by Deb Marlowe
“Which one?” she asked, facing the row of houses on three sides.
“That one.” He motioned toward the partially loaded wagon that sat outside the corner house. As they moved toward it, the door opened, and a servant came out with a crate.
When it was loaded, Sterne stepped up. “Has Lady Tresham arrived home yet?” he asked.
The servant gave a respectful nod. “No, sir. Nor do we expect her before this evening.”
He gave the man a sympathetic look. “I believe her plans have changed. I would expect her at any moment, were I you. We were to meet her here.” He glanced back at Penelope. “It would seem we’ve arrived before she could get home, my dear.”
The servant looked alarmed. “She left orders to have everything loaded and ready to go when she returned, save for what her dresser kept back for her.”
“Don’t let us delay you, man. Just show us to a parlor and we’ll wait, out of the way. I doubt she’ll be long.”
“Yes, sir. Thank you, sir.” He escorted them inside and into a room just off the entryway. “Here you are. I do apologize about the covers and the state of things.
Most of the furniture had been removed and white sheets covered what remained. “No worries. We’ll be fine while we wait. You go and do what you must. We don’t want to be responsible for stirring up the lady’s ire.”
“Nor do I, sir!” The man bowed and left in a hurry, shutting the door as he went.
“Well! You handled that smoothly.” Miss Munroe—Penelope—moved to the wall to examine the art. “Don’t worry, though. She’ll likely be along soon. I’ll wager anything that she is right now convincing her betrothed that she cannot wait a moment longer to marry.”
“I wouldn’t take that bet. Mr. Simon indicated the man was more than wealthy enough to afford a special license. I think you are right. She’ll send him off to Doctor’s Commons and she’ll come back to see to the last of her things. They’ll likely be out of the city by dawn.”
She was bent over the stacks of paintings leaning against the wall. Lady Tresham had a varied collection, if he could judge by the small noises of approval, dismissal and the occasional tsk of disgust that she was making.
“Are you an art lover, Miss Munroe?” he asked.
“Penelope,” she corrected.
He nodded. “Penelope.”
“Well, I enjoy art. Who does not?” Her mouth twisted a little as she looked back at him. “As the child of a woman known for her botanical drawings, I might have a jaundiced eye. But I love portraits the best.” She reached for a large, covered painting at the back of the stack. “Don’t try to tell me that you don’t enjoy artistic endeavors, sir,” she said.
“As a matter of fact, I do.” But not nearly as much as he was enjoying the sight of her backside thrust in his direction.
“I wouldn’t have believed you, had you denied it,” she said absently. “I’ve seen the art in your drawing room.”
A curious thrill shot through him. He’d forgotten. Or not fully processed the notion that she’d been in his rooms without him. Observing. Evaluating. Judging.
He snorted at the thought of her earlier worry, fearing that she wouldn’t fit in with the young ladies of the ton. She wouldn’t. She was so much more than any other young woman he’d met. She was complex, with layers of thought, empathy and curiosity. He found he cared what her reaction might be. What had she thought of his rooms, his things, the atmosphere he’d created that was essentially an extension of himself?
He wanted to demand that she tell him.
“Oooh,” she breathed. She had uncovered the painting. He came to stand at her shoulder and see what had delighted her.
It was a portrait. A woman looked back at them. English countryside stretched out behind her and she stood in a bower of green, dressed in the wide skirts of an earlier age. She wore an expression—
“What is that?” She asked, enchanted. “Not impatience. Not disgust. It’s . . . exasperation! Who poses in such a way for a portrait? And what is she exasperated with? The artist? The process? Her entire life?” She glanced at him, all alight. “Oh, I hope Lady Tresham arrives soon. I have so many questions.”
As did he. “You meant it when you said you find people fascinating.” But it came out a statement, rather than a question.
“I did.” She gestured. “Just look at her! There is a story here, about a real person. Who was she? Does she live, still? Is she still exasperated?” She laughed. “Is it not fascinating?”
