Page 11 of The Duke’s Hidden Runaway Bride

“I often do. I possess so little of either.”

She laughed.

The sound startled her, but Adrian only smiled, as though he had known all along that she could.

“Tell me what each of these is for,” he said, threading a length of red ribbon through the withies. “I have spent most of my life understanding nothing and being forgiven for it, but I find I should like to know more about this.”

“The bay is for glory. Rosemary for remembrance. Holly for endurance, because it keeps its green through winter.” She touched one of the small red apples. “These are only pretty. My mother said one was allowed a thing for no better reason than that.”

“A sensible woman indeed.”

“The most sensible,” Ophelia agreed, thinking that sensible was a safer word than interesting.

“Then I shall take her advice.” He fixed another apple into the greenery. “Even if you insist upon hanging it crooked.”

“I did not hang it crooked.”

“It was straight until you touched it.”

“Give it to me.”

He lifted his hand out of reach, and the ribbon tightened sharply.

Adrian looked down. He had tied himself to the bough again.

Ophelia began to laugh.

He regarded his trapped hand, salvaging what dignity he could. “You see how indispensable you have made yourself?”

“Only to the most helpless duke in Wales.”

“The most helpless duke presently in Wales.”

“Hold still.”

He obeyed. She took his hand between hers and worked the ribbon loose. His skin was warm from the fire, his fingers relaxed in her grasp.

The task took longer than it should have.

Neither of them remarked upon that.

The household moved around them, hanging holly over the mantel and arguing over the ivy, but for a few moments Ophelia heard nothing except Adrian’s breathing.

Lady Elise’s face recalled her.

Her godmother entered the hall and stopped still, staring at them, weary dismay plain on her face, as if the thing she had feared had happened exactly as expected.

Ophelia drew her hands away.

The bough was finished. It lay between them, the mistletoe at its heart. She and Adrian had been leaning over it, towards each other, far too close.

“There,” Ophelia said. “It wants only hanging. One of the servants must do it. It is bad luck for the maker to hang her own.”

She rose, gave him the smallest curtsey, and went to help Mrs. Probert with something that did not need her help.

She did not look back.

She could no longer pretend there was no danger.