“Good.” His smile deepened, making the corners of his eyes crinkle. “I like the woman before me as well. Now then, where is your brush?”
Ah, yes. His offer to brush her hair. She’d nearly forgotten. Elizabeth moved toward a nearby rosewood table, where her lady’s maid had laid out the necessities for her toilette in neat array. Extricating herself from Torrie’s touch felt wrong. She mourned the loss of his warmth. Liked the way it felt, his fingers encircling her arm, his touch burning into her.
But here was a moment to remind herself of the necessity that she guard herself against falling in love with him all over again. The first time, she had been young and foolish. Despite the fact that he was now her husband, she didn’t dare allow herself to entertain tender feelings for him.
He had married her to save her from gossip and the inability to find another post as governess. Theirs was a marriage of convenience, a far cry from a love match. And despite the kind and tender words he offered her, Elizabeth knew he never would have lowered himself to marry her if his sense of honor hadn’t demanded it.
Belatedly, she realized she was staring at the implements arranged before her. She took up the brush, then hastily turned about, startled to find that Torrie had followed her. He was perilously near, his tall frame looming over her petite one. Unsmiling now, his expression guarded, his jaw tense.
Slowly, as if he feared she would shy away from him, lest he move too quickly, Torrie took the brush from her. She relinquished it, their fingers grazing each other as she did so, sending awareness sparking through her.
“Turn,” he said simply.
And, lackwit that he had turned her into with such devastating ease, she obeyed, spinning on the ball of her foot and presenting him with her back.
“We’ve been talking for so long that your hair is drying,” he rumbled behind her. “You must tell me if I get caught in any snarls. I have no wish to hurt you.”
“I’ll tell you,” she lied, knowing full well that even if the brush became helplessly entangled in her wavy locks, she would never breathe a word of protest.
Viscount Torrington, the man she had pined for, yearned after, dreamt of, stood at her back, giving hope to the awkward debutante she had once been. Hope that there might be happiness awaiting her after all, despite the odds that suggested strongly otherwise.
She held her breath as the brush passed through her hair slowly.
“How is this?” he asked near her ear.
They weren’t touching, and yet, they might as well have been pressed together for the intimacy of the moment. It took Elizabeth a few seconds to gather her wits and find her tongue.
“It is quite lovely, thank you.”
“Hmm,” he hummed, sounding unconvinced. “Better than your lady’s maid?”
The brush made a few more passes through her hair, stroking from root to end. The patience with which he attended her did strange things to her ability to resist him.
“I can’t compare the two of you,” she confessed with a smile, “since I’ve been dismissing her each night. She has never brushed my hair.”
“You prefer to tend to yourself,” he observed as the brush traveled slowly through her hair again. “But you needn’t now. You’re not a governess any longer. You are the lady of the house.Mylady.”
The emphasis he placed on the last was not lost upon her. And Elizabeth couldn’t lie to herself. She liked the thought of belonging to him. The possession in his voice made her weak in all the ways she had previously believed herself to have overcome where he was concerned. Oh, yes. Let there be no doubt about it. She wanted very much to be his. In every way.
“It will take me some time, I suspect,” she allowed, the admission torn from her. “To accustom myself to the change in circumstance. Not long ago, I accepted the fact that I must be a governess for the rest of my life, until I became too aged to keep my charges under control, and now, I am a married woman.”
The brush went through her hair a few more times, her husband silent behind her. And then, he leaned forward, replacing the ivory-handled brush on its polished table. The action made his chest press fully against her back. There was nothing but the muscled wall of him, the heat of his body, his scent, heady and decadent.
And the undeniable prod of his manhood, rising to prominence against the small of her back.
He wanted her. The realization was gratifying. Heady.
Terrifying and exhilarating, too. She wasn’t sure how to feel, what to do. What to expect. Lady Andromeda had attempted to explain the marriage bed to her once, and she had stumbled over her words, growing so flushed with embarrassment that she had ended the discussion prematurely, never to revisit it.
Elizabeth’s heart wanted to leap from her chest, but she forced herself to remain calm. To inhale slowly, and to exhale carefully.
His fingertips grazed over her nape as he moved the heavy curtain of her hair to the side. And then, just as quickly, she felt the scorching heat of his lips on her bare skin. His hands moved to her hips, his fingers sinking into her softness, keeping her where she was.
“Speaking of marriage,” he murmured, raking the coarse bristles of his cheek whiskers over her sensitive skin, “when do you want to consummate ours, Bess? I confess, I’ve been desperate for you all damned day.”
He had?
His words sent a heavy, hot arrow of desire shooting through her.
