Page 50 of One Day for a Valet

“Oh, for fuck's sake, Christopher. I’m not going to hurt my sister, so you can go back to reading your romantic penny novels or whatever it is you do all day.”

Christopher did not move. Oliver’s voice lowered to a growl, which was even more menacing than his previous bellowing. “I’m pissed as hell, but I’m perfectly clear-headed and she doesn’t need protection from me, from you, or from anyone else, for that matter. She is my responsibility, no matter how I’ve made a hash of it in the past. And you—” he reeled on Sofia, eyes bright and dangerous.

Then, whatever he’d been planning to say remained exactly where it was. He just stared at her, his eyes wide, throat working with a swallow. He shook his head and when he spoke again, his voice was soft and raw with emotion. “I’m fluent in three languages and they’re all goddamned worthless. None of them have invented words for how sorry I am for having put that fear on your face … in your heart.” He squeezed his eyes closed and his chest heaved in a massive sigh. “Ti voglio bene.” When his eyes opened again, everything about his appearance remained unapproachable, from his tautly strained muscles to his clenched fists. But there was such tenderness in his eyes that it rendered the other details unimportant. “Thank you for the offer of breakfast, little flea. Will you come here?”

She closed the distance, halting just inches from him. She looked up, puzzled when he did not reach for her. With deft fingers, Oliver removed a hairpin from her hair, but before she could ask why, he had twisted and secured the lock back in its place along with the tendril that had fallen when she’d sacrificed a pin to Violet. “You missed some.”

There was her brother, the boy who had cherished her above all others.

Pride in Oliver’s strength and determination descended upon her in a nearly overwhelming crush of emotion. Feelings crowded into her soul, bringing with them a sense of safety that her memory had long ago stripped away. To see his rage splash so close to the surface, then watch him fold it all neatly back inside like clothes into a carpetbag when it threatened to overwhelm … it was miraculous.

“Go on now. I have important rocks to move. Come back for supper. I’ll feel better by then. I will feel better.” He repeated the last in Italian, and offered her the most unconvincing smile she had ever seen. She returned it with all the conviction that he could not muster.

Sofia’s fingers absently moved to touch the hairpin her brother had so carefully placed. “Of course you will.”

As it turned out, catapulting random objects was exactly what the duchess needed to restore her cheer. After several hours of calculations and experimentation, the swing arm of the trebuchet cracked and further carpentry was required. Because the children were to do all the assembly without assistance, that left Violet with nothing to do. Constitutionally incapable of being sedentary, Violet promptly decided that, since she was so nearby Hamish’s cabin, the remainder of the afternoon would be best filled with a visit.

Almost immediately, Zach and Nora’s determination to repair their trebuchet gave way to frog catching and then a discussion of amphibian life cycles. As the sun drooped in the sky, they gathered the rest of their picnic lunch and started for home, leaving their broken trebuchet to be collected by a wagon. When they passed by Oliver’s cabin, all was quiet, and there was an intricate, spiralling rock garden where the pile of rubble had been. They continued towards Northam Hall without stopping.

Sofia turned to Zach, who had fallen behind a few steps, weighed down by the blanket and basket. “Your papa has decided the picnic and game of calcio storico will take place this Sunday. He thinks the staff could use some fun after all the planning for the ball.” Gabriel had discussed the idea with Zachariah, and Zach had begrudgingly agreed to participate.

Nora let out a squeal of delight, then wrapped her hands around Zach’s forearm with a tug. “Come practice with me, please. Just for a few minutes before supper!” Zachariah’s gaze crept up to Nora’s for an instant before sliding off in a different direction. He nodded, then followed her exuberant skipping towards the back gardens at a more sedate pace.

Christopher rose from the bench near the entrance to the garden, his gaze assessing her as though he could catalogue the moments of her day by the state of her frazzled curls and flushed cheeks. And maybe he could.

He met her halfway both in step and smile, extending his hands to her the moment she was within reach.

“You’re here,” she said, somewhat breathlessly. “I didn’t expect to see you until supper with Oliver.” His natural, unstudied delight at the sight of her kindled warmth in the pit of her stomach.

