Page 8 of Savage Blooms (Unearthly Delights #1)

CHAPTER FIVE

Nicola

Nicola woke to the thin gray sunlight of an overcast day shining onto her face.

She rolled over underneath the goose-feather comforter and let out a groan of mammalian contentment.

For a moment she thought she was back in her nest of pillows and blankets in her studio apartment, but then she remembered the adventure of the night before, and her eyes flickered open.

She was still in Craigmar, still wrapped in a wonderful waking dream. She felt like a medieval princess waking to brush out her hair a hundred times and then be latticed into her gown by her ladies-in-waiting.

Nicola slipped out of bed and shivered the moment her feet touched the rug. She wanted to find Adam, but she wanted a cup of hot coffee more, so she pulled her pink puffer jacket on over her tank top and pajama pants and slipped out into the hallway.

In the light of day, the manor was less intimidating.

The dark wood paneling glowed russet in the sunshine, and the rugs underfoot, which had seemed dark as spilled blood at night, turned out to be crimson, accented by geometric designs in blue and gold.

Nicola padded down the hall, peering out the windows onto the ocean as she went.

You could see the water clearly from the second story, as though Craigmar had been built right on the precipice of a watery kingdom.

Nicola followed the sound of running water and clattering cutlery to an open door, which led into the kitchen.

Finley stood at the sink, his back to Nicola, filling a gooseneck kettle with water from the tap.

Just as she was about to ease back into the hallway, he glanced round and caught sight of her.

In a chunky sweater and with his eyes heavy-lidded with sleep, he looked like an entirely different person than the man she had encountered the day before.

He was still handsome in a broody way, but now he also looked approachable, sleep-rumpled and touchably warm.

“Good morning,” he said.

“Ah, sorry,” she stammered. “I’ll just go back to my room and—”

“No, you’re up now,” Finley said, waving her into the kitchen. “Come in and have a cup of tea.”

Nicola stepped barefoot onto the tiled kitchen floor.

The room wasn’t as large as she might have imagined, but it was bigger than any student apartment kitchen she had ever been in, adorned with copper pots and pans hanging from a rack above the wooden butcher block island.

Finley leaned a hip against the island, watching her with another one of those smiles.

Did he only smile when they were alone together?

“Sleep well?” he asked.

“Very. Is Adam up yet?”

“I don’t think so,” he said, retrieving a chipped mug from the cupboard and producing a tea bag from a tin on the counter. “Can’t say I blame him. It’s a lot to take in, and so is Eileen.”

“It’s Eileen now, huh?” Nicola prodded, drifting a little closer. “I thought she was ‘sir’ and ‘the lord’ last night.”

Finley held out a strongly brewed cup of breakfast tea to her.

Nicola accepted it, if only to warm her fingers on the mug.

She was more of a coffee girl, but what couldn’t she learn to like, with time?

She was used to slotting herself into much more cramped, loud houses than this, and getting along with much more unpleasant temporary family members.

Finley wasn’t family, certainly. But she liked the way he looked at her, like he knew the way his gaze warmed her from the inside out. Like he wanted to see what she looked like when she was entirely melted.

“Sorry about that whole routine,” he said.

“She’s very particular about formality, especially when it comes to new people, but her bark is worse than her bite.

She’s not even a lord, not on paper anyway.

I think technically she’s some minor baroness.

But it’s a hard job, being head of the manor, and I do what I can to help. You aren’t scared of her, are you?”

“I went to private school on scholarship when I was younger. I know girls like Eileen, and they don’t intimidate me.”

“Good, that will serve you well. Milk?”

“Yes please,” Nicola said.

Finley bent over to reach into the fridge, and while Nicola might have been well behaved enough not to stare, she wasn’t so virtuous as to not sneak a peek at his firm ass.

“How long have you worked for Eileen?” she asked, easing down onto a nearby stool. The lord’s given name felt good in her mouth.

“Oh, a small eternity. My family, the Buchanans, have worked for her family as groundskeepers for three generations. My dad even went to school and moved to Glasgow before he got called back here to pick up the mantle after his dad died. It gets its claws into you, this place.”

“Did you grow up here?”

“Sure did. I’m the same age as Eileen. We were brought up alongside each other, her and me. Roughhousing in the heather like she wasn’t anyone special, climbing trees and scraping our knees.”

“That sounds really nice,” Nicola said. “I didn’t grow up in one place like that. I can’t imagine being a kid here, free to roam in all that green. I don’t think I would have come indoors except to sleep.”

