Page 21 of A Winter Scandal

“Am I?” A faint smile touched his lips, mysterious and warm. “Do you expect me to apologize?”

“I do not expect anything from you.” Thea kept her voice tart and refrained from shifting again in her seat. His smile did peculiar things to her insides, things that were both delightful and vaguely terrifying. He made her feel not quite herself, and Thea was not sure whether she liked that. She had the suspicion that she should not. “However, I fail to see what can be of such interest about my face, which you have been staring at since I sat down.”

“’Tis your hair, actually, that I am watching.” The smile turned into a grin, quick and flashing, lighting his eyes. “I am wondering exactly how long it will be before your braid tumbles free.”

“My braid?” Instinctively, Thea’s hand went to her head, feeling for the coil of hair secured by only a few hairpins. It was, indeed, loose, the weight of it dragging the coil down the nape of her neck, and when she touched it, the braid slipped completely free, draping down over her shoulder.

Thea grimaced and started to re-pin it, but Gabriel reached out to stay her hand, saying, “No, leave it.”

“Don’t be absurd.” Thea’s voice came out more shakily than she intended. “’Twill come undone. It’s inappropriate.”

“No more inappropriate than sitting alone in the kitchen with a man.”

“Then no doubt you had better leave.”

He shrugged. “I have little affinity for propriety.” He paused, then added quietly, “I like the way your hair looks down.”

He raised his hand and tugged the end of her braid. She had not tied it, only slipped the end into the center of the coil, and at the little pull, the braid began to unravel, the curls slipping free.

“I’ll look like a savage,” Thea muttered, but she did not move to braid it back up.

“I do have an affinity for savages.” The faint smile came again, touching his eyes more than his lips. “Your curls are beautiful.”

Thea was painfully aware of how close Gabriel was, his hand resting on the table only inches from hers. She thought of the way he had kissed her earlier. Surely he would not do so again. Would he? Her breath hitched in her throat. She knew she ought to say something, do something. She should pull back from him. Yet she could not make herself move.

A little hiccuping cry broke the silence.

“The baby!” Thea jumped up and hurried over to the makeshift bed in the basket, not sure whether relief or disappointment was uppermost in her feelings.

She bent over the basket. Matthew’s feet and hands were moving restlessly, and he rubbed his head against the pillow beneath him, his mouth twisting up and his face turning red. Quickly she bent and picked him up, and his face cleared a little. But then he jammed his fist in his mouth and closed his eyes, his face screwing up once more, and he began to cry. Thea bounced him a little and patted him on his back, but he opened his mouth and let out a wail.

“Good God!” Morecombe shot to his feet. “What’s the matter with him? Is he all right?”

“I think he’s hungry. Here, hold him, and I’ll get his food.”

“Me?” Gabriel’s dark brows vaulted upward. “But I don’t know what to do with him.”

“It isn’t as if I am an expert.”

“You are a woman.”

“An unmarried, childless woman,” Thea retorted. “Of course, I could hold him if you would prefer to prepare his broth.”

Morecombe looked askance at the fireplace. “The devil. Here, give him to me.”

He extended his hands and Thea thrust the baby into them. Gabriel took the child, holding him out and looking at him warily.

“He won’t bite you.” Thea didn’t bother to hide the amusement in her voice.

“Are you entirely certain?” He sighed and settled the baby into the crook of his arm, holding Matthew up against him.

To their amazement, Matthew’s cries ceased immediately and he stared up at Gabriel, his eyes wide. It was, Thea thought, entirely vexing; apparently the man’s charm worked on infants as well. She went to the fire and picked up the small iron pot that sat near the embers. She dipped a ladle of the thin broth into a small bowl. As she turned back to the table, the baby left off his fascinated study of Gabriel’s face and began to cry again, his little sobs building. Thea could not deny that she was small enough to feel some satisfaction at the event.

“Hurry.” Gabriel cut his eyes toward Thea as he began to jiggle and pat the baby. “I think he’s working up to something worse.”

Thea forked a couple of pieces of potato from her bowl into Matthew’s broth and quickly began to mash it up. She stirred it and tested a spoonful with her finger.

“I’m not sure it’s cool enough.”