Where Shona marshalled the courage to spout such outlandish flummery, she couldn’t begin to venture.

But it felt wonderful.

So wonderful in fact, that in that instant, she determined to do so again.

And again. And again.

Not tell thumpers, just speak her mind and do as she wanted more often.

Captain Le Draco’s mouth slid into an approving smile, his azure eye, the tiny flecks of silver there, flashing with wry amusement.

His support bolstered her growing courage.

“I did indeed promise.” Humor infused his melodic baritone. With a smart bow, all proper decorum and politesse, he extended his right arm as if she were a princess he escorted to The Theatre Royale.

A giggle almost escaped Shona at the vinegary expressions pleating the Olsons’ faces and cinching their prune-like puckered mouths. The darkling look Mrs. Olson glowered at the captain nearly caused another round of uncontrolled mirth.

Only by biting the inside of her cheek was she able to check her jollity.

If she’d offered them sugared earthworms or glazed maggots during tea, they couldn’t have appeared more offended. Yet, how could they raise a breeze? As new acquaintances, they held no power over her and certainly had no right to any expectations.

Perceptibly displeased with the situation, they exchanged a peeved, telling glance.

Good.

Perhaps they’d take the hint and leave off their pursuit. She’d never allow a gentleman of Mr. Olson’s weak character to pay his addresses. And a more disagreeable mother-in-law she couldn’t envisage.

Far better to remain unwed.

Shona darted an uncertain look upward to find the captain observing her with that same grave contemplation he’d regarded her with earlier.

What was he thinking?

Did he find her inadequate too?

The thought chinked away at her burgeoning confidence like rust relentlessly eroding iron. She almost retreated into her customary shell of silence and fled to the house. However, the kindness tempering the hard lines of his face and warming the edges of his eyes encouraged her.

Shona trailed a sympathetic visual path over the scar slashing his face’s left side.

What on Earth had happened to him?

How horribly painful it must’ve been, unfortunate man. She’d half raised her fingers to her cheek in sympathy before she caught herself.

Others might think him hackit and unpleasant to look upon. She couldn’t have disagreed more.

Nae, nothing about his countenance was ugly.

The strong angles and planes of his face still modeled a proud if somewhat harsh masculine beauty she found hard to ignore. Much the same way a damaged Grecian or Roman sculpture remained timelessly breathtaking despite its obvious imperfections. One didn’t focus one’s attention on what was missing or marred, but rather admired the undeniable awe-inspiring magnificence that had endured.

“You needn’t wait for the captain and me. I’ve lost my slippers, so my progress will be considerably slower than yours.” Shona offered the Olsons a genial smile to lessen the sting of her words.

My, but she’d grown bold as polished brass buttons since making the captain’s acquaintance mere minutes ago. And what an utterly lovely, heady feeling. She could get rather accustomed to this. In the past five minutes, she’d demonstrated more gumption than…

Well, ever in her memory.

Perhaps not terribly audacious by some standards, but certainly an acceptable beginning for a diffident mouse of a thing.

Clutching Captain Le Draco’s coat closed across her bosoms with one hand, she looped the other through his extended elbow. The merest hint of cologne wafted up from his jacket. A clean, manly aroma. Faintly spicy. Woodsy, even.

At once comforting and invigorating.

Neither of the Olsons moved an inch.

Not even when a bird flitting about the oak’s branches pooped on Mr. Olson’s shoulder.

Shona choked on another restrained laugh and faked a cough into her cupped palm when Mrs. Olson’s eyes narrowed in suspicion.

Evidently Captain Le Draco had no such compunction for he laughed outright, despite Mr. Olson’s denigrating glare.

His mother opened her mouth, no doubt to object to Shona’s suggestion, but before she uttered a syllable, Captain Le Draco smoothly suggested, “If you would be so kind as to hurry ahead, find our hostess, and inform her that Lady Atterberry requires a bath drawn straightaway. I’d advise hot tea and broth too. For as you sagely advised, Mrs. Olson, we wouldn’t want her ladyship taking a chill.”

Oh, my.

The captain possessed the cheeky boldness of a bloke with bull-sized ballocks.

Rampant heat streaked to Shona’s hairline even as her focus gravitated to that part of his anatomy.

“As you say,” Mrs. Olson ground out as if chewing glass. Her gray eyes sinking into irritated slits, the irises barely visible between her lids, she gave a terse nod. No match for the captain, she evidently knew when she’d been beaten. “We shall see you at dinner, Lady Atterberry. It’s my fervent wish that afterward you’ll permit Clarence a turn about the terrace or gardens with you on his arm. And of course, you must save him a waltz at the ball.”

