The valet backed away, relief evident in the hunch of his shoulders. As he disappeared from the glow of candlelight, Lord Rigsby appeared within its yellow circumference. “And thank you for watching over Miss Blake.”
“What are you doing here?” Henrietta demanded.
He stepped closer to her, and her breath caught in her chest. The candle threw shadows on the hard planes of his face. He looked forbidding with his lips set at such a stern angle, but she caught a curious glint in his eye. Why ever he stood before her, he had a purpose; she recognized determination when she saw it.
He stood so close to her now, she could reach out and touch him. But his hands remained impassive at his sides as he stared down at her through the candlelit darkness. “We need to have a little chat, Henrietta.”
Mercy. She had to say no. She had to turn away. She’d suggested the plan to search the rooms during the ball purely because it kept him away from her. She couldn’t be trusted around him. Her body wanted him too much. She swallowed the wanting and clutched her own determination. “It’s not the right time of day for a chat, Lord Rigsby. Perhaps in the morning.” She turned and strode away.
But he didn’t let her go. His fingers wrapped gently about her wrist, and he whispered her name.
Closing her eyes, praying for strength, seeking out the anger that seemed to melt in his presence, she turned. Where had it gone? “Hm?”
He took the candle from her, then folded one of her hands in his own. A lightning bolt shot through her. They sat, and he placed the candle beside them, leaving one side of his face cast in light, the other in darkness. The black hallway tightened around their huddled bodies. She had to speak or she’d kiss him. Again. She’d kiss an engaged man again. Shame should have flooded her.
Her mind went completely blank, drained of everything but his lips, including shame.
She pulled him forward and pressed her lips to his. He didn’t hesitate to pull her into his lap, never breaking their kiss, as if bringing her home after centuries apart. Why did it feel like coming home?
His arms held her tight. His heart beat next to hers.
When he broke the kiss, Henrietta heard a whimper—hers—at the loss of their connection. But he hushed her with another quick kiss then turned his attentions elsewhere, feathering kisses up her jaw to her ear, where he whispered huskily, “My Hen.”
The possessive claim should have shaken sense into her, but brain and body were at odds. No, her brain had completely given in to her body’s primal arguments. They were in cahoots against her now.
She wound her hands in the hair at his nape and opened her neck more fully to him, giving him access to all the skin above her bodice. His clever fingers accepted her invitation, sliding down the column of her throat, caressing the swells of her breasts, then teasing the skin at the edge of her bodice with soothing strokes, making her moan.
His low chuckle sounded like midnight wrapped in velvet. “My Hen,” he repeated.
The repetition did it. She opened her eyes and sat straight up.
“Ow! My nose!” His hands disappeared from shoulders and breasts. She peeked up at him. He cradled his nose, brows furrowed like storm clouds over his eyes.
“I didn’t mean to.” She rubbed her temple. “My head hurts, too. It’s dark.”
He stopped ministering his nose and stroked a curl away from the temple that had whacked him. He placed a kiss there, and the sweetness of the gesture sliced her in two.
She scurried from his lap, retreating to the furthest reaches of the candle’s glow, glad for the darkness hugging her tight. She’d kissed other men in the last year; none of them made her forget logic, reason, time, and purpose. In fact, her first post-Grayson kiss had been too dry. Her second had been too cold. Her third, too wet. She felt a bit like Goldilocks, and Grayson was her just right.
Shame heated her body. Henrietta actually liked Grayson’s future fiancée, a woman who had promised to help Henrietta achieve her dream. If Henrietta didn’t control her urges, they would ruin everyone’s lives. Perhaps the ton had the right of it, about those like her who made their money through hard work. They lacked some essential breeding.Shelacked essential breeding.
Behaving correctly may not come naturally to her, at least when confronted with over six feet of Grayson Maxwell, but she did know the difference between right or wrong, and she pulled the knowledge about herself now, armed herself with it. “That is not conversation. You wished to speak with me?”
His gravelly voice sailed to her across the candlelight. “If you wish to kiss instead of talk, who am I to—”
“A mistake, Lord Rigsby.” She crossed her arms over her chest, warding off the chill creeping up her arms and legs. “My apologies.”
“You did nothing I didn’t want you to do, nothing I didn’t participate in as well.” He shook his head, cleared his throat. “But you’re right. We must talk.”
She waited, then waited a minute more. “Well?”
“Last year, after you ended our engagement, I came for you.”
Confusion fluttered in Henrietta’s chest. Then indignation. Did he take her for a fool? “You did not. I would have noticed that detail.”
“I was too late, or I thought as much.” He scratched his ear again. “A fortnight passed before the grief lifted enough for me to realize maybe you had not meant what you said. Another went by before I found the space to come after you.”
“But you didn’t come after me.”
