Only… inside, she did not find George’s ring. Instead, folded neatly together, it contained a collection of cylindrical but somewhat transparent… sheaths?
The moment she realized what they were, she hastily tucked them back into the pouch and stuffed it back into the jacket. She had never seen one, but she’d heard of them.
French letters!
In one pocket the blighter carried around one of her hairpins and in the other, he carried these! Exhaling loudly, she turned to stare back at the man who was currently creating far too much chaos in her life.
The ring was not in his coat. Where was it?
She located a flint, lit the taper on the desk, and did as thorough of a search as she could possibly manage, illuminating inside the dresser drawers and then every surface in the room.
Twice.
He did not have it. They’d left it in the field.
“Maggie?” His voice made her jump. “I’ve been thinking.” He ran one hand through his hair, sitting up now, looking more asleep than awake.
“You know where it is?”
His eyes were still glassy and he swayed, causing her to rush back to the bed to prevent him from toppling onto the floor. “About you and me.”
“You’re foxed.” And yet she wasn’t angry. She was only frustrated and worried and sick at the thought that she had lost something so valuable.
He dropped an arm around her shoulders and buried his face in her neck. “It’s good,” he mumbled. “ Don’t you think? You and me.”
“What is good, Sebastian?” She inhaled, not really expecting an answer. Even in this state, his nearness affected her.
He wrapped his other arm around her waist. “This.” His mouth located the side of her jaw. “You feel it. You’ve felt it since that first night. It’s most unusual... Spectacular, really.”
His lips crept searchingly along her jaw and then hovered at the corner of her mouth, tasting her skin. He was right. Itwasgood.
“I cannot,” she answered. “Today was a… lapse.” She was not this sort of woman. Yes, it was only a lapse brought on by her thirtieth birthday and her impossible situation.
As well as a rather handsome younger man.
It is a lapse.Because if she allowed herself to think anything differently, she would be dreadfully disappointed.
“Just listen to me, Maggie. I’ve had too much drink.” He studied her with sleepy eyes. “But it’s good. It would be such a waste to not…”
She drew away from him with a frown, the discovery of his packet of English overcoats all too fresh in her thoughts. The ring obviously wasn’t here, leaving her with no reason to remain in his chamber. She needed to return to her own chamber now.
“Stay.” He groaned. “I don’t think you understand what you’re doing to me. You’re here, we should—why is the room moving?” And then he frowned. “I’m foxed.” He dropped back onto the pillow.
Pathetic man!
She moved to the foot of his bed and grasped at the heel of one of his boots. “Didn’t the tavern wenches wear you out?” Her comment sounded petty, jealous. It was quite unlike her.
She tugged a few times before realizing that he’d risen to his elbows and was watching her with a curious expression. “I thought about it, Maggie, but I didn’t. None of them were you, which ought to have been a good thing. You’re a cruel joke, Lady Asherton. With your breathy little moans and your soft skin… because damned if you didn’t leave me in a painful state this evening.”
A painful state? She dropped her gaze to stare at his breeches. What might it be like to do whatever one pleased?
Dangerous? Terrifying?
Delightful?
Disturbed by such thoughts, she roused herself to her task at hand and increased her efforts on his boot. “Don’t you have a valet? You’re a marquess, for heaven’s sake.”
How was it that she found his stockinged foot as beautiful as the rest of him? Long, slim, but not too slim. She trailed her fingers up to where the silk disappeared into his breeches.