Nicola glanced up to find Finley staring at her intently, lips slightly parted, as though she had just begun speaking in tongues. She suddenly felt a stone’s throw from naked in her thin pajama bottoms, and she wished she had had the foresight to finger-comb her curly bob.

Finley, as though noticing her discomfort, turned to gaze out the window.

“Rain’s stopped earlier than expected,” he noted. “If you’re lucky the roads will be safe to drive on by late afternoon.”

“Oh,” Nicola said, and she was surprised to find she was disappointed. Getting stranded here might have been bad luck, but it was hard to feel like it was anything but a boon sitting in the hearth-warm kitchen of a country home, chatting over tea with a gorgeous and interesting stranger.

“Do you want to see them?” Finley asked.

“What?” Nicola replied, eyelashes fluttering.

“The grounds. You aren’t dressed for it, but I could wait down here while you change. Eileen lays in late, and I suspect Adam is still asleep. It seems a shame not to show you around before you leave. We could be back before breakfast.”

On the one hand, it was probably safest to say goodbye to this unknown man and return to her room to wait for her friend – the person she actually trusted in this situation – to wake up.

But she also hated the idea of being cooped up, and this unknown man just so happened to have the sort of rough, soft voice she had always been weak for.

“I’d love that,” she said.

The ground was soggy underfoot as Finley and Nicola made their way across the grazing green, and there was a mist hanging in the air, but the worst of the storm had passed.

Cozy in her jeans and a sweater and securely laced into her boots, Nicola strode after Finley over the uneven ground.

He walked with determined strides, not having to watch his footing.

“How exactly does one keep grounds?” Nicola asked. “Or whatever the technical term for your job is.”

Finley let out a bright laugh. He was more relaxed outdoors, away from the house.

There was an easy slouch in his shoulders and a springy life in his wind-tossed curls.

It was pleasing to look at, the darkest parts of his hair against the splash of green in his hazel eyes, only a few shades deeper than the marshy rolling hills.

She lost herself for a moment in mentally picking the right colors to capture the scene, because Finley deserved to be rendered with boldness and depth.

“I do anything that needs doing,” he said. “Plant flowers and trim hedges, salt the drive in case of ice, uproot any trees that are dead or dying, tear ivy off the house… I’ve been known to do a bit of masonry, a bit of carpentry, even a bit of cooking when it’s called for.”

“Jack of all trades, huh?”

“Something like that.” Finley pointed ahead to the sliver of rocky coast in the distance, and the deep blue waters beyond.

“This strip of grass stretches all the way down to the shore, about a mile away. The woodlands go on for acres and acres, entirely uncultivated. Once upon a time they were used for hunting, or for growing mushrooms and berries for the kitchen, but they’ve gone wild by now. ”

Finley kept up the pace, leading Nicola further and further from the house.

As Craigmar manor shrank in the distance, they passed a few unbothered sheep nibbling at the wildflowers underfoot.

One of them let out an inquisitive bleat, then shuffled aside to reveal the tiny lamb who had been suckling from its mother.

Nicola clasped her hands together, overtaken by the sight, and let out a gasp of delight.

“Oh, a baby!” she exclaimed. “It’s so cute. I’ve never seen a lamb up close.”

“You haven’t?” Finley asked, and a wicked grin passed over his face. “Stay right there.”

Taking big steps in his wellington boots, Finley walked right up to the nearest lamb.

The mother let out an indignant baa, but Finley shushed her like she was a fussy toddler and scratched her behind the ears.

Then he tucked the lamb’s legs up underneath its belly and carried it over to Nicola, who was practically vibrating with delight.

“Go ahead and give him a cuddle,” Finley said, proffering the lamb. “Just mind his teeth. The little ones bite.”

Nicola held out her hands and Finley deposited the bundle of wriggling warmth into her arms. Nicola cradled it with the care she would show to a human newborn, holding it safely close to her chest. It smelled earthy and damp, like fresh cut grass, with the unmistakable musk of farm animal underneath.

Nicola could feel the rapid patter of its heart through its wooly chest, a tiny miracle in itself.

“Oh,” she said reverentially. “Oh my goodness.”

Nicola glanced up at Finley and found he was watching her with a strange expression. It was partly pained and partly reverent, as though he were witnessing something holy. Nicola stood there, scratching the lamb behind the ears, and let him look at her, really look.

Then Finley stepped forward and retrieved the lamb from Nicola, breaking the spell.

“You’re good with animals,” he said, not quite able to meet her eyes. “Shall we keep walking?”