“I, um, wanted to see if Mr. Murray would care to stay for luncheon,” Gabriella said. “Chef Pierre is preparing your favorite duck confit, as well as the usual courses. The soup is asparagus, I believe, and for dessert there’s trifle, the one with the chocolate and brandied cherries you showed a preference for last week and a selection of cakes—”
“Murray will not be staying, my dear.” Adam cut her off before she recited the entire menu. The rush of words betrayed her anxiety, and although he knew the cause of it, he wouldn’t discuss the matter with her in front of company. That would wait until they had privacy. “He has preparations to make for this eve.”
Taking the hint, Murray said ruefully, “As tempting as your invitation sounds, Mrs. Garrity, I fear I must be on my way.”
As Murray’s tawny head bent over her hand, Adam felt his molars grinding again. He didn’t know why the younger man’s gallantry bothered him; perhaps it was that Murray was close to Gabriella in age, and there’d always been an ineffable bond between them. Adam couldn’t forget that, all those years ago, Gabriella had pleaded on Murray’s behalf, asking Adam to let the fellow work off his debt.
The pair murmured some private good-byes, and jealousy twisted Adam’s gut. Which was ridiculous. He told himself that his reaction was simply proprietary: he didn’t share. What was his was his. And Gabriella was his wife, the mother of his children. She belonged to him.
If she needed reminding, however, he’d be happy to oblige her. Surely, he thought broodingly, it was his husbandly duty to stake his claim…even if it meant altering the schedule. A small deviation from routine wouldn’t hurt.
Indeed, it would be quite pleasurable.
After Murray finally departed, Gabby turned to Adam. “When will you be ready to dine, sir?” She tilted her head in question, a flame-red curl sliding into her eye.
Before she could brush it aside, he did it for her. He trailed his fingertips over her silky, rounded cheek, feeling the rising warmth of her blush. Her eyes were wide and slightly glazed, like that of a doe confronted by danger. Only his little spouse didn’t want to flee. Her ripe breasts rose and fell with an enticing jiggle that no modest, high-necked bodice could conceal, and he’d wager his empire that, beneath all those layers of fabric, her cherry-red nipples were already hard and budded.
Anticipation simmered in his blood.
Hiding a private smile, he offered her his arm. “I’m ready when you are, my dear.”
4
Later that afternoon,Gabby was seated at the rosewood table in her sitting room with the housekeeper, Mrs. Page. It was their weekly meeting to review the household accounts. Typically, Gabby enjoyed her chats with the silver-haired lady, but at the moment her mind was elsewhere. Specifically, it was on her husband and the dangerous mission he would be embarking upon tonight. The mission thatshehad convinced him to take on.
Her fingers knotted in her lap.Have I sent Adam into mortal danger?
“I have your approval for the new bed linens, Mrs. Garrity?”
Gabby nodded absently. “Mr. Garrity prefers silk sheets, from that mill in France.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
As Mrs. Page continued to go down the list, worry churned in Gabby. She looked longingly at the tray of refreshments. The housekeeper had brought along a plate of iced cakes, which looked ever so tempting, but Gabby was determined to reduce (part of her never-ending self-improvement plan). In point of fact, she’d started a slimming regimen just this afternoon.
She resigned herself to sipping plain black tea from her Sèvres cup. It wasn’t nearly as comforting as that lemon sponge layered with jam and whipped cream would be. Or that marzipan-covered genoise. She stifled a sigh. How she wished she had delicious flavors to concentrate on, something to distract her from the dark swell of her thoughts.
It had started yesterday, when Tessa Kent had stopped by. Gabby had become friends with Tessa because her husband Harry Kent was the brother of Gabby’s dearest friends, the former Kent sisters (the ladies were now all married to aristocratic husbands who adored them). Tessa’s visit had not been social in nature. She’d come to tell Gabby about a terrible plight: Glory, an eight-year-old girl, had been kidnapped.The villain, a man named Sweeney, had threatened tokillthe girl if her father, the Duke of Ranelagh and Somerville, didn’t pay the ransom. Tessa had grimly shared her belief that Sweeney intended to murder his young hostage either way.
Gabby had been horrified. Her first thought had been of her own children, Fiona and Maximillian, her heart squeezing with a mother’s panic. She’d asked Tessa if there was anything she could do to help.
Tapping her finger against her chin, Tessa had said, “Thereissomething. Talk to Mr. Garrity. Convince him to join our rescue mission.”
Gabby had gone directly to Adam and hadn’t been surprised when he’d agreed to help. He was a good man and the most accommodating of husbands. At dawn, the two of them had gone to Tessa’s house to plan Glory’s rescue. Gabby had been glad to assist…until Adam had said that he wouldpersonallyparticipate in the dangerous battle.
She’d frozen in panic.
On one level, it was stupid of her. It wasn’t as if she didn’t know what her husband did for a living. As a business, moneylending did not come without risks; it wasn’t for naught that Adam had a coterie of guards that regularly accompanied him and the family on outings. Nonetheless, when Adam went off to work, her mental picture was of him in his lavish offices near the Bank of England and the Exchange. Running his empire from behind his very large and elegant desk.
In truth, she’d blocked from her mind the dangers of his trade. When he’d stated that he and his team would surround the dock and prevent any possibility of Sweeney escaping with Glory, reality had struck her with a terrifying blow. She’d expected Adam to be a general, planning and directing the rescue from the safety of an encampment, not some foot solider leading the charge on the battlefield. What if he got hurt, shot…or somethingworsehappened?
He was her world. The center of her universe. She loved him with all of her heart and couldn’t bear for anything to happen to him.
Of course, she couldn’t disclose her worries during the strategy session. To do so would undermine Adam in front of their friends, and she knew how much his pride meant to him. She’d bided her time, anxiously devouring a plate of cakes in Tessa’s drawing room (hence the newly instituted reducing plan). By some miracle, she’d managed to hold back her concerns until the carriage ride home, when they’d burst from her. She couldn’t remember how far she’d gotten—perhaps to their poor, grieving, fatherless children—when Adam had tipped her chin up.
“Don’t worry your head about it, my dear,” he’d said.
“Not worry? How can I not worry? You’re my husband—”
