Except he was so close. His face inches away from her as he investigated the state of affairs outside. She could practically count his eyelashes—all dark and lush and long.

“Anything amiss?” she asked, hating how breathless she sounded.

“I cannot see if there’s an accident or anything of the sort ahead. Hopefully we’ll be moving along soon.”

He dropped back down on the seat again with a sigh, but this time he seemed closer, his bigger body encroaching on her space in the tight confines. He stretched his long legs so that his feet settled alongside hers.

She smiled shakily. “It seems we are stuck.”

“Not for very long, I imagine.”

She nodded. “Indeed.” Pause. “You have been very generous with your time today. You are doubtlessly eager to put this day behind you.”

He canted his head. “Why do you say that?”

“I’m certain you did not appreciate the earlier spectacle with . . .” She gestured vaguely.

“That bastard?”

She jerked at the use of profanity. Not because she was particularly offended, but because she had not expected that from him. It seemed so out of his very dignified character. So very unrestrained and he was the epitome of restraint. She grimaced. The very antithesis of Nora.

He shook his head. “Don’t give him another thought.” His lips twisted wryly. “Believe me, I won’t.”

“He knew the duke. Knows the duke . . .”

“If the man was an important person to Birchwood I would have already met him.”

She nodded, trying to let his words soothe her, but she was still stuck on the notion of how her presence was only bringing discomfort to his orderly and noble life. Certainly she had not thought of him when she barged her way into his world, but now she thought of him.

Now she thought of him a great deal.

Studying him, she admitted that she liked his face. She liked all of him. His face. His form. His large and capable hands.

When she stared at him, she felt a deep pulsing tug in her abdomen. It was most unusual—nothing she had experienced before.

She had not thought him to be the manner of man to appeal to her tastes, but there it was. Attraction. A troubling hypothesis. Not that she felt attraction for someone. She had no problem with that in theory. She was a scientist by nature. As a scientist she was open to different experiences. Just because she was not disposed to marriage did not mean she was uninterested in the possibility of a tryst with a pleasing partner.

Yes, radical thinking for a properly bred lady. She knew that, but she had long ago accepted herself as unconventional. She should shy from the notion of amorous congress outside the bounds of matrimony, but she did not.