Not a polite request but the command of a domineering woman accustomed to getting her own way.

Then you’re in for a disappointment, my dear lady. I do not waltz.

She must’ve read the refusal in Shona’s bland stare.

With a curt jut of her chin, Mrs. Olson grabbed her son’s arm and all but dragged him across the lawn.

A scowl marring his handsome face, he glanced behind him, his perturbed gaze waffling between Shona and Captain Le Draco. His expression fairly shouted, “How can she favor him over me?”

Shona stepped nearer the captain, sending a silent, but unmistakable message.

She did prefer this scarred, disfigured man to Mr. Olson’s carefully polished good looks. She’d choose sound character over practiced charm any day.

“I feared she wasn’t going to take the hint, and I’d have to resort to impoliteness.” The captain chuckled, a deep, pleasant rumble behind his ribs that drew Shona’s attention to the dark, curly mat of hair his parted collar revealed.

Her insides turned soft and malleable, while her pulse ticked up a notch.

How could a man she’d just met have such a profound effect? Was she, who couldn’t flirt and was a pathetic disaster at womanly wiles, all aflutter?

“As did I. Since yester eve, they’ve been quite persistent and annoying.” Dash it. Why had she said that? Now he’d think her a gossip or an unkind shrew.

“How so?” Considerate of her shoeless feet, Captain Le Draco took small strides and guided her around any debris on the ground.

A songbird chirruped overhead, and she automatically sought the source. A little bird with a blueish-brown head hopped along a branch, watching their progress.

As they sauntered along, the captain’s coat brushed her thighs. Shona absently rubbed the jacket’s fabric between her forefinger and thumb while contemplating her response.

Should she tell him her reservations about the Olsons? Would he think her shallow or conceited and full of self-importance? Worse yet, what if Captain Le Draco was, indeed, another opportunist? A roué?

Well, even if he turned out to be a full-on knave, he’d risked his life to save hers. She truly didn’t think she’d have been able to swim to shore. The beach was inaccessible from where she’d toppled into the lake, and with her water-logged garments, the stretch to where he’d bundled her aground would’ve been too far for her to swim.

Her impulsive, imprudent flight might’ve ended her life. Better she face her adversary next time.

At the very least, she owed Captain Le Draco a brief explanation.

“Last evening, the Olsons learned that I possess a title, along with an endowment.”

There. Captain Le Draco would either prove himself a charlatan like the others—Oh, don’t let it be so, her timid heart cried—or, he’d turn out to be the caliber of man she suspected he was.

Hoped he was. Needed him to be.

“Ah.” A smile skewed his mouth, his scar hitching his lips up farther on one side.

“Besides, I don’t waltz. It is a dance for graceful women. Women light on their feet.” Which she was not. She knew how to, of course. Mama had insisted she learn. The harsh truth was, Shona had never been asked to partner a man for the dance.

“You’ve yet to find the right partner then.” He gave her a rather bashful look. “Might I be so bold as to request you reserve one for me?”

She wanted to say yes, but dared not. For his sake. “I’ve never attempted a waltz in public. I’m afraid I’d make a hash of the steps. Tromp your toes. Trip over my gown.”

Or something equally inept and mortifying.

“Then we’ll practice together beforehand. We’ve almost a week.” He gave her a roguish wink and canted his head. “I’ve been told, I make a fair partner.”

With his eye patch and flowing hair, it gave him a rakish swashbuckler appearance. All he needed was a saber belted at his waist, a crimson scarf across his forehead, and a golden loop shining from one ear. Wholly charming and irresistible to imaginative bluestocking misses more accustomed to being snubbed than admired.

He was the stuff of which romantic legends were woven.

She couldn’t resist his offer. “All right. I suppose we might practice in the conservatory.”

“Perfect.”

She enjoyed the sensation of his firm muscles flexing beneath her fingers too much. Even more, she’d reveled in his arm snugly embracing her, holding her tight against his sculpted, muscled shoulder as he towed her to shore. Never had she been as aware of a man in her life. But then again, no man had ever held her so intimately either.

And the captain was a big man.

So large she didn’t feel all that cumbersome and ungraceful with him near. In fact—could it be true?—she felt feminine, and if not petite, at least delicate beside his towering, solidly-muscled form. Muscles which bulged and rippled beneath his damp shirt quite divinely as he walked.

Heavens. Since when did she notice men’s muscles?

You noticed his bum earlier.

It took every iota of self-control Shona possessed not to sneak another look at that particular portion of his anatomy.

