Catching the quizzical look in his eyes, Lenore chose her words carefully. “I see nothing wrong in my brothers’ pursuit of pleasure. They enjoy it and it causes no harm.”
“But such pleasures are not for you?”
“The frivolous is hardly my style, Your Grace.” Lenore delivered that statement with feeling.
“Have you tried it?”
Lenore blinked.
“With the right companion, even frivolous pastimes can be enjoyable.”
Lenore kept her expression blank. “Really? But no doubt you are an expert on the topic, Your Grace?”
Jason laughed lightly, a smile of genuine appreciation curving his lips. “Touché, Miss Lester. Even I have my uses.”
Oddly warmed by his smile, Lenore found herself smiling back. Before she could do more than register that fact, he was speaking again.
“But tell me, given your antipathy for the frivolous, do you enjoy organising such events as these, or do you suffer it as a duty?”
Try as she might, Lenore could see no hidden trap in that question. Tilting her head, she considered the point. “I rather think I enjoy it,” she eventually admitted. “These parties are something of a contrast to the others we have from time to time.”
“Yet you take no part in your brothers’ entertainments?”
“I fear my pursuits are in a more serious vein.”
“My dear Lenore, whatever gave you the idea the pursuit of pleasure was not a serious enterprise?”
Lenore stopped, jerked to awareness by his use of her name. She drew away and he let her, but the fingers of the hand that had rested on hers curled about her hand. “I have not made you a present of my name, Your Grace,” she protested, putting as much force into the rebuke as her sudden breathlessness allowed.
Jason raised a laconic brow, his eyes steady on her. “Need we stand on such ceremony, my dear?”
“Definitely,” Lenore replied. Eversleigh was too dangerous to encourage.
With an oddly gent
le smile, he inclined his head, accepting her verdict. Only then did Lenore look about her. They were no longer in the drawing-room but on the terrace. A darted glance added the shattering information that no one else had yet ventured forth. She was alone, with Eversleigh, with only the sunset for chaperon.
Feeling a curious species of panic stir in her breast, Lenore looked up, but the grey gaze was veiled.
“It seems somewhat odd that you should so willingly organise, yet remain so aloof from the fruits of your labour.”
Eversleigh’s tone of polite banter recalled her to their conversation. Guardedly, Lenore responded, “The entertainments themselves are not my concern. My brothers organise the frivolity. I…merely provide the opportunity for our guests to enjoy themselves.” She looked away, across the rolling lawns, trying to concentrate on her words and deny the distraction assailing her senses. Her hand was still trapped in Eversleigh’s; his fingers, long and strong, gently, rhythmically stroked her palm. It was such an innocent caress; she did not like to call attention to what might be no more than absent-minded oversight. He did not appear to be intent on seduction or any similar nefarious endeavour. She strolled with him when he moved to the balustrade and stood, one hand on the stone, her skirts brushing his boots.
About them, the warm glow of twilight fell on a world burgeoning with summer’s promise. The sleepy chirp of larks settling in the shrubbery ran a shrill counterpoint to the distant lowing of cattle in the fields. The heady perfume of the honeysuckle growing on the wall below the terrace teased her senses.
Glancing up through her lashes, she saw that Eversleigh’s features remained relaxed, hardly open but without the intentness she was learning to be wary of. His gaze scanned the scene before them, then dropped to her face.
“So—you are the chatelaine of Lester Hall, capable and gracious, keeping to your own serious interests despite the lure of fashionable dissipation. Tell me, my dear, have you never felt tempted to…let your hair down?”
Although, as he spoke, his eyes lifted to the neat braids, coiled in a coronet of gold about her head, Lenore knew his question was not about her coiffure. “It’s my belief that what you term fashionable dissipation only results in unnecessary difficulties, Your Grace. As I find more delight in intellectual pursuits, I leave frivolous pastimes to those who enjoy them.”
“And what particular intellectual pursuits are you engaged in at present?”
Lenore studied him straightly but saw only genuine interest. “I’m undertaking a study of the everyday life of the Assyrians.”
“The Assyrians?”
“Yes. It’s quite fascinating discovering how they lived, what they ate and so on.”