“Yes,” he whispered, stepping closer. “It is.”
She halted as a flush crept up and spread along her jaw to creep into her hair.
“You like people,” he said. “All of them? Everyone you meet?”
“I like to know people. But no, I do not like all of them.”
She liked him. Just as he liked her. No matter how he told himself he shouldn’t get entangled, he wanted to know more.
“Hot pennies,” she said suddenly. She spoke low and the rough edge of her voice vibrated along all of his nerve endings. “The coin in your room, encased in glass—is it from that ceremony?”
He shouldn’t answer. There was no point to it. She was devastatingly alive and attractive. By this time next year, she’d be betrothed, or even already married. And it wouldn’t be to him. He was in no place in his life to keep her safe and secure, let alone comfortable and indulged.
But they were here together now, on equal footing. For the first time, he wanted to share pieces of himself, just as he wanted to know more and more of her. It was a first. And this short, intense time of sharing and flirting was all he would get of her.
He wanted all he could get.
“Yes,” he admitted.
“Tell me about it. It must have made an impression, for you to keep it like that.”
“I just . . .” His gaze unfocused and suddenly he was back there, standing up high, watching two very different scenes play out before him. “I was young. Ten years old, perhaps. I stood up on the balcony with my father and his cronies. They were laughing and warming pennies and taking turns tossing them to the crowd. Below, the townspeople scrambled to get the coins, but they laughed as they dove and grabbed and shoved each other away. I felt . . .”
Her green eyes shone, bright and interested, but she merely waited.
“I felt . . . far away, perhaps. I could see both groups, but I didn’t feel part of either of them. I was watching with new eyes, somehow, as if I could see the bands of connection forming between the rowdy crowd below and also between my father and his friends as they frolicked. I remember feeling sad, because there was no real connection between the two groups. And I could sense the differences between the two. The townspeople were competing against each other, but there was still a light-hearted sense of community about them. But my father’s group had a darker tone to their bonding. It felt slightly malicious and tinged with a superiority and a disdain that made me uncomfortable.”
She watched him closely. “The bonds,” she said slowly. “That’s why you like rituals and are interested in badgers and their dens and those sorts of subjects.”
He hesitated again, but his reluctance didn’t stand a chance against the longing to have her understand, to have her know him—and find him worthy.
“Yes,” he said, suddenly urgent. “Everyone in the natural sciences is eager to find something new. They are all looking for the unknown, for something we’ve never seen before. But it’s the interactions between those creatures we already know I find to be more interesting. It’s why I’m always looking at nesting behavior, territorial disputes, pack relationships.”
“And how rituals affect humans?”
“Yes. That and more. How our cultural connections define us. What makes us feel as if we belong? With whom do we connect and why? What gives us a sense of community?”
She stepped closer and he suddenly snapped back, all senses fully engaged in the present.
Her breath came quickly and as he
watched, her tongue came out and swept along that bottom lip. “I believe,” she said huskily, “that in most cases, a connection begins between just two people. After that—”
She didn’t get any further. Pushed past bearing, he took her in his arms, kissing her with a fierce possessiveness. She made a sound of surprise, but surrendered, melting in his embrace. Kissing him back, she ran her fingers along his jaw, down his neck to his shoulders, and finally buried her hands in his hair.
Damnation, but it felt good. Tingling sensations raced from his scalp and down along his spine. She opened beneath him and he swept his tongue home, teasing and stroking until they were both breathing heavily.
Pulling away, he set his mouth against her neck and kissed the quivering spot where her pulse beat wildly.
Her head tilted, giving him more freedom to nuzzle a path back up the slope of her neck until he reached her ear.
The crash of a dropped crate in the entry startled them both.
“We should stop,” he said roughly, straightening enough to look into her eyes.
“Yes.”
“This isn’t wise.”
“Not at all.” She rose on her toes and pulled him back down.