Captain Le Draco pressed her hand to his arm, the gesture so natural, she couldn’t ponder the inappropriateness. “When I heard you addressed as Lady Atterberry, I confess, I feared you were married.”

He inclined his sable head, his regard dropping to her mouth before gravitating back to her eyes. Something intense and commanding flashed in his.

She tamped down the most insane desire to lick her lips.

Wait—

He feared she was married?

He feared I was married?

Feared?

In her mind, she chanted the lovely phrase, trying to decipher his precise meaning.

Was it too much to hope he was glad she wasn’t?

Of course, a fortune-hunter would be relieved, her skeptical conscience jeered.

Captain Le Draco pushed a hank of hair behind his ear that had fallen forward, and as if he were nervous, cleared his throat.

She found the boyish act endearing and a startling contrast to the battle-hardened soldier who’d earned the moniker Dragon. Even she, as sheltered as she’d been, had heard whispers about the young cavalryman who’d single-handedly slain ten—a dozen or more if one listened to the exaggerated tales—French soldiers at Waterloo.

“Lady Atterberry, I suppose I ought to properly introduce myself since neither of the Olsons thought to do so. I know it’s not quite de rigueur, but I’m sure you’re as curious as I. And I won’t tell anyone we breached decorum if you won’t.”

He inclined his head in that sleek mannish way she’d already come to associate with him.

“Captain Morgan Reed Kincaid Le Draco, formerly of the 1st Royal Regiment of Dragoons.”

She dipped into a fairly graceful curtsy—wobbling only a little, she proudly noted. “Shona Beatrice Imelda Atterberry. Or, I suppose, if properly done, Shona, Lady Atterberry. I inherited a Scottish Lord of Parliament title.”

“I’m deeply honored, my lady.” One hand at his waist—a purplish, convoluted scar zig-zagging from his wrist to his middle finger, he bowed. “That’s the equivalent of an English barony, isn’t it?” he said as he straightened, then took her elbow once more.

The captain’s touch sent another of those wondrous tremors skidding over her flesh. She seemed all tingly nerves and prickly sensations around him. Attuned to the largeness of his presence in a feminine way she’d never experienced with any man.

She gave him a delighted smile, inordinately pleased he knew that trivial detail. “Yes. It causes a bit of confusion at times.”

“That explains your almost indiscernible brogue. It’s just barely apparent when you’re distressed or excited.”

Despite Mother’s efforts to beat the accent out of me.

How astute of him to notice. None other than he had ever commented on it. He was inordinately observant. Must be his soldier’s training.

“Are you here with your family, Lady Atterberry?”

True interest? Banal conversation? Or did he fish for details?

Och, Shona. Ye’ve become as suspicious as Mama.

He might as well know the truth of it.

She’d already experienced a degree of censure as a result of her mother’s sordid crimes. However, the blades and young bloods seeking a wealthy wife didn’t seem to mind her tainted past all that much. Money and position covered a multitude of sins, it seemed.

“No, Captain. I came with Bridget and Hugh Needham.” She slid him a sidelong look and discovered he closely observed her. Normally, that would have her blushing, stumbling and stuttering over her words. Where was her usual timorousness? “I’ve lived with them for the past two years.”

That she could speak freely and openly with Captain Morgan Le Draco spoke to her in an undefinable, but nevertheless profoundly impacting way.

He didn’t pry, just smiled, that disarming, devastating twist of his mouth, and her heart, nigh on smitten with him already, flip-flopped. Other parts of her did strange, not altogether unpleasant, things too. Things that had never occurred with any other man

Stop this nonsense at once, Shona. You may be a bashful misfit, but you’re level-headed and prudent.

Tish tosh, her heart scoffed. Remember your mad dash to the lake? How prudent was that?

Worry rendered her answering smile somewhat weaker and less remarkable. How would he react to her tainted history?

A fortune hunter wouldn’t care.

Enough.

With firm resolve, she banished the cynical, pessimistic voice jeering in her ear to a remote niche in her mind. “I fear my reasons for accompanying the Needhams here aren’t altogether pleasant ones.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.” Though acute interest shone in his eye, he didn’t probe for more information.

“It’s a long, disagreeable tale,” she ventured, not yet certain she wanted to share the ugliness with him.

“I’d be honored to hear it, but please don’t feel obligated to tell me.” He absently grazed his long fingers over his jaw. “I understand some things are difficult to discuss.”

Somehow, she knew he did understand.

What was his story? She’d like to hear his too.

