Still, Gemma believed in kindly impulses more than mischief. Some villagers were glancing his way, and Gemma began to suspect that the choice of the problematic bilberry juice had not been random. She grabbed Lysander by the hand and dragged him from the noisy shed.

"Come with me. And don't lick your lips, whatever you do."

CHAPTER 22

Chapter 22

THE AIR WAS COOLER outside and the dew had begun to fall. Gemma had never considered how passionately romantic the dale looked by moonlight.

Until tonight.

Lost in her spinning thoughts, she stumbled on the slick grass. The matching elegant slippers she had borrowed from Miss Worthington were not meant for Yorkshire pastures. Instantly Lysander came to her rescue, just as he had on her previous coquettish stumble. How carefully he watches over me.

His warm hand cupped her bare elbow and his other slipped about her waist. Her back fell into his chest and the heat of him rose up to infuse her senses. Desire broke powerfully over her, crashing into her like a wave on a rocky shore. She was drenched, tumbled and breathless and deliciously confused.

She stayed, leaning into him, not stepping away as she very likely ought to have. He stayed as well, neither moving away, nor forward into some caress. He simply held her, allowing the moment to last just as it was.

I could love a man who understood such moments.

She tipped her head back to rest it on his shoulder. The sky above them was a riot of stars, the moon a brilliant disk that still could not outshine the shimmering swath of forever.

"We are so small," she whispered. "Insignificant."

"No."

Gemma felt the single word rumble through her body. Her knees weakened and her desire spiked. "No?" She murmured, just to feel his deep voice vibrated through her again.

"You are not small, Gemma. You are … essential."

His words echoed inside her, provoking emotions and needs she had hidden away years ago. She realized she was shaking her head, denying his words, denying her response. "I'm not. I'm —" Not a lady. Not a doctor. Not even a true Yorkshire woman.

However, her usual litany of inadequacy no longer rang true in her mind. She abruptly realized how careful she'd become. So careful. So formal and awkward in her position of weighty responsibility.

She felt altered tonight, as if the gown and the attention had granted permission to some other Gemma to take her place.

Her pulse pounded. The rush of blood through her veins combined with the moonlight to brew a fizzy sort of indestructibility within her. The rules of propriety seemed suddenly pointless and limiting. She felt them slipping away, as if perhaps they had fit badly all along. Perhaps they had.