Читать книгу The Viscount and The Virgin - Valerie Parv, Valerie Parv - Страница 13

Key members of the castle staff were housed in pretty stone retainers’ cottages arranged around a village green where the children often played while their parents socialized over coffee. Although the houses looked to be hundreds of years old, in reality, they had been built by the previous Marquis of Merrisand so that he could have his staff on call in case he needed them. Direct lines still connected each of the cottages with the castle switchboard.

Built on an area once known as The Tennis Courts, each cottage had its own vegetable and flower gardens, and backed onto a stand of woodland. Ring-necked partridges, quails, doves and wild turkeys frequented the woodland, attracted by Angel Creek, which crossed a corner of the castle grounds. It was an idylic place for children, and at night Kirsten liked to pretend that the cottage and the lovely surroundings were hers alone.

“Which cottage is yours?” Rowe asked, signaling his intention to accompany her all the way home.

She gestured vaguely. “The one with the blue curtains on the other side of the green. Really, there’s no need.”

“It hasn’t escaped my notice that you’re limping,” he said quietly. “I want to see that you get home in one piece.”

She didn’t need or welcome his concern. “I’m fine, really.”

“So I can see. How did you hurt your foot?”

She was forced to be honest. “New shoes.”

He frowned. “Why do women do that to themselves?”

So we have a fighting chance of meeting men like you eye to eye, she thought savagely. But it would take more than five-inch heels to achieve that miracle. And without them, Kirsten suspected she would strain her neck trying to look him in the eye.