A Hero for Lady Abigail by Dallen, Maggie (i can read book club txt) 📕

embrace, his grip on her sure and tight. The kiss was like their dances together. Effortless. Perfect.

I wish it would never end.

The thought broke through her mindless state, and like a spell being broken in a child’s tale, the moment ended abruptly.

“Alex?” A voice called his name and he froze. His muscles tensed beneath her hands and then he was turning, tucking her behind him. “Alex, is that you? Whatever are you doing on the side of the woods—” Lord Arundel’s voice came to an abrupt halt. “Oh. I, uh...I did not realize you had a companion.”

“Lady Abigail?” Marigold’s voice was awash with shock.

Abigail closed her eyes against a wave of embarrassment. Not only had Lord Arundel witnessed her kiss, but his wife, Lily’s best friend, had also seen their stolen kiss.

 “Max. Marigold.” Alex’s voice was tight as he greeted them. “Lady Abigail was kindly assisting me with an errand.”

Abigail stepped out from behind Alex, a small smile plastered to her face out of sheer habit. Caught kissing a man who was not even courting her. How very amusing, she hoped her smile said as her mind replayed two words over and over. An errand. Abigail was helping him with an errand. The words sounded so ludicrous she nearly winced.

Why on earth would he have hidden her from view if this were a simple errand? No one with half a lick of sense would take this scene to be anything other than what it was. A stolen embrace.

That was surely what Lord Arundel and his wife were thinking. Indeed, Marigold’s thoughts gave her away in a heartbeat. Her eyes wide, her lips parted, her cheeks pink—she looked positively scandalized.

Well, at least I’m not boring. It seemed even when attempting to be on her best behavior, Abigail still had the ability to make a wallflower blush. The thought did little to assuage her pride and embarrassment still slithered through her like snakes.

“I thought you were meant to be escorting Miss Charlotte this morning,” Max said, confusion and something insultingly close to horror in his eyes at the sight of his friend with Abigail.

She stiffened, her shoulders going back and her chin coming up high. She was a duke’s daughter, for heaven’s sake. Certainly Major Mayfield could have done worse.

Marigold’s still-horrified expression seemed to belie the thought. Her gaze screamed, mistake! Clearly in Marigold’s opinion Major Mayfield had made an egregious error.

Really, the girl was as good as an open book.

Abigail took a step back toward the calm safety of her horse as she half-listened to Alex explain about the ripped gown and her offer of assistance.

“That’s very sporting of you, Lady Abigail.” Lord Arundel’s’s voice was filled with suspicion.

Abigail turned to her horse and pulled the cloak from her saddle bag. With little else to do, she made a show of adjusting the side saddle so she could get back to riding. Preferably her ride would take her far, far away. To another country, perhaps.

Silence filled the air, but she wasn’t about to justify her actions to Lord Arundel. But no one else stepped in to fill the silence either.

“Yes, well, it seems my good deed has been done for the day,” she said, turning back with a feigned calm, as she handed Alex the cloak, that smile brittle but fixed in place. She could feel Alex’s eyes on her, but she kept her smile aimed at their host and hostess who were now staring at her like she was a viper about to strike. “If you’ll excuse me…”

She turned back to her horse, but Alex caught her arm. “Don’t go just yet,” he murmured.

She spoke to him through that frozen smile. Afraid that if she let it go she’d never be able to summon it again. Terrified that if she let her emotions off the tight leash she was holding, she’d lose her composure entirely. “I hardly think you need my assistance delivering the cloak, Major.”

“Abigail—”

“You’d best hurry, Major Mayfield.” She kept her voice loud enough for the others to hear.

Now that her mind was functioning again, it was working hard to make up for lost time. Each realization was worse than the last and if Alex didn’t let her ride off soon, she would very definitely lose her composure.

As it was, her hands on the reins shook as she accepted his assistance back into the saddle. How much had Lord Arundel and his wife seen? What must they be thinking? Why had he kissed her?

Or had it been she who kissed him? She couldn’t remember now who had leaned in first and a panicky sensation in her chest made it hard to catch her breath.

“Abigail?” His voice was soft, the question clear. “Are you all right?”

But what could she say? No? She was all too aware of their audience, and no matter which way she turned this in her mind, it always looked the same.

Their hosts must have known they’d shared a kiss—an intimate moment, at the very least. All while he was supposed to be escorting another young lady. A good, proper girl who Alex intended to court. Even now she could hear them talking softly to one another.

It didn’t take much imagination to know what they were saying.

He wasn’t hers. He was meant for another. And the manipulative, beastly Lady Abigail had come along and snared him.

Her heart gave a violent kick, and her inhale was embarrassingly audible as she gasped for air. She needed space. Distance. If she was going to sort this out, she needed to get far, far away from the confusing presence of Major Mayfield. Alex.

“Abigail, please, don’t rush off. Let me deliver the cloak and then—”

“I will not sit here and wait for you,” she said in a low voice. “It’s bad enough that they think I—that we—that you—”

“That I kissed you?” He leaned forward until his face was directly underneath hers so she was forced to meet his gaze. His warm, wonderful, laughing gaze. “I can think of worse fates.”

“Yes, well,