How to Woo a Wallflower (Romancing the Rules #3)(40)

He looked around him to ground himself. Gazing into her eyes, holding her in his arms, he’d forgotten who he was. Who she was. That he stood sucking her finger in her own brother’s home. The brother who paid his wages and could decide to sack him without a second thought.

“We should go back to the ballroom,” he said, though each word was painful to get out, as if he didn’t have enough breath for any of them.

She stilled as she had in the library. Frozen in frustration and disappointment. “Very well, Mr. Adamson.” Without waiting for him, she rushed for the door. “Tell Miss Morgan there’s no need to thank me this time.”

“For what?”

“For the moment when you take her into your arms for the next dance.”

“And if I ask you instead?” He shouldn’t. He couldn’t. But he wanted to. Desperately.

“I’d say no.”





CHAPTER THIRTEEN

On the Monday following the charity ball, Clary beat her usual arrival time at Ruthven’s by an hour.

She’d slept fitfully, risen before the sun came up to dress in the dark, and left the house with a bag filled with a drawing pad, pencils, brushes, and a portable watercolor set. She’d walked the short distance to the British Museum to sketch, attempting to catch the pinks and golds and peaches of dawn in quick washes of watercolor as morning glow lit up the Portland stone facade.

The hour was still early when she finished. She’d walked the park for an hour, ambling along the row of costermongers’ carts before finally making her way to the office.

After unlocking the front door, she settled her bag on the desk she’d been given, directly across from Daughtry’s, and carefully pulled out the cluster of blooms she’d purchased from a flower seller. This, she realized, was the danger of having one’s own money. Coins in one’s pocket were too easily spent.

A rustle of movement set her senses tingling, and she turned to find Gabriel in the doorway of his office, shoulder against the frame, arms crossed, as if he’d been settled there awhile. Watching her.

“Good morning,” she offered cheerily, attempting to be as professional and unaffected by him as she’d promised herself she’d be. At least during working hours. She was prepared to allow herself to think whatever thoughts she wished about him after leaving the office.

“Flowers aren’t allowed at Ruthven’s,” he barked from across the room.

“That’s outrageous.” Clary whirled on him, nearly dropping the cluster of tulips and daffodils. “Flowers should be allowed everywhere. If I ruled the world, they’d be required.” She stomped over, holding the bouquet out under his nose. “How can you ban such beauty from any space?”

He glared down at the perfect pink tulip heads and frilled daffodil trumpets and sniffed. “Very nice,” he said in a smoky voice. His lips eased into a mischievous grin.

Clary’s mouth fell open. “You’re teasing me. You are actually attempting to be jovial.”

“And doing a terrible job, apparently.” He returned his mouth to the stony expression he usually wore. “I shan’t try again.”

Clary started to insist he must, and he grinned once more, sending her belly into a flip-flopping tumble. She leaned closer, and he bowed his head. When he reached up, her heartbeat skipped several beats. But instead of touching her, he swept a finger along the edge of a daffodil petal.

“They’re prettier than most flowers,” he acknowledged.

“Tulips and daffodils.” Clary pointed from the pink blooms to the yellow. “They’re harbingers of spring and always welcome after the winter doldrums. Don’t you like flowers?”

“If I admit that I don’t, are you going to tell me again how you’ll require them everywhere once you’re queen?”

“Perhaps.” Clary breathed deep, relishing the combination of the flower’s green scent mixed with his. “But first tell me why you don’t like them.”

He stared at her intensely before turning away, moving into his office. “Flowers remind me of death. A friend of my mother’s was a flower seller. She’d gift us the old ones, mostly roses whose petals had begun to wilt. They smelled sour and sickly.”

“But these don’t.” Clary smelled them again and wished she’d purchased pungent lilies or hyacinths, scents sure to win over the staunchest flower doubter.

“No,” he said, turning to face her as he leaned against the front edge of his desk. “They smell fresh and sweet. Like you.”

For a long breathless moment, they stared at each other. His gaze dropped to her mouth, and heat flared there and in her cheeks and then her chest. He didn’t have to touch her to affect her because she remembered, with searing detail, every time he had.

Then the bubble burst, and he stood up sharply from his desk, buttoning his suit coat and casting his gaze over her shoulder. “Good morning, Daughtry. Thank you for coming in early.”

Clary had been so focused on Gabriel she hadn’t heard the older man shuffle up quietly behind her.

“The missus says spring blooms always bring cheer,” Daughtry said approvingly as he joined them in the office. “Well done, Miss Ruthven.” Passing a folder to Gabriel, he said, “Here is the information you requested, sir. Everything is in order for the vendor appointments this morning. The first arrives at nine.”