“That a proper Mayfair townhouse could contain something so magnificent as the work of a Spanish master. Have you ever attended a dinner at Wellington’s address, Apsley House?”
He shook his head.
“Suffice it to say that we English are insatiable when it comes to having the best at the world’s expense.”
“The Dutch might rival the English when it comes to insatiability.”
Surprised blue eyes widened, and her ivory throat emitted a small, self-conscious laugh. A nervous tic of a laugh. An intoxicating laugh. He felt like sharing in it. Like forming a conspiracy with her.
“Shall we see what more this house has to offer?” she asked.
A buoyancy to her step, she flitted past him into the next room, leaving behind only her scent of lavender and sandalwood. The scent was much like her: simple and expected on the surface, but complicated with the earthy and unexpected just below. He inhaled, helpless to the urge, no choice but to follow.
“In here,” she said, her voice echoing out as she performed a slow three hundred and sixty degree turn, “I would rein in the drama. A soothing robin’s egg blue for these walls.” Her eyes drifted shut as if her entire being was concentrated on absorbing the essence of the room. “I would bring Sir Joshua Reynolds back to life to paint a four-year-old Lucy in the style of hisThe Age of Innocenceand place the piece adjacent to the fireplace.”
Eyes shimmering with passion and vibrancy found Jake’s. And the light within no longer faded at the unwelcome sight of him.
“Perhaps even a portrait of Lucy’s first dog, Poochie the First. We now have Poochie the Second.” A smile, diffident and helpless, pulled at her lips, and she lifted one shoulder in a Gallic shrug.
Jake followed, like a pup at her heels, as she led them back to the foyer, occasionally poking her head into an empty room. Lady Olivia had never been the same woman twice around him. She’d always been a combatant in one form or another, but somehow in this empty house she’d become more companion than combatant. In this state, she was an intriguing wonder to behold.
“This foyer . . . have you ever seen anything like it?” She didn’t pause for an answer. “Observe the way the staircase winds around the room like a loose coil all the way up to the skylight.” The same beatific smile he’d witnessed yesterday in her interaction with the washerwoman illuminated her face now.
The full glory of her beaming gaze landed on him, and he basked in its warm glow.
“Shall we investigate the bedrooms upstairs?”
Chapter 9
Shall we investigate the bedrooms upstairs?
The air whooshed out of the room the instant the words crossed her lips, transforming the unexpected camaraderie of a minute ago into an uncomfortable sort of intimacy. She might burst into flame. It was possible.
Everything was wrong with that sentence.
We. There was nowe.Weimplied togetherness. And he and she most definitely were nottogether.
He was Lord St. Alban. She was Lady Olivia Montfort. That was all.
Then there was the separate, but entirely too related, issue of the bedroom investigation upstairs. How unaffected by it he appeared as his hand ran along the fine wood grain of the banister. Women must invite him to investigate their bedrooms on an hourly basis.
His gaze held hers, steady and stoic. Or was that an amused glint in his eye? “After you, my lady.”
Her voice caught in her throat, and she nodded her assent. Shoulders squared, she turned away from him and toward the coiled staircase. It was a lovely staircase, calling to mind a nautilus fossil she once held as a girl. This might beherstaircase . . .herhouse.
So why had she said those words in it? They were words spoken from the lips of a wife to her husband. From a mistress to her lover.
She set a boot on the bottom step and began to climb, the heat of his gaze setting her back ablaze. She tried to imagine all the places his eyes could rest, but her mind kept returning to one: her derriere. Displayed at eye level. The cool, open space of the foyer turned close and hot, stifling.
To make matters worse, it seemed she couldn’t keep the sway out of her hips, try as she might. She was a woman. She had hips. And, apparently, they would sway. What further indignity must she suffer before this day was done?
At last, she reached the second level, and her oblivious feet led her to the first door on the right. Her mistake instantly foregrounded itself. This was the master’s bedroom suite with its high corniced ceilings, rich mahogany paneling, and floor-to-ceiling bow window overlooking a peaceful back garden. The echo of his footsteps increased in volume as he followed her into the room.
Her body tensed, anticipating the inevitable question. The same question that had delighted her no more than a few minutes ago. He’d asked it in every other room. It only followed that he would ask it here. Such was the current state of her luck.
“Lady Olivia”—Here it came—“what masterpiece would you hang in this room?”
The last word sounded as if it had been bitten off. As if the realization of which room they occupied dawned on him in the process of speaking. Her gaze flew to meet his, and she saw confirmation in his eyes. It was possible her assumption that this sort of scenario was nothing new to him was premature.