And because he had permitted Shona her privacy, her pride and dignity, she wanted to tell him. Wanted him to hear the truth from her before someone whispered an exaggerated or false account and tainted her in his estimation.

“The abbreviated version is that my mother tried to have my half-sister, now the Duchess of Harcourt, murdered for her fortune. I inherited if Alexa died. Mother was sent to an Australian penal colony for the rest of her life. The Needhams graciously took me in for as long as I desired. Mrs. Needham is my half-sister Alexa’s maternal aunt.”

Because Katrina was their daughter, Shona had hesitatingly agreed to join the Needhams at the house party. Also, Alexa, whom Shona adored, had written to say she planned on attending, and Shona hadn’t seen either since Season’s end.

Another purpose had motivated her as well.

She’d accepted the Needhams’ generosity for nearly two years. Of age, with no marriage prospects and none likely to ever arise, Shona had determined the time had come for her to return to Wedderford Abbey, take over the running of the estate, and assume her role as Lord of Parliament.

Her heart and stomach quivered.

Those might be considered brave things, mightn’t they?

A little raggedy-around-the-edges smile softened the corners of her mouth.

Perhaps wee, verra tiny courageous things.

She couldn’t hide from her destiny any longer or continue to take advantage of the Needhams’ benevolence. They hadn’t been informed of her decision yet, because she wanted to inform Alexa first since her husband, the Duke of Harcourt, was Shona’s guardian.

Only for one more day.

The duke had graciously overseen the estate and managed her modest inheritance. Through his financial finesse, he’d parlayed her funds into a credible fortune. More importantly, Wedderford was now solvent, and with continued diligence, the estate might become more so. She’d continue to rely upon his guidance once she took over the management, at least until she retained a trustworthy agent.

The last steward had conspired with Mama, and he too had been sent to the penal colony.

She veered the captivating man beside her a covert glance.

Captain Le Draco looked straight ahead, his brows slightly drawn together, seemingly lost in his own thoughts, and she squelched a wistful sigh.

How she envied Katrina’s and Alexa’s composure, their confidence and sophistication. And yes, she envied the cousins their handsome, loving husbands. Both their graces openly adored their wives.

Not that she wanted to be a duke’s wife.

Her saturated gown didn’t cause the shiver padding down her spinal column.

No indeed. Shona didn’t even begin to aspire to such heights.

That notion terrified her far worse than being humble Lady Atterberry. Gads, it had taken months to accept the Chancery Court’s decision granting her the title. Alexa, as the eldest daughter, should’ve inherited the title, but the court had bestowed it on Shona instead.

With a small start, she realized the captain had turned his one arresting blue eye on her, his mouth curved into a faint ribbon of a smile.

Shona’s stomach tumbled over itself, and she tripped over her own feet.

Och, a newborn lamb is more nimble.

His firm hand at her elbow steadied her as new heat rushed to her cheeks.

What had they been discussing?

Oh, yes. Why she’d come with the Needhams.

“The Needhams are the loveliest people. Their daughter, Katrina, the Duchess of Pendergast, is a dear friend. I don’t know what I’d have done without them.” And she didn’t. As awkward and gauche as she remained, she’d been a veritable social disaster when they’d taken her in. She owed them much.

“I’m truly sorry for your suffering, Shona.”

Captain Le Draco had used her given name.

Most impudent of him. Quite beyond the pale.

And she didn’t object at all.

“It must’ve been unbearably difficult for you.” Compassion rendered his voice husky and thick, and for an instant, Shona gaped, owl-like in amazement.

Except for the Needhams, Harcourt, and Alexa, no one had ever expressed any sympathy for her situation. She swallowed against the tangled knot constricting her throat, and blinked away tears she hadn’t realized had sprung to her eyes.

She wrapped his coat a bit tighter around her shoulders. “Thank you. It was quite awful at first. But the passage of time has helped. That, and being surrounded by people I know care for me.”

Seemingly of its own accord, her finger touched his marred cheek, the merest feathering over the rigid flesh. Brazen, that. And wholly invasive, and inappropriate, particularly since she’d known him all of twenty or thirty brief minutes.

Why did she feel this compelling need to comfort Captain Le Draco? To touch him? Such a powerful, overwhelming need that she kicked aside her usual shyness and reticence?

“What about you, Captain?” Her confidence hadn’t yet grown enough to address him by his given name too. “I imagine it’s been most difficult for you as well. Does it still hurt?”

She softly pressed her pads against the contorted flesh.

He seized her hand and held it to his ravaged cheek, his eyes closed, eyelashes trembling as if he were in pain or overcome by extreme sentiment.

“Yes.”