Page 97 of The Mistress of Ashmore Castle

‘Oh, come on! You’ve been flirting with me all evening, and then you slipped in here. What was I to think?’ His big face loomed closer again.

‘Stop it! Leave me alone,’ Rachel said, shoving him hard in the chest.

‘Oh, come on, Rachel. I’ve been longing to kiss you for days. You gave me every reason to think—’

She shoved him again and he released her, but was still standing close, and looking at her with an honest perplexity that made her want to hit him.

‘But I want to marry you,’ he said, as though she ought to have realised that. ‘I really do. It’s not just . . . you know. I was going to ask you, honestly I was.’

‘Well, I don’t want to marry you,’ Rachel said. Why did she feel so cross about it? It was a nice thing, to receive a proposal, and he was a nice boy. ‘In any case,’ she went on, trying to sound reasonable, ‘our parents would never allow it.’

‘Don’t say that. I’m sure my pa wouldn’t mind.’

‘Well, my mother would. She wants me to marry a duke, or a prince, or something.’

‘But what do you want?’ Henry said. His arms went round her again. ‘I bet I know. I bet your mother would allow it if you made a fuss. Will this change your mind?’

He was going to kiss her again. She struggled against him. ‘Let me go! Leave me alone!’

And then someone else was there, and Henry was plucked away as easily as if he had been a twig caught in her hair.

‘You heard what she said,’ came Angus’s voice. ‘Step away. This is not the way to carry on a courtship.’

‘Oh blast and damn you, Tullamore! What’s it to do with you? You think you can just—’

‘Go back in the ballroom, Eassie, and stop making a fool of yourself.’

A glance at Rachel told him she wanted him to go. ‘All right, I’m going. Keep your hair on,’ he said crossly. And he was gone.

Then there was just her and Angus. The air seemed suddenly cooler and fresher. At all events, a little shiver ran down her spine.

‘Did he hurt you?’ Angus asked neutrally.

‘No. He was just annoying,’ Rachel said.

‘I’m afraid that’s what happens when you encourage the wrong people,’ Angus said, in a flat voice.

She peeped up at him uncertainly. ‘Are you angry with me?’

He sighed. ‘No, of course not. Not with you.’ He looked down at her with a faint, wry smile. ‘I’m always rescuing you from cads, aren’t I? Last time it was Johnny Etteridge. In the orangery at Alvie.’

‘I didn’t think you remembered that,’ she said, in a small voice.

‘Didn’t remember that I kissed you?’ Angus said. ‘Didn’t remember the best moment of my whole life so far?’

‘You—’ She began to remind him of what had happened next, and stopped.

‘I asked you to marry me.’

‘Yes,’ she said. There was a silence. She was very conscious of his breathing. She had a wild urge to lay her hands on his chest – under his jacket, against his shirt – so she could feel his breath going in and out. She thought she would feel his heartbeat, too.

‘Rachel,’ he said, in quite a different voice.

She looked up into his face, feeling on the edge of something momentous, as though she might actually go up in flames, like a piece of paper. ‘Yes?’

‘You really have got to get this flirting under control,’ he said, smiling. And then he was kissing her.

It was entirely different. It was heavenly. His lips were firm and warm and dry and his breath was sweet and the smell of his skin was like something she had always known, and filled her with longing. Her arms crept up round his neck, and his were round her waist, and the kiss went on and on and she wanted it never to end.