Miss Isabella Thaws a Frosty Lord(12)
“It isn’t! I assure you. But you did ask…”
“So I did. Though it doesn’t escape my notice that asking appears to yield results demanding does not, I vow I refuse to budge from your side until your lips share what you insist on keeping so closely guarded—that of how you came to be in such a predicament.”
He termed her blindness a predicament? What an unusual word choice. She appreciated how very casual he was about it. “I vow,” she gently mocked, “you’re beginning to sound much like Harriet.”
“Heaven forfend,” he muttered darkly. “I’m more than double her age if I’m a day and certainly don’t need to be sounding like a schoolroom chit, even one so entertaining. But come now. The others shall be returned by the evening meal and at this rate I’ll count myself fortunate to have been granted the letters of your last name, much less a full explanation.”
“I promise to convey those letters into your safekeeping before our host and hostess arrive and bombard you with more choice descriptors.”
“Descriptors?”
“Ah…cork-brained simpleton being one of but a few.”
“A reminder I could have gone all day without but I shall thank you for it nevertheless.”
“Generous of you,” she said, having more fun than she’d had during any conversation in recent memory.
“On the contrary, it is miserly you are, I’m beginning to see.” He sighed deeply as though sorely aggrieved. “’Tis this not the season of goodwill and charity? Can you not share some of your own without scoffing an idiotic imbecile? One who plays the court jester quite well without any help at all?”
“At least I’ve discovered one of your talents. Do you juggle too?”
“One of my talents? That of the fool, you mean?” He made a credible cannon-blast noise and jerked into her as if wounded. “Oh! A direct hit!”
Laughing as he plainly intended, Isabella considered how far she wanted to stretch her newfound bravado, having never had the occasion to flirt with a man before. And by now Isabella recognized full well what she was doing. Recognized it and was loving every second. Not for the first time since he’d joined her, she hoped the housekeeper was delayed in returning with the promised refreshments, having no wish to have their discourse interrupted. “Were I to answer your questions without quibble, do you then agree to answer mine?”
With a long-suffering but obviously put-upon air, he returned, “If I must, I must.”
“You’ll tell me why you have such a reputation for…”
“Being unfeeling? Cold? Arrogant?”
“Though I’m tempted to let you go on for I find the enumeration of your faults quite illuminating, I was going to say grumpy.”
He barked a laugh. “Then why didn’t you?”
“I lacked the courage.”
“One thing you definitely do not lack, Miss Issybee—nay, I believe I prefer Issybelle—is courage. Though the longer you keep me waiting, the more I begin to doubt that assessment.”
It was exhilarating, bantering about with a lord—especially one so many found fearsome. Isabella only found him engaging. And appealing. And so many other things that if she let herself, she could easily forget what awaited her at the end of the holiday. Pushing away the unwelcome reminder, she said lightly, “So, you are in dire need of hearing how it happened?”
“Aye,” he said dryly.
Some imp made her reply, “I couldn’t keep up with your pace, my lord. My foot—”
“Not that, you vexing female, as you well know.” His bluster only made her smile more. “Your sight. How did you lose it?”
“You know, I do believe you’re the first person to ask it of me so directly. Most people either dance around the topic, as if my inability to see doesn’t exist or they fall over themselves with so much solicitousness I’m smothered by it. But you…” She paused, unsure how to proceed.
How much did he want to know, truly?
How much did she want to share?
He retrieved her left arm and it was only then that she became aware of how restless she’d grown, how her fingers had tangled in a loose strip of bandage she’d pulled free from the back of one hand. “Me?” he said. “I’m the nodcock who didn’t even notice by damn—beg pardon.”
He smoothed her palm and fingers over something solid and warm—his thigh? Her hand fluttered beneath his but Isabella made no move to retract it, consciously making an effort to relax her muscles against his hard flesh with every bit as much effort as she attempted to regulate her breathing.