Her insides fluttered at the way he was looking at her. It was going to take every ounce of self-respect — not to mention the fear of any ramifications should they go too far — to keep her from giving in to her attraction for him.
“An afternoon concert,” she insisted. There was less chance that the high society types visiting from London would be awake and out any earlier than dinnertime.
“I would prefer the evening one,” Lord Diamond said.
Alice sighed. “I think we must delineate precisely what can be between us.”
“Between you?” came Lady Beasley’s voice. “What on earth is going on here?”
“Not again,” Lord Diamond muttered.
Adam left the Beasleys’home satisfied everything was going along better than he could have hoped. By being frank with Lord Beasley and later, more awkwardly, with Lady Beasley, he’d been given permission to court Mrs. Malcolm.
In his heart, he didn’t believe he even needed their consent. However, better to have a smooth path at the outset. Besides, he doubted Alice would have agreed to anything if she hadn’t received both of her employer’s blessings, albeit rather ungraciously provided by the lady of the houseaftershe’d heard what her husband had to say.
“If you prefer a governess to my daughter,” Lady Beasley had quipped, “then I wonder at your judgment. Regardless, while there is no accounting for taste, young man, I understand there is also no way to fathom the mercurial and oft-spontaneous yearning of the human heart.”
With that statement, she had left him to invite Alice to go riding again. It was the best way he could spend time with her until he could get tickets to the daytime concert.
And she had agreed. He had never been happier than when Alice was at his side. While she only had Saturday afternoons and Sundays free during the day, she had nearly every night to her own devices, too. He found it the strangest thing, having to wait a week to be able to tour the Roman Baths with her, climb the Gothic abbey’s clock tower and bell tower and see the city from the top of the cathedral, or ride again through Victoria Park.
However, after some persuading and him being on his best behavior for two weeks, she agreed to let him take advantage ofher evenings, too. He filled them with any event in which she showed an interest, never a dance or place where she had to mingle with theton.
Adam restrained himself from taking advantage of anything else until she was ready, although time was not in his favor. Determined to win her over like a gentleman should, he treated her as if she were a lady of his class. Doing anything else, such as pressuring her into being alone or plying her with jewelry, would be reprehensible, no matter how tempting her soft lips. Thus, while his ultimate aim was a torrid affair before his imminent departure, he took his suit slowly, as if truly courting her.
Strangely, even after a few weeks in which she comported herself as well as any lady, she was reluctant to return to the assembly rooms for a ball or accompany him to a private dinner party.
“Absolutely not,” she declared when Adam said they had been invited to the home of a friend of his from London.
“They will love you,” he assured her, but she was adamant.
He assumed she felt herself a fraud amongst the titled and wealthy people. She would have to get over that were he to convince her to attend. Any female accompanying him anywhere, as long as she wasn’t crude or behaved in a low manner, would be accepted by his acquaintances. Members of his class would understand that he was enjoying aspecialfriendship. It was done, and often. Nearly every king, in fact, had a lover chosen from the middle class or lower, even actresses!
But with Alice, convincing her to enjoy a dinner party had to be undertaken slowly. Everything to do with her had to be done at a leisurely pace.
Except the workings of his heart. That spontaneous organ Lady Beasley had once mentioned had charged ahead as fast as a fully stoked steam engine zipping along the track from interest to admiration to love.
Adam knew it for what it was because when Alice wasn’t with him, he was thinking of her. When she smiled, he was happy. When she was nearby, he felt contented — and, naturally, he was also growing exceedingly frustrated. An entirely different kind of yearning than Lady Beasley had meant tortured him, both daily and every night.
Each time their gloved hands brushed against one another, he wanted to pull Alice into his arms. When their arms touched and her warmth seeped into him, he could imagine her naked beneath him. He did, in fact, imagine that, and all too often.
Was it any wonder, he finally asked her consent to kiss her again?
He could have got down on his knees and thanked the good lord when she saidyesin her breathy way, which indicated she was as affected by their close proximity as he was. Instead of dropping to the damp grass like a supplicant, he drew her close in the safety of the Beasleys’ back garden, hoping none of the family were watching. But truly, he didn’t give a tinker’s damn if they were.
When he claimed her mouth under his after weeks of behaving like a monk, Adam had never felt more like a parched man being given a sip of delicious water. He drank her in, every soft nibble he took of her lips, every taste of her tongue, every sweet brush of her skin against his.
“Marry me,” Adam breathed against the skin of her neck, feeling her freeze instantly.
Chapter Ten
The devil! How on earth had that outrageous question popped out of his mouth?It must have been the worrisome knowledge that they were running out of one precious commodity he could not replace. Andrew Marvell’s “winged chariot” of time was soaring without slowing.
And just like the narrator in that famed poem, Adam hoped Mrs. Malcolm would set aside her inhibitions and let him tup her.
Certainly, the more he thought about never seeing Alice again, the more he wanted to hold on to her with both hands. But binding her to him in matrimony was out of the question. She was meant for a Mr. Malcolm type of man, except loyal and kind and not a cheating bastard. A man who wore a beige coat made of cheap kersey, who went to work at a mercantile or, if very fortunate, at a bank. She would give him children, which she would raise to be smart like herself, and stay at home to keep house, maybe hiring a woman to do the laundry.
If Alice could cook, which he didn’t know, perhaps she would have a nice dinner on the table when her husband came home, needing his feet rubbed.
