Мэри Бэлоу - Someone to Romance

She was extraordinary.

“Thank you,” she said again as the manager, his chest puffed out with importance, paused outside the suite and opened the door—somehow it was unlocked.

And she swept inside, turned toward Gabriel as the door closed behind him, and . . . became Jessica again. And the thing was, he thought, she seemed unaware of the two roles she had played in the last ten minutes. Being Lady Jessica Archer—or, rather, Lady Jessica Thorne—was so much second nature to her when she was in a public setting that she did not even have to think about it.

“I am sorry about that,” he said. “I did not announce this morning that I was off to marry the daughter of a duke. And I do not believe Horbath would have announced it either—my valet, that is.”

“Gabriel.” She laughed. “You must have been in America too long. Servants, employees, often know things about their employers or paying guests before those people know those things for themselves. There is no keeping anything secret from one’s servants, you know. That is why it is important to engage their loyalty and even affection. It is why it is important to treat them well.”

He was not sure it was quite the statement of equality for all that was so touted in the New World, even if it was not a perfect reality there. But he was in England now, where the class system was still alive and well and perhaps always would be, and where it would work comfortably for all, provided there was mutual respect along the spectrum. It was not perfect. But what was? And these were not thoughts he needed to be having at this precise moment.

“Horbath?” he called. He was not sure whether his valet was in the suite or not.

“Sir?” Horbath stepped out of his bedchamber.

“You may take the rest of the day off,” Gabriel told him. “Until after dinner anyway. Let us say half past nine?”

“Yes, sir,” Horbath said. He bowed to Jessica. “Does my lady wish me to take my lady’s maid with me?”

“Ruth is here?” she asked. “Yes, by all means, Mr. Horbath. Thank you.”

Horbath disappeared. There was the murmur of his voice and a female’s before another door to the suite that was outside the sitting room opened and closed, and there was silence.

“Perhaps,” Gabriel said, his eyes moving over Jessica’s wedding dress and straw bonnet, “I ought to have consulted you before sending your maid away. Perhaps you will need her sooner than half past nine tonight.”

“I can manage without,” she told him.

“And,” he said, “I can be an excellent lady’s maid. Not that I have had any experience, I hasten to add. But I can brush hair and I can undo buttons on a dress that are inaccessible to the wearer.”

Her cheeks flushed. “Thank you,” she said. She did not add, he noticed, that she could manage without.

He looked at the clock that was ticking on the mantel. It was half past four. An awkward time. Three and a half hours to dinner. A little too late to plan anything. Too late to go out. Besides, if they went out, they would probably throw the downstairs staff into consternation. It was too early to—

He stepped forward, took her in his arms—one about her waist, the other about her shoulders—and kissed her. Hard and deep. Her mouth opened and he pressed his tongue inside. Her hands, still gloved, came to rest just below his shoulders. She made an inarticulate sound in her throat.

“It is still afternoon,” he said when he lifted his head. “Daylight.”

“Yes.” The color in her cheeks had deepened. She was still wearing her bonnet as well as her gloves.

“Will you consider it in very poor taste,” he asked her, “if I take you to bed now, rather than wait until tonight?” Waiting would be a severe trial. What else was one to do in three and a half hours with a new wife whom one found damned attractive, to say the least?

“I think perhaps,” she said, “that in some part of the world it is night, Gabriel.”

“Where?” he asked. “India? China? Where shall we imagine we are?”

“Either,” she said. “But we had better both decide upon the same place. It would be too bad if you were in China and I were in India. Join me in India, if you will.”

“Done,” he said. He was still holding her against him. He could feel the warm, slender shapeliness of her from the shoulders to the knees. The soft femininity of her. He could smell the same subtle perfume she had worn when they sat together on the pianoforte bench at her cousin’s party.

“There are two bedchambers,” he told her. “Will you come with me to mine? Will you allow me the pleasure of brushing out your hair and unclothing you?”

He watched the color deepen yet more in her cheeks as her teeth sank into her lower lip, leaving the upper to curl upward very slightly—and very enticingly. He watched her consider her options and glance briefly at the window, through which the sun was beaming from a clear blue sky, still very far from sinking over the horizon.

“Yes,” she said, and even in speaking the one word she sounded breathless. But quite decisive.

“Come.” He took her by the hand and led the way.

Jessica had imagined a nighttime consummation with darkness and bedcovers and the white silk and lace nightgown, only very slightly daring, which she had purchased for the occasion. She had imagined Ruth getting her ready and leaving her room a discreet five minutes or so before the appearance of her bridegroom in his nightshirt and brocaded dressing gown belted at the waist. She was eager for the experience. She was hardly nervous at all except for a bit of anxiety that she would be awkward and not know quite what to do. But that was a foolish fear. Though she did not know for sure, she would be very surprised if Gabriel did not have a good deal of experience. She hoped he did, though she did not—thank you kindly—want to know any details.

But now it was to happen in the daytime with bright sunshine beaming through the rather large window of the bedchamber into which he took her. He did not even cross to it to draw the curtains.

It was a large square room with another door. But that must lead into a dressing room only large enough for essential private functions. There was a dressing table in here as well as a great marble washstand.

The masculinity of the room struck her immediately. Two pairs of large boots—riding boots and Hessians—stood neatly beside the wardrobe. There was shaving gear spread out on the washstand, a set of man’s brushes on the dressing table as well as a neat pile of starched neckcloths. The room smelled faintly and enticingly of something distinctly male—his shaving cream, perhaps, or his cologne, which was in a dark glass bottle on the dressing table. It was something she smelled whenever she was close to him—something that always made her want to burrow closer. There were three leather-bound books on one of the bedside tables, a handkerchief folded in the top one, presumably to keep his place.

There was no sign of any of her things. They must be in the other bedchamber. Ruth probably had everything laid out ready in there.

There was no Ruth either, she thought, not until half past nine tonight. She had left the suite with Gabriel’s valet.

There were just the two of them and this room and bright daylight. And a large, high bed.

She was still wearing her gloves, Jessica saw, looking down. And her bonnet. And her wedding dress.

She drew off her gloves and looked around for somewhere to put them. He took them from her, dropped them—oh dear—on the floor, and came to stand directly in front of her. He pulled loose the bow beneath her chin and removed her bonnet, using both hands. He looked into her face the whole while, those dark eyes of his roaming over it. He dropped the bonnet. Her hair must be squashed.