Her lips moved soundlessly; her attitude was one of supplication. She stepped further into the meadow, lay down on the grass and rolled in the dew.
Over and over her slender curves tantalized him—sleek back and gently curving bum, breasts and belly and long, shapely legs. And back again, over and over, while he gazed, bewildered and transfixed. He hadn’t had a woman for a while, but he realized, somewhere in the part of his rational mind that was still functioning, that his fascination with this girl was far more powerful than anything he’d felt before.
She stopped to catch her breath, and her breasts, now dotted with bits of grass, quivered invitingly. He longed to pick the grass off piece by piece and bury his face in those sweet mounds. She closed her eyes, put her hands together as if in prayer, then raised them over her head and rolled again.
A distant whinny jerked Alexis from his trance. Hell and damnation! That must be Elderwood’s horse. He leaped to prevent his own mount’s answering whinny; he mustn’t let his friend get a glimpse of this naked girl. Elderwood wouldn’t force her if she didn’t want it—he wasn’t that sort of man—but faced with such temptation, he could be very persuasive, and he would doubtless offer her compensation...
The very thought offended Alexis beyond belief. He dashed into the meadow.
* * *
“Get up! Get dressed!”
Peony froze in midroll. A strange man bounded toward her, gesturing, his voice low but urgent. She scrambled to her feet, a shriek catching in her throat.
“I won’t hurt you,” he said, but he kept on coming. Her heart clambering into her gullet, she tried to cover herself with her hands.
“Who—What—” She couldn’t get a word out.
“Don’t stand there like an idiot, girl! I already know what you look like naked.” A blush crowded up her neck and burned her cheeks. “Get your clothes on, and be quick about it.” With brisk, shooing motions he herded her toward the hawthorn where she’d left her shift and gown.
Anger swelled up, overcoming her fear. How dare he order her about? “Go away,” she said, hating how her voice trembled as she fled before him. “What are you doing here? You have no right.” A little way round the circle of meadow, she spied a horse, cropping the grass at the edge of the wood.
“You should be thankful I’m here,” he said, stopping several feet away when she reached the hawthorn. “I don’t know what foolishness you’re up to, but clearly your lover isn’t coming, and—”
“No, because you spoiled everything,” she said. Her hair had fallen out of its ribbon and stuck wetly to her face. She clawed it away, wanting to hit him. Her chance at finding love was gone. “Go away!”
He folded his arms and just stood there, scowling—and looking at her as if, underneath that frown, he was enjoying himself. “Not until you put your clothes on and be off home where you belong.”
Another flush overwhelmed her, this time of shame and misery, as she realized what he meant. He thought she’d come out here to tryst with some likely village lad, as if she were a scullery maid. And who was he, anyway? She’d never seen him before. He was dressed like a gentleman and spoke like one, too, but he didn’t belong here.
“Who gave you the right to order me about?” she demanded. “This is private land.”
His eyes widened. “You silly little fool, I’m trying to protect you. I traveled here with a friend. To him, a naked woman is a blatant invitation. You’re lucky it’s I who came upon you and not he.”
She grabbed her shift and turned it right side out. “Stop staring at me.”
“You’re a beautiful girl without any clothes on,” he said. “I wouldn’t be much of a man if I didn’t stare.”
At that bold statement, she should have taken fright once again, but...she didn’t. Instead, a rush of unexpected heat shimmered through her from the tips of her nipples to the place between her thighs.
Appalled at herself, she struggled to pull the shift over her head. She was wet with dew, and bits of grass stuck to her everywhere, and so did the shift.
And she wasn’t beautiful, either—she was too tall and entirely the wrong shape, and passably pretty at best. Perhaps that was why she’d had such a shocking reaction to what he’d said.
“A lovely girl like you deserves better than this,” the man said.
She wanted to scream at him. She wasn’t lovely at all. She’d been assured of that often enough. His words hurt, which was ridiculous, seeing as she didn’t know him and didn’t care what he thought. Covering herself took forever and made her angrier with each passing second, at both him and herself.
When she finally emerged, he wasn’t watching her anymore, but gazing across the meadow as if alert for something. His lecherous friend?
Unnerved, she hastened into her gown and settled the skirts about her. “You may leave now,” she said with what she hoped passed for icy dignity.
He turned and eyed her. The corner of his mouth curled up. “Your stockings and boots.”
It was infuriatingly obvious that he wouldn’t budge until she obeyed him. She sat on the cold, damp ground and pulled on her stockings and then her boots. She stood and grabbed her shawl.
“Ho!” came a distant voice. “Where are you, old fellow?”
“Coming!” cried her persecutor. “Go home,” he said softly. He vaulted onto his horse and was gone.
Deprived of even the pleasure of stalking away in high dudgeon, Peony did as she was told.
When Lucasta tapped on her bedchamber door a while later, Peony was stark naked again. “You may come in if you don’t laugh,” she said bitterly, turning the key in the door.
Lucasta slipped in, her usually tidy hair falling down around her ears, and mud, leaves and several white blossoms clinging to her gown.
Peony burst into giggles. “Whatever happened to you? All that mud! Your gown is ruined.” She locked the door again.
“A stray bull,” Lucasta said, “and it’s all your fault. I saw you were gone and went out to check on you, but the horrid creature took a fancy to me. I’m lucky I arrived home intact.” She eyed Peony and snorted. “You’ve bits of grass and weeds stuck all over you.”
Peony shivered, returning to the painstaking task of picking every bit of greenery from her skin. “I should love to wash it off, but I daren’t ask for a bath. The maids will be sure to tell Mrs. Groggins, and she’ll tell Aunt Edna and Papa, and then I’ll really be in the soup.”
“Let me help.” Lucasta shed her gown. “We can say the mud and grass were stuck on me. I shall explain that I went out to check precisely where the sun first falls on the Enchanted Meadow on May Day. I’ll say it’s significant in an ancient Beltane rite.”
“Thank you,” Peony said dully. “Is it?”
“I have no idea, but it’s absurd enough to be plausible.” She poured wash water into the basin, wet a towel and wrung it out, and began to swab the debris from Peony’s goose-pimpled skin.
Her cheerfully sympathetic expression only made Peony feel worse.
“I gather rolling in the dew produced no result,” Lucasta said after a while.
Peony shivered all over, and it wasn’t just from being naked and cold. She pushed the memories of the man who’d ruined everything to the back of her mind, along with her inappropriate reaction to him. “It was freezing cold and sopping wet, and I felt horridly exposed. Now what am I to do?”
“Maybe