“What in blazes do you call this sort of collar?” he asked, nuzzling past the high point and setting the bell tassel to swinging.
“A pagoda collar,” she said, shivering as he breathed his way up her nape.
“It’s my new favorite.” He spread the fabric wide and breathed in her ear, teased her with the lightest of kisses, then gently nipped her earlobe.
She gasped and gave a great shiver. “Do it again,” she whispered.
Chuckling, he obliged, and he used his foot to move aside a small landscape so that he could press her against the wall. She went willingly and when he eased his hands from her waist, down over her hips, she grinned up at him. “Now you’ve got me where I want you.”
He laughed. She was such a delight. And indomitable—in the very best way. Devil take it, he wanted to pull her close and hold her forever, while their hearts thumped in shared rhythm—even as he knew he had to push away, to put an end to this.
Just, not yet.
He bent to kiss her again. Tiny, soft kisses all along her mouth. Her lips trembled beneath his onslaught and fell open and he slid inside, smooth as silk. His fingers began to undo the buttons of her carriage dress, one by one. There was still the soft, simple dress of cambric beneath, but it was easily pulled aside. Finally, he revealed enough skin to press his mouth into.
Arching her back a little, she slid her hands inside his coat.
“So soft,” he whispered. “I smell lavender. The countess and her sachets have got to you.”
“Yes,” she laughed. “There is no escape.”
None for her either, as he worked at the ties of her stays. He ran his tongue over her collarbone and her hands moved restlessly over his chest.
There. At last. He’d uncovered the pale valley between her breasts. With gentle kisses and the slightest, softest touches of his tongue, he heightened the tension and her excited anticipation.
Exquisitely slow, he pushed her stays aside. “Lovely. So damned lovely.” The pale bud of her nipple thrust toward him. Watching her face, he eased down and gently licked it.
“Oooh.” Her eyes closed and her mouth fell open. He set to pleasuring her, circling and teasing the rosy tip until it peaked, and she was writhing. With his fingers, he pinched and rolled her other nipple, and at last he covered her with his mouth and sucked. She arched into him again, encouraging, silently asking for more and her hands came up to grip his shoulders.
“I see the mistress’s carriage!” The call came clear and loud.
He let her nipple pop out of his mouth. His eyes cast up and they shared a long, frustrated and resigned look.
She straightened and so did he. With shaking fingers, she began to retie her stays. He helped and together they got her buttoned and back together. When she was fully restored, he set his hands on her waist and pulled her close again. “One last kiss,” he whispered.
She obliged him. It was slow and deep—and then it was done.
“It’s just as well,” he whispered. “We let ourselves get carried away.”
She moved away as they heard the outer door open. Murmuring sounded just outside the door. When Lady Tresham came in, looking sour, Penelope had the portrait in hand and a smile on her face. “Good afternoon, once again, my lady,” she called. “Will you tell me who this fascinating lady is?”
Chapter 10
“She was my mother,” Lady Tresham answered, pulling off her gloves and tossing them over the back of a covered chair. “And to answer your next question, the expression is due to her having four daughters and a husband without status or money.”
“Oh, yes.” Penelope nodded. “That would exasperate anyone.”
Sterne stepped forward to greet the lady and Penelope gratefully turned back to the painting. She needed a moment to recover. Hang it all, she needed a week, a pot of brandy-laced tea and a long talk with Hope to recover—but she would take what she could get.
Good heavens, it was all so deliciously tempting—the conversation, the smiles, the anticipation that shimmered between them. Worse, now she knew it scarcely held a candle to the . . . giving in. To the hot breath and soft touches and tiny kisses and the licking. She shivered.
Sterne had finished with the pleasantries and Lady Tresham had clearly decided that she had no time for them. She flicked a sheet off a chair and indicated Penelope should take it. “You are a quick one, Miss Munroe.” She twitched the cover off of a settee and curled up on it. “I generally try very hard not to use that expression of my mother’s, but you are making it difficult.”
