Page 21 of A Scandal In July

“Let’s have a drink.”

“To celebrate finding another flag?” she asked doubtfully.

“No. Something more important. To celebrate beingalive.Here. Now.”

His dark eyes glittered in the lamplight, and the angles of his cheeks and chin cast intriguing shadows on his face, making him look both wicked and playful at once.

“Being alive is the very best thing to celebrate, don’t you think?” His deep voice in curled around her. “Surviving the war made me look at things from a new perspective. Before, I took everything for granted. I put value in all the wrong things. Now, I’m just grateful to wake up every morning. I’ve learned to appreciate the small things, like the warmth of sunlight on my face, and the first sip of an excellent bottle of wine, and the company of friends.”

“Would you call us friends?” Lenore asked. Her heart seemed to pause as she waited for his response.

“Why not?” he said easily. “We’re not enemies, are we?”

She held his gaze. “No, we’re not.”

He glanced down at the labels. “Shame we had to fight the French. Hopefully now the war is over, they can go back to doing what they do best, which is making excellent wine.” He held the two bottles aloft. “Now, Chateaux Margaux, or Haut Brion? Both are fabulous Bordeaux, is you like red wine. Any preference?”

“I do like red wine, but I’ll bow to your superior knowledge over which one to choose.”

He peered at a label to read the date. “Well, Haut Brion is best to drink between twelve and twenty years of aging, so this one should be perfect.”

“How will we open a bottle? Don’t tell me you always carry a corkscrew with you.”

“Sadly not. But there are other ways. One is to push the cork in, instead of pulling it out. But you need the handle of a woodenspoon, or something like that. And it runs the risk of the cork disintegrating and ruining the wine.”

“Sacrilege!” she said, with light mockery. He was clearly a man who knew and loved his wine. “What’s another way then?”

“You can heat up the air in the neck of the bottle, just under the cork. When it expands, it pushes the cork out.”

“We can use the lamp flame, if we take the glass protector off.” Lenore said.

He nodded, and she held the flickering flame of the oil lamp steady while he kept the bottle in exactly the right spot. To her surprise, the cork began inching out of the bottle neck.

“It’s working!”

He sent her a dry, mocking look. “O ye of little faith.”

“Wait. We don’t have any glasses,” Lenore groaned.

“We’ll just have to drink from the bottle.”

She sent him a mock-horrified look. “How terribly uncouth. What would thetonsay?”

“I’ve never really cared for what thetonthinks of me,” Rhys shrugged. “And I’m fairly sureyoudon’t care, either. Besides, I won’t tell anyone if you don’t.”

“Deal,” she grinned.

He pulled the cork the final way out of the bottle with a satisfying pop, the muscles on the back of his hand rippling most intriguingly as he did so. He held the bottle out to her.

“Ladies first.”

Chapter Eleven

Sensing the challenge in Rhys’s eyes, Lenore set the lantern safely on a shelf, then tilted the bottle up against her lips. She took a ladylike sip, then handed it back.

The near-darkness seemed to have heightened her senses, and her skin prickled with awareness of his proximity; the warmth of his body was a delicious contrast to the chill, damp air around them.

His swig was much deeper, and her stomach clenched at the realization that his lips were touching the same place hers had just been. It seemed oddly intimate.