The Secret Service of Tea and Treason (Dangerous Damsels #3)

by India Holton

Daniel stirred his tea in a manner that suggested he was laughing behind his inscrutable countenance. “I would not worry. Frederick Bassingthwaite is even greater a moron than Mr. Collins.” “Who?” Mrs. Kew inquired. “From Pride and Prejudice,” Alice and Daniel replied in unison. They very carefully did not glance at each other. Mrs. Kew’s gentle confusion failed to lift. “Is that a crime-fighting duo?” “No, ma’am,” Daniel told her. “It is a book.”

Fiddlesticks. She was approaching hooliganism with such speed she might as well just give up and become a politician.

I hooted out loud when I read this.

Gradually the kiss eased, providing her with the opportunity to breathe and to analyze the event. (1) She had not expected so much involvement of the tongue. (2) Cardiac side effects may present some concern. (3) — But it had not been an ending after all, only a trap to lure her further in. Suddenly he kissed her even more deeply, stroking against secrets she never knew she had. He pulled her close, cupping a hand against the back of her head, wrapping his arm more securely around her waist so their bodies were pressed hard together. Everything began to pulse—lips, heart, loins. Alice felt an echo of it in him too, through her clothes, behind his bones. Good heavens, no wonder people married!

Speaking as a young woman who married six months after my “ring by spring,” I can testify to this universally acknowledged truth.

Daniel shifted aside a broken suitcase to reveal a painting of a riverside city. “Bah,” he said with a frown. “Hamburg.” Alice laughed. The noise so startled her, she clamped a hand against her mouth. Daniel turned to stare at her amazedly. “Please excuse me,” she gasped. “I have not been amused in years.” “No, I apologize,” Daniel answered. “I should not have referenced Dickens in such an offhandedly witty fashion.” “The apology is mine,” Alice argued. “I fear I’m devolving into hooliganism.”

For two people who had read Jane Eyre, the answer really ought not to have been a surprise.

I also howled with laughter here.

The madwoman bared her teeth. “She is our resident Lunatic,” Frederick continued blithely. “One can hardly own a properly decent Gothic castle without keeping an Attic Lunatic. We also have a Mysterious Scar-Faced Man lurking in the cellar, and the famous medium Mrs. Zhu comes in quarterly to refresh our ghosts.”

One touch in the wrong place—or perhaps even in the right place—and he’d go up in flames faster than an erotic novel in a Puritan community.

Seriously, LOL.