She did not know what to say. The truth would never do, and lies would ruin the memories. “Yes, that would be best.”
He nodded, and moved again. She trembled from the pleasure. Another luxurious stroke, then he kissed her hard. “I could do this all morning, but you must go.”
It did not take all morning, but it took long enough. Different this time. Slow and soulful, with them seeing each other in the daylight.
He was the one to leave the bed first. He walked to a door, opened it, and spoke quietly. He returned, striding toward her. She watched him move, admiring his body, which displayed the hard beauty of a young, active man.
“You can use the dressing room. There is water and whatever else you need.” He pulled on a banyan. “There will be food here when you are done.”
The dressing room proved larger than some homes, with divans and chairs as well as the usual items. She found the necessary equipment, and washed with soap that smelled like the duke. She dried herself with a linen so soft that she wondered how it had been made. She took a moment to inspect his brushes, which were nicer than she’d ever imagined a brush being.
She dared not use one, so fixed her hair using only her fingers and pins. She had carried in her clothes and now put them on. One glance in the looking glass deflated her joy. Suddenly she was Amanda Waverly again, not the goddess this duke had made her.
He offered her a choice. A discreet affair, or being his mistress. No liaison at all had not been among the options. That was the way it had to be, however. She did not think she had the courage to tell him that this morning.
Breakfast indeed waited when she returned to the bedchamber. They sat to it together. When he saw how she savored the tea, he poured her more until she had drunk most of the pot.
He appeared rakish and rough with a shadow of beard on his face and his thick curls disheveled and wild. The celadon-green brocade banyan probably cost more than she earned in half a year. She feasted her gaze on him, on the chest partly visible above the garment’s unbuttoned collar, and the well-formed legs that showed when he sat back and extended them.
“How will I get out?” she asked when she finished her meal.
“How did you get in?”
An unfortunate question. “Through the garden door. It was left unlocked.”
His gaze settled on her skeptically. “I doubt that. The housekeeper is very strict. She sees to that door herself.”
She felt herself flushing. “If you don’t laugh, I will tell you the truth. I came in a window. Your housekeeper is not so careful with those.”
He did laugh. “I am picturing that. You cannot go out that way. I will go down and have everyone make themselves scarce under penalty of death. Then you will walk out any door you choose.” He took her hand. “If I have the garden door left unlocked tonight, will you come back?”
“Not tonight.”
“The next then.”
She dared not return to this chamber and this bed. She could not risk falling asleep again. The reasons she should not, the future waiting for her, shouted that this idyll must end.
She should put him off and leave and never meet him again. She need only give him the same excuse she had used with Lady Farnsworth, or the one she’d given Katherine.
She could not find the strength to do that yet. One more time, perhaps. One last bit of heaven before Amanda Waverly disappeared.
“I should not risk entering this house again. However, tomorrow night I will try to meet you in the garden, if that will do.”
He kissed her hand. “We will do it any way that you want, Amanda.”
* * *
He was good to his word and saw Amanda could leave without anyone seeing her. It was not the first time he had demanded the servants disappear so a woman could avoid gossip.
Once she had gone, he washed and dressed. While he donned the coats Miles had laid out, he sent the valet for a footman named Vincent. The fair-haired young man appeared at the dressing room door.
Gabriel brought him in while he finished. “Is the watch on my brother’s house continuing?”
“We are taking turns, Your Grace. A man is there every night.”
“Is he aware of you?” Harry had asked this watch start after he returned to the country. Gabriel could not picture his brother confronting an intruder, so he had sent the footmen at once but told them to stay on the street and remain unknown to his brother.
“I think he is unaware, sir.”
