He stopped halfway to the dressing room.
The air curling up from beneath the door to the bath was warm, touched with steam. He could smell Winnie’s soap. As he stood, motionless, he heard the soft sound of water, rippling against the lip of his copper tub.
Winnie was in the bath.
He swallowed, backed away from the door, and laid his coat carefully across the spindles of his desk chair.
Winnie was in the bath. Her skin would be flushed pink from the heated water. Her hair—would it be wet from washing or piled up on her head to stay dry, little tendrils curling damply around her face?
Wet, he decided, and pictured her shifting the damp mass over one shoulder, the water cascading down—
He swallowed again. His mouth felt parched. He needed a glass of water. He needed more brandy. No—he’d had quite enough brandy as it was.
He unbuttoned and removed his waistcoat and laid it over his jacket. He took off his cravat. The skin at his neck felt hot; his whole body, in fact, was racing with heat. He sat down on the edge of his bed.
There was another splash from the bath, more soft sounds.
He stood up. He should go—somewhere—downstairs? He should go into the library and read something painfully, mind-numbingly dull.
He smelled lemons.
He sat back down.
She would have to get out at some point. She could slip and fall. Really, it was only the honorable thing for him to stay here, in case she required his assistance.
She would have to get out. She would have to dry herself, the cool linen of his towels sliding down along those pink-flushed limbs, clinging to her damp skin. He could see her in his mind’s eyes, all the slim golden curves of her, sliding the towel up the back of her neck. Into her hair. And then down—down across her delicate collarbones and to her breasts, following the droplets of water along her skin.
Oh Jesus, he could no longer pretend this was the honorable thing to do when somehow he had his trousers unfastened and his hand wrapped around his cock.
Winnie, her face flushed and her green eyes on him—because in his mind it was his hand now, holding the towel, trailing the edge along her breasts, teasing her nipples until they were tight and hard beneath the thin linen. He would use his mouth on her, his tongue, the edges of his teeth.
He stroked himself harder as he breathed in the scent of her soap. He wanted to run his tongue all over her, on her neck, between her thighs. He wanted to hear what sounds she made—he thought she’d be loud, his Win, unable to hold back, gasping and moaning out her pleasure. Oh God, he wanted to hear, to know, to see—to watch her come on his cock—
“Spencer?” she said. Her voice was muffled, as if through the door.
He looked blindly up, and for a moment, he was so goddamned confused that he nearly strode across the room, yanked the door open, and pressed her up against the wall.
Winnie in the bath, Winnie naked, Winnie dizzy and drunk on pleasure, Winnie—
Jesus Christ. He lunged for sanity and his trouser buttons.
“Ah,” he gasped, “yes?”
“Youarethere,” came her voice through the door. “I knew I heard you.”
Fucking hell, he couldn’t imagine what she’d heard. A groan slipping through his teeth, perhaps. He hoped he had not said her bloody name.
He felt lightheaded, his fingers shaking as he did up the buttons of his trousers. “I’m here.”
“Might I come in?”
He still had a flagrant erection. He flipped the tail of his shirt over his lap, which did little to help, rearranged his legs, and then finally flung his elbow onto his knees and leaned forward in the least-casual pose imaginable. “Certainly.”
The door between his chamber and the bath came open. More humid lemony air rushed in, and with it came Winnie, as flushed as he’d imagined and wrapped to the chin in a dressing gown.
Inhisdressing gown. She must have taken it out of his wardrobe. The heavy quilted wool, a dark blue-and-green tartan the twins had given him years ago, dragged on the floor when she walked. She hiked the edges up a bit as she slipped into the room, and he could see her bare toes beneath.
Dear God, why was he still so aroused? He’d never been so hard in his life—from the sound of bathwater and the sight of her naked feet, of all things.
