“Well,” he said finally, getting regretfully to his feet, “we have taken enough of your time, ma’am. I shall awaken myaunt and see her settled in the carriage.”
She awoke so easily that he wondered if she had been asleep at all. “Is it time to leave already, dear Archibald?”she asked. “How time does fly. Run upstairs for your bonnet, child, and we will drive once or twice about the park. Idoubt it is the fashionable hour and we have only the closedcarriage anyway, but a drive will be pleasant. It is a chillyday. Or perhaps it is just these ancient bones that feelchilled.”
Harriet was blushing and looking distressed again. Had she not learned that there was no point whatsoever in tryingto argue with his Aunt Sophie?
“It is chilly,” he confirmed. “Lady Wingham, will you do us the honor of driving with us?”
“I’ll fetch my bonnet, your grace,” she said, her eyes unhappy, and went from the room.
Of course there was almost no one in the park and not a great deal to be seen from the windows of a closed carriage.And his aunt had very little to say. He and Harriet talkedabout the weather and the beauty of the trees in Hyde Parkand the need of a good rain to refresh the grass. He smiledat her in some amusement at one point until he rememberedthat he was sitting opposite his aunt and there was nothingwrong with his aunt’s eyes even if she did need eyeglassesto read with. He did not want to feed her suspicions.
But evidently they did not need feeding. She sighed when they were still in the park and complained of stiffnessand some chill about the legs, despite the blanket that covered them. And then for good measure she discovered aheadache.
“I think you had better convey me home, Archibald, dear,” she said. “I sometimes forget that I am too old for avisit and a drive all on the same afternoon. Forgive me,pet.” She patted Harriet’s hand. “I know Sir Clive’s iscloser, but it would be too far for me. Never fear, though.Archibald will escort you home afterward.”
“Of course, Lady Wingham,” he said, inclining his head. The inspired old fiend.
Harriet helped him get his aunt out of the carriage and into the house on St James’s Square. There the old lady assured them that the same stout footman who had assistedher earlier would give her his arm to her room. After anhour’s rest she would be as right as rain once more. Shedismissed them with a careless wave of the hand.
The duke handed Harriet back inside his carriage, gave instructions to his coachman, and vaulted in after her.
It was not the plain carriage in which they rode on Mondays and Thursdays. This one was far more opulent with its dark blue velvet upholstery. His ducal arms were paintedon the outside. Harriet waited while he gave instructions tohis coachman and wondered if it was as obvious to him asit was to her that Lady Sophia had deliberately thrown themtogether. But why? Surely she must realize that the daughter of an impoverished country parson could not aspire tothe hand of a duke. And even if she did not, then she mustknow that he was all but betrothed to someone else.
He drew the blue curtains across the windows as he always did in the plain carriage. Then he settled beside her, his shoulder touching hers. She looked down at her handsin her lap until he covered one with his own and curled hisfingers beneath it.
“I wonder,” he said, “that you even tried to defy my aunt, Harriet. Did you not know that she is undefyable?”
“It was not a matter of defiance,” she said, “but of propriety. She does not know, does she?”
“She knows that I admire you,” he said. “That is why she took me to visit you this afternoon and why she developeda stiffness all over and a chill in her legs. Ah, yes, and aheadache too, I believe.”
“She does not understand,” Harriet said, distressed to know that it really had been obvious to him. “But I couldnot say no to her. I am sorry.”
“You need not be.” He lifted her hand to his lips. “Harriet, I could not go for even a week without a sight of you.”
She turned her head sharply away, but of course there was no longer a window through which to look.
“You are well?” he asked her.
“Well?” She looked at him in some surprise. “Yes, of course, I—”
“Some women have bad cramps, I believe,” he said.
“Oh.” Yes, she had suffered badly from them until she had had Susan. The experience of childbirth seemed tohave cured her. “No. I am well, thank you.”
“Harriet.” His silver eyes laughed at her. “Will you still be blushing when you are ninety, I wonder? No, don’tlower your head.” One long finger caught her beneath thechin and held up her face for his scrutiny. “You have manycharms, but your blush is the one I find most endearing.”
She found his kiss deeply disturbing. Not because there was passion in it, but because there was not. Passion sheunderstood and could feel comfortable with. It was whatone expected of a lover. It was a thing more of the bodythan of either the mind or the emotions. This was more likethe way he had made love to her—for want of more accurate words—during their last two assignations. But it waseven more disturbing because he knew he could not takethe embrace to its physical conclusion. And yet he kissedher.
His mouth moved over hers, caressed hers, played with hers. His tongue touched, stroked, teased. One of his handscaressed a breast, though he made no attempt to slip herdress from her shoulder and avoided touching her nippleand thus arousing her. And then he slipped an arm beneathher knees and lifted her onto his lap and cuddled her thereafter untying the strings of her bonnet and tossing it to theseat opposite.
“We ought not,” she said.
“Ought not what?” he asked, finding her mouth with his again. “Crush my legs, O mighty feather?”
“Be doing this,” she said. “Why have we not arrived at Sir Clive’s yet?”
“Because my coachman has instructions to take the long route to it,” he said. “Don’t worry, Harriet. I am not abducting you. You will get there eventually. I want to hold youfor a while. It is going to be an eternity before I can haveyou again.”
