Page 99 of A Story of Love

Lori smiled at the claw marks.

“Find that amusing, do you?”

“I do. How did those happen?”

“I tried to take back one of my stockings.”

“You need to stop leaving such things lying about, hmm?” she mimicked.

“If that was an attempt to sound like me, you failed spectacularly.”

He was about to withdraw his hand when Lori noticed something and grabbed it. She ignored the fluttering in her belly that even the slightest touch of his appeared to ignite and studied his knuckles. “I know Mr. Pouncefoot-Jones is vicious, but your knuckles are swollen. What happened?”

“Nothing.”

“It doesn’t look like nothing,” she said, releasing his hand.

There was a brief rap on the door before it opened, and Rufus entered and dropped something into Severn’s outstretched palm. “Here’s a pair from Dinah, my lord.”

“Thank you, Rufus. That will be all.” Once the door had shut, Lord Severn held up intricately embroidered garters, one between each forefinger and thumb. He wore a mocking smirk that reminded her of a little boy taunting a little girl. “Hmm, what is it that has been embroidered on here?” He squinted exaggeratedly at the garter in his right hand. “It looks like people. What on earth could they be doing?”

Even from a foot away Lori could see that a needlework virtuosa had embroidered nude men and women engaged in coitus.

She snorted. “I thought you were forty, not fourteen.”

He scowled. “Nine-and-thirty, Miss Fontenot—nine-and-thirty.”

Lori laughed outright this time. “Oh, I beg your pardon. Did I lacerate your delicate self-esteem?” She grabbed at the garters, thinking to catch him unaware.

“Uh-uh-uh,” he chided, not releasing the garters as a decent man would do. Instead, he tugged hard enough to pull her forward, requiring her to brace a hand against his chest to avoid a full body collision.

Lori couldn’t resist flexing her fingers a little, shivers running through her at how little give there was.

“Feel anything you like?”

She jerked her hands away and stepped back.

“Here.” He grinned down at her and held out the garters, but then jerked them back again when she reached for them. “Unless you would like help putti—”

“Give. Them. To. Me,” she said through clenched teeth.

He laughed and handed them over. “I’ll turn my back so you can tie them on.”

Lori stared suspiciously at his broad back for a few seconds. When it appeared he wasn’t lying, she lifted her foot to the chair, hiked her skirt, tugged up her stocking, and tied on the garter, pausing to examine the erotic scenes depicted. They really were quite stunning—not to mention scandalous.

Once she’d secured the stocking, she thought about her other garter and sighed. No point in having unmatching ones, although who would ever know?

You’re worried that his lordship might find out later on. Or hoping, rather…

She gave an exasperated sigh at her own idiocy, switched legs, and changed out garters, tucking her own boring singleton into the hidden pocket in her petticoat.

“You may turn around now.”

He turned and eyed her up and down, a slight pucker on his forehead.

“What?” she demanded.

“It has just struck me that you are not dressed for dinner.”