Page 30 of The Duchess’ Second Chance

Amanda sighed. “Do what you must,” she said. “I suppose it is your house, after all, and I have no right to give you orders when it comes to what you do with your own things. If you want to help me put the room in order then you may.”

She thought he might reprimand her for framing it as a question of what he was permitted to do—of course, he could do whatever he liked in his own home, and her permission was not required. But he only smiled faintly, as though she’d said something that entertained him, and began to shift the settee into the middle of the room. “Why don’t you tell me where you want this?” he suggested.

“Where I want it?” She was surprised. She hadn’t thought about it in those terms. “Won’t you just put it back…wherever it was before you went to the war?”

“I can’t even remember,” he said. “That was so long ago…it feels like something out of another life, to be very honest with you. And besides, you are the duchess. It is up to your discretion how the home is arranged. If you have a vision, I’m happy to help you realize it.”

Was it truly her decision? She hadn’t expected that. “I suppose you could put it there, before the fireplace,” she said. “That would be cozy, and guests would be able to sit comfortably. And then maybe the armchairs could go opposite…” She pointed out two likely places. “What do you think of that?”

Sampson unbuttoned the top collar button of his shirt and the cuffs of his sleeves, which he rolled up. “I can see we have a lot of work ahead of us,” he said with a smile.

Amanda smiled back automatically, but she had caught sight of the bare skin on his collarbone and on his forearms, and she had been hard pressed not to let out a gasp.

His face wasn’t the only place he had been scarred. There were long-healed marks on his arms as well. And there was thick muscle there too, muscle that stood out all the more prominently as he lifted one end of the settee and dragged it to the place she had indicated she’d like it to go.

He set it down and stretched out his arms, then glanced in her direction. She turned away quickly, not wanting him to see that she had been staring. She was sure that color was showing in her face now. She felt hot and disgruntled. Uneasy. Uncomfortable.

She moved to one of the lighter pieces of furniture, an ottoman, and picked it up carefully. It was bulky and somewhat difficult to hold, but it wasn’t heavy. She carried it to a better position in the room and set it down. Then, because she couldn’t bring herself to look at Sampson, she pretended to wrestle with the placement. She stepped back, eyed the ottoman critically, and then moved forward and adjusted it slightly.

Even as she did so, she felt foolish. Anyone could see that she wasn’t making any real difference to the appearance of the room. She was wasting time, that was all—and giving herself something to do that would keep her from having to look at Sampson.

She moved the ottoman slightly again.

Behind her, she heard Sampson let out a grunt of effort and the grating sound of another heavy piece of furniture sliding across the floor.

The two of them worked together in a silence that seemed easy as long as it went unexamined. Amanda was painfully aware that if she thought too hard about what was going on here, she would be forced into reckoning with the fact that she had grown uncomfortable the moment his attire had changed. The moment he had shown some skin, and the muscles under his shirt. Not to mention his scars.

And now they were all she could think about.

How would it feel to touch muscles like that? She was sure they would be hard. Would he be able to lift her, if he wanted to? What would that feel like?

Her heart raced at the thought of it.

This was her husband. It couldn’t be wrong to think about him like this.

And yet, it felt as if she was crossing a line just by letting the thoughts enter her mind. What would he say if he knew what she was thinking right now?

What would George say, for that matter? She had cared for George, but she had never had this sort of thought about him.

She let out a long, heavy breath.

Focus on the room. Don’t get carried away with ideas that will never amount to anything.

CHAPTER 15

“Is everything where you’d like it?” Sampson asked Amanda.

“I think so.” She stood in the center of the sitting room, turning in a slow circle and taking things in. “I do think perhaps I’d better test it, though.”

“Test it?”

“Will you sit there?” She pointed to one of the armchairs. “I want to see what it’s like to use this room, to find out whether it gives the feeling I’d like our guests to have.”

Sampson couldn’t help smiling. “Certainly,” he agreed, walking over to the chair she’d indicated and taking a seat. “Will you be pretending I’m a guest?”

Amanda chuckled. “I don’t think there’s any need for that,” she said. “I just want to see what it feels like to socialize across this much space, that’s all.” She took the seat opposite the one she had pointed him to. “Do you feel as if we’re uncomfortably close to each other—or far from each other? Or does this seem a natural distance?”

“Well, it seems all right to me,” he said. “But on the other hand, we’ve been here for only a few moments.”