing on her face, the butler had undoubtedly told her that Mason was here. Er, rather, thatthe dogwas here because she didn’t seem to notice Mason at all as she hurried over to the shaggy hound, dropped to her knees, and flung her arms around him in eager greeting.
“Fluppy,” she cooed softly to the dog.
Even though Nora had heard her daughter speak yesterday, she was still surprised by the happy jolt of her heart.
“His name is Brutus,” Mason told her, clearly attempting to cajole her into saying the dog’s name. Into saying anything except—
“Fluppy,” Emmeline said again, laughing and completely ignoring Mason. But then so did Brutus as the irascible creature gave her an appreciative lick in reward.
Giggling, Emmeline skipped out of the room toward the front door with Brutus loping easily along at her side. They sent up a loud clatter on the checkerboard marble floor as they scurried across the entry hall.
“I think your dog has a new name,” Nora told Mason as she put on her hat and moved toward the door, unable to hide the glistening tears he surely saw in her eyes.
He walked slowly beside her and muttered, “And I wish a woman would be as thrilled to see me as she is to see that mongrel.”
Being bolder than she’d been in years with a man, Nora placed her gloved hand on his forearm. “I am.” When he glanced down at her in surprise, doubt pricked at her, and she looked away, quickly changing the subject. “But you’re tilting at windmills if you think you can convince Emmeline to ride inside a carriage.”
“Not me,” he corrected with a nod at the dog as Emmeline raced with him outside onto the grand stone portico. “Brutus.”
She silently arched a brow.
Then both brows shot up when she saw the carriage. Not an enclosed town coach but an elegant barouche with its top completely down. She glanced up at the grey sky. Even if Mason could somehow cajole Emmeline into the carriage—and she still didn’t think he could—
“It’s going to rain,” she commented.
He looked up and grunted, then escorted her down the steps and into the courtyard where Emmeline and Brutus chased each other in laughing and barking circles.
The little carriage door hung wide open, but the liveried tiger who’d opened it wasn’t standing by to help her up as he should have been. Instead, he stood in front of the horses, holding them. The coachman sat perched on his seat, but he stared straight ahead, not paying them any attention.
Nora stopped, the gravel of the courtyard crunching beneath her half boots. She eyed the barouche suspiciously and lowered her voice, “What are your men doing?”
“Exactly as instructed.”
