She wished she could say the same, but she could not. She had hated him, been furious with him. For so terribly long. But perhaps only because she’d liked him so much before that.
And as she set the book aside to stroke the line of his nose and kiss him softly, sweetly, she realized how very easy it was to like him, how very easy it would be to feel more than that.
“We should return,” she said. “The others will begin to wonder. Selena will worry.”
He groaned but left the bed, picking up her ruined clothing and handing them to her. Then he whipped open his wardrobe and rummaged around for clean clothes of his own. Lucky man.
She wrinkled her nose at her gown and shift. It would be unpleasant to put them on, but no other choice. Taking a lover would be a challenging enterprise. “Oh.”
He looked up from buttoning his fall. “Something wrong?”
“You… we… are we lovers now?”
He barked a laugh and had his arm hooked around her waist in two steps. “If you have questions about that, I haven’t done my job.”
She rested her chin against his chest, feeling quite satisfied. “Lovers then. Until the party ends.”
He scowled. “No. Not until the party ends. Longer.”
“I don’t see how?—”
“I’ll figure it out.” He returned to his fall, his shirt, his waistcoat, his jacket, and cravat. “Or you will.Wewill. But we are awenow. No arguments, hellcat.”
Oddly, she couldn’t think of a single one.
She stepped into her shift and did up her stays as best she could. Richard was tying her tapes when a loud banging made them both jump.
“What the hell?” he stepped into the hallway.
Beatrice followed. “They’re probably looking for me.”
More banging.
“Stay here.” Richard started down the stairs.
No arguments there either. She peeked around a corner and over a banister, though, where she could only just see the door.
It flew open as Richard reached the entry hall. A man stood wobbling in the doorway, a lightning strike behind him casting his features in shadow. And then he fell into the house.
Richard caught him, froze, cursed.
Beatrice rushed down the stairs, slamming to a stop when she saw… “Daniel,” she breathed.
“It seems you were right after all,” Richard said. “The prodigal son has returned.”
Daniel’s face was ashen, his dark hair plastered to his forehead, his body limp. But his eyes fluttered, then opened. His lips parted for a shaky breath before he said, “Home. And shot. Careful, brother, or I’ll get blood all over your waistcoat.”
Richard pulled an arm out from under his brother’s body. His white sleeve now red and glistening.
Twelve
Abell rang upstairs, and Richard ignored it. It rang again, and he growled. The third time the bell rang he was already half up the stairs. By the time it was done peeling, he’d thrown open the bedchamber door. “What in God’s name is it this time?”
Daniel reclined against a pile of pillows at the head of a bed, legs crossed at the ankles. He wore Richard’s banyan and, it appeared, nothing else. By the fingertips of an outstretched arm, he clutched the handle of a small bell. “Unfeeling brute, talking to an injured man like that.I wasshot, Richard. You should be weeping over my mostly dead carcass.”
Richard leaned against the doorframe, pinching the bridge of his nose. “You were scratched by a stray bullet, you nodcock.”
Daniel shrugged, winced, pretended to cry. When Richard did not care, he shrugged again—this time no wince—and stopped pretending. “I require sustenance.”
