She left the books and was drawn to the mantel, where a few miniatures were perched. She couldn’t help but smile, for they were all of Finn’s sister, Marianne. One from when she was a very little girl, another she looked to be around thirteen or fourteen and a more recent one. Esme had come out two years before Marianne, and Finn’s sister had an unfortunate first few years after her debut, so they hadn’t known each other well. But she’d always liked the bookish wallflower. She was kind, and Esme appreciated that now more than she probably had during her years in ballrooms and drawing rooms.
There was a light knock at the antechamber door and she turned toward it in surprise. “Yes?”
The door opened and Finn stepped in. He paused in the doorway and leaned on the jamb, his gaze flickering up anddown her body. She warmed at the focus of his stare, the desire in it. Good Lord, but it was out of control to want someone so much. To be wanted in equal measure.
“You—you didn’t have to knock. This is your room and you’ve seen me naked multiple times.”
He chuckled as he entered, at last. “And I hope to do it again in the future. But that doesn’t mean you surrender your right to privacy as you prepare yourself.”
She shook her head. There were few men who understood that consent was something forever asked for and given. Fewer still in the class this man belonged to.
She motioned to the mantel. “I love these portraits of your sister.”
He stepped closer. “Yes. I suppose I’ll have a new one to add to the collection, as I’m sure she and Sebastian will pose for one after their wedding in ten days.”
“That wedding helped you uncover my true identity,” she teased.
He smiled down at her. “Your attempt to comfort me about my sister did that, my dear.” He sighed. “I worry about her, but…”
“But?” she pressed.
He shrugged. “She and Ramsbury declare they are happy and in love.”
“Do you not believe it to be true?”
He stared at Marianne’s most recent portrait a moment, an expression of sadness in his eyes. “Sometimes I believe it. I see their connection now that my blinders have been torn off, certainly, and not just the physical. But love? I’m not certain I’d recognize it if it were there. I have not much experience with the emotion.”
She shifted. He knew so much about her father, but she knew so little about his. Only what rumor had told her years ago. But rumor was so often wrong.
“Your parents weren’t a love match, then?” she asked gently.
He stiffened and didn’t look at her. “Very much not. My mother longed for it, though. Chased it. Rode every wave of that man’s attention and crashed on the rocks when he withdrew. She was obsessed with how she could force him to see her. She had a breakdown right before my sister came out and died shortly after.”
“Oh yes, I recall that. Your poor sister, not only losing her mother but having her coming out so tied to such a tragedy.”
He nodded. “There were so many rumors about how our mother died, that was all people saw when they looked at her.”
“How did your father take it, after all those years of dangling her on a string?”
He laughed but there was no humor to the broken sound. “My father was annoyed she’d ruined his night out with his mistress.”
He trailed off and she couldn’t help it. She reached out and took his hand, cupping it between hers as she stared up at him. He finally looked down at her and in that moment, in the soft firelight, he looked lost. How she wanted to find him, even if that was the most dangerous desire she’d ever experienced.
She released him and backed away. “I assume your carriage is ready for me?”
He cleared his throat. “Yes. All you need do is give my man your direction and he’ll take you. If you’re ready, I’ll escort you down.”
He held out an arm and she almost laughed. It was all so proper after a highly improper night together. But she took the arm, loving the shape of his muscular bicep beneath the silky fabric of the dressing gown he wore. Together they walkedthrough the halls and down the stairs into the foyer. She braced to encounter his butler again, be stared at and sniffed at by someone who knew what she was.
But there was no one. It was just them. Finn stopped and turned toward her, cupping her cheeks gently. “This night was wonderful, Esme.”
She nodded. “Yes.”
He bent his head and his lips brushed hers, gentle at first, but slowly it transformed, becoming heated. It made her want to forget her promise to leave. It made her want to shove him down on the hard marble floor and feel him surrender to her, feel herself surrender to him, all over again.
So she stepped away, lips burning and breath short. “Goodnight, Finn.”
“Goodnight,” he said softly and then reached back to open the door.