“Apologies, Lady Tresham, but we have some delicate questions to ask and I don’t think you’d care for us to raise them in public.”
The lady sighed. “I suppose I must thank you for that, at least.”
Penelope leaned forward. “Lady Tensford wished to be here, but she is indisposed. She did say, though, that you are a direct and pragmatic person and that she expected you would answer our questions.”
The other woman frowned. “She is all right?”
“Yes.”
Lady Tresham frowned. “Think what you will of me, young lady, but Hope is the closest thing I have to a friend. Is she all right?”
Penelope’s estimation of the woman instantly rose. “I do understand that you two have a long acquaintance. I don’t think she’d mind if I tell you that she is expecting a happy event.”
Lady Tresham’s face cleared. “Oh. You must send her my congratulations.”
“I will. And our questions?”
Her eyes closed. “I suppose I owe her that much. And I suppose the answers can’t hurt so much.” She waved a hand. “As you can see, we are leaving, and I expect it to be a nice, long trip.”
Sterne moved to stand before her, but a little distance away. He looked very serious. “Did you steal Lord Tensford’s fossil?” he asked bluntly.
“What?” She straightened. “Tensford’s fossil?” Her eyes had gone wide. “That great, hulking thing? No. Of course, I did not.”
Penelope glanced at Sterne. She believed the lady was telling the truth. By the glum look on his face, she thought he did, as well.
“Do you know who did take it?” she asked.
“No. It was quite an organized effort, though, was it not? Have you looked to Stillwater?”
“Why?” Sterne asked sharply.
She shrugged. “It seemed a very personal type of theft to me. Such a big undertaking. And not that large of a payoff. Who would go to the trouble except someone who wanted to hurt the earl?” She paused. “I don’t know what it is that Stillwater holds against Tensford, but there is definitely something there.”
“We know you visited Stillwater’s home after the specimen was taken,” Penelope told her. “Did you see Tensford’s fossil while you were there?”
<
br /> “No. He only showed me his collection. At length. But he apparently did have the space to hide something that large away.” She nodded toward Penelope. “It was your cousin who noticed it. I convinced him to take me to Stillwater’s and we basically bullied our way in. I was grilling the old gentleman about the value of his collection and Mr. Lycett was bored silly. He kept pacing between the two rooms that held all of the pieces and when we left, he said the dimensions of the rooms were off, or something. He suspected the old man had a hidden closet tucked away.”
“Lady Tresham,” Sterne said gently. “Did you steal fossils from Stillwater?”
She sighed. “Yes. Just a few, small pieces that I thought were in particularly good condition.”
“Did you sell them?”
“No. I meant to,” she said defiantly. “He boasted hard enough about buying many of his pieces for next to nothing, from yokels who didn’t understand what they possessed. He went on about it so long, I barely felt a twinge relieving him of a few. But they were stolen from me before I could manage it.” She lifted a shoulder. “I’d already discovered that they were not worth much, in any case.” Looking at Sterne, she nodded. “And that just makes me feel even stronger that I’m right—that the person who took that fossil didn’t do it for the money or for the acclaim. He did it to hurt Tensford.”
“If it was any other man, I might agree with you,” Sterne told her. “But Tensford hasn’t any enemies. He’s the most decent man I know.” He held out a folded bit of paper. “Will you take a look at this list of names? Do you think any of these men might have stolen the pieces from you—or might have been the one to steal from Tensford?”
She looked the list over. “These are all collectors. I discovered that much during the last few months, as I was learning the community. You think one of these men might have Tensford’s fish?”
“Do you?” Penelope asked.
“Perhaps.” She pursed her lips. “Sheffield. He has a fit of jealousy any time someone finds something new or noteworthy—someone other than himself. Rowland. He’s a possibility. You know he loves to possess any artifact that has legend or scandal attached to it. Not just fossils, but he’s become more interested in the field as it grows among men of learning.” She paused and her brow raised. “That would explain . . .”