“I am,” he said. “And you should stop looking at me with those eyes unless you wish to be debauched in the rose garden.” He took her hand in both of his, raising it to his lips to press a lingering kiss to her palm.

“What nonsense. I only have one set of eyes and all they’re saying is that I am not opposed to the pleasure of your company.” She arched an eyebrow, challenging him to turn that into romantic drivel. It was one thing to enjoy his company and another thing entirely to allow his words to land at the centre of her heart. There was nothing at all wrong with the calculations of his verbal trebuchet.

A slow smile curved on his lips. “There seems to be a fundamental difference of opinion between your various body parts. Your eyes are declaring unadulterated pleasure at my unexpected company.” His lips moved to the inside of her wrist, the warm slide of his tongue branding her skin. “They are downright enthusiastic to have settled upon mine. In fact, if you attempt to look away, I fear they may secede from the sovereign country of Sofia just so they can continue to take in the sight of me without ever blinking again.”

She tipped her chin and gave him a slow, antagonistic blink.

“And now, they are most definitely flirting with me. For shame, Sofia, you really must keep them in line. At this point, their shameless behaviour borders on mutiny.”

Christopher leaned in, tingling anticipation building in all the places where his body brushed against hers. “I always did love a good mutiny.”

He lowered his mouth to hers in a series of deep, searching kisses, each one tumbling into the next. The light teasing of his words only moments before was completely at odds with the urgency of his hands as he skimmed the angles of her jaw, the slope of her shoulder, down the length of her arms to her fingertips, as if they could not rest until they had travelled across every exposed centimetre of her skin and committed it to memory.

With a tortured sound, he eased his mouth away from hers and buried his face in her neck. “Sofia.” In that breathless groan, her name sounded like a prayer. “I met you outside tonight because, foolishly, I thought an absence of walls might prevent me from spending every minute we’re alone trying to quell my hunger for you. Because, Christ, I’ve missed you terribly. As it is, my brain has catalogued fifty different locations where we could find privacy without even having to wander so far as the back garden.”

He chuckled into her shoulder, a low raspy sound that caused an answering flare of heat through her veins. Her body canted closer, and Christopher went still save for his rapid inhalations. His hands slid to her hips, warmth bleeding through the material as he held her in place. She squirmed within the rigid clasp of his fingertips, some contrary devil inside her further incited by his determination to resist, by the tenuous grip with which he clung to his control.

“It seems I’ve arrived just in time to rescue you from my wicked sister once again.” Oliver loped closer, his tousled curls bouncing with every step. “See, I’ve been paying attention to all those lessons in friendship you’ve been droning on about.” Oliver quirked a smile, and Sofia’s stomach rolled at its similarity to Gabriel’s.

Christopher dropped one hand from Sofia’s waist, but she could feel his reluctance in the slide of his fingertips against the cotton of her dress. He tucked her body against his, a casual arm draped across her shoulder. “Clearly, I have done a poor job explaining the nuances. A good friend would have circled around and entered through the kitchen.”

Oliver fell into step beside them, trailed by Violet, who had one caterpillar crawling up her arm and another hanging from her earlobe. “Ah, but I don’t require lessons in being an older brother, and this situation required a direct path to the front door.” Despite words that could easily contain a threat, there wasn’t one. Oliver’s voice remained jovial, reminding Sofia of countless conversations from their childhood.

Whatever had occurred between Christoper and Oliver over the past fortnight, it seemed that a mutual trust had been forged between them. But part of her, a suspicious, despicable part she hated, wondered if Oliver was manipulating Christopher’s friendship for his own purposes. She hated to think Oliver capable of deceiving her, especially after all the effort he had put into his sobriety, but he had inflicted too much damage upon their bond, obliterated her trust too many times, for her to blindly ignore the possibility.

“What are you doing here, Oli? I thought we were going to bring you dinner,” Sofia said.

“You were, but I found the duchess watching a caterpillar build a chrysalis in my newly planted chestnut trees, and it was getting dark. I wanted to see her home safely.”