Shaking herself, she forced herself to look only at the brief. They had work to do.
***
Rubbing her eyebrow, Nicola reread the constable’s report. For hours, they’d read and reread and reread again, report after report. The day had darkened, and the gas lights in the room had been lit over an hour ago, yet still they researched and examined and tried to find some way to effectively defend Thomas’s client.
Exhaling, she gave up. There was no way around it. “I don’t think calling the constable will help in any way. His statement is ironclad, and none of the events are in dispute.” Turning her gaze from the report, she glanced at the man beside her.
His own report forgotten before him, he looked at her, his thumb pressed against a smile.
Brows drawing together, she asked, “Was there something, Thomas?”
Removing his thumb from his lips left only his smile. “You’re rather adorable when you concentrate.”
Heat flared in her cheeks. Quickly, she looked down at the paper. “You shouldn’t say such things.”
“Nic, are you blushing?”
“No,” she mumbled.
“You are!” She looked up to find him grinning at her. “The Queen of Scandal, stymied by such a small comment? Why, I fair can’t believe it to be true.”
She scowled. “I’m not stymied, and I’m not the Queen of Scandal. I feel quite certain there are others much more worthy of that epitaph.”
“Yes, you are stymied.” Reaching forward, he flipped a loose curl of her hair. “It’s adorable.”
“Don’t say such!” Hitting his shoulder, she tried to conceal her smile. She was fairly certain she failed.
Grin widening, he caught her wrist. “And now you’re fighting adorably.”
She tugged, but his grip was too strong. “You are cracked. You know that, right? Absolutely cracked in the head.”
“Maybe that’s true. Doesn’t stop you from being adorable.”
Throwing her other hand at him only put her at further disadvantage. With both of her wrists caught in his grasp, he glanced at the brief. “You’re also correct. The constable would not be a good witness for us.” Gaze turning back to her, his grin softened to a lovely smile.
Emotion swelled inside her. Dear God, but she loved him. All of him. The slight crinkle at the corner of his eyes. The way the light hit his skin. The fall of dark blond over his forehead. Each and every one of his beloved features, and the way he trusted her opinion, the way he laughed with her, the way he…. She just loved him.
His smile faded as something began a slow smolder in his eyes. “Nic. Thank you for helping.”
She shivered. “Of course.”
“Nic?” he said.
Barely able to breathe, her gaze drifted to his lips. “Yes?”
“I’m going to kiss you now.”
“Yes.” Her eyes drifted shut.
Slowly, his lips met hers, brushed once, twice.
“Thomas.” She sighed and, as his mouth took hers again, she felt the shape of his smile.
Pleasure rushed through her, sharp and bright. Never had it been like this. All the boys she’d kissed, the men she’d teased, none had made her feel as she did now. Emotion swelled, until it felt her heart was too large for her chest and would encompass all of her, occupy her totally with this feeling for him. For Thomas.
Threading her fingers through the short hair at the base of his neck, she smiled as he placed his lips against her eyelids, her brows. Cupping her face, he placed a string of kisses along her cheek and over her temple before returning his mouth to hers.
Pulling back, he smoothed his thumbs against her cheekbones. “I can’t resist you, Nic.”
“Good.” She placed her hands over his. “I can’t resist you, either.”
“Then we are in agreement.” Though he smiled, his hazel eyes held something that was bleak and bittersweet. “What are we to do about this?”
“At this moment?” Ignoring any misgivings, she ran her fingers over his jaw. “Would you just come and see me tomorrow?”
He didn’t answer. Continuing to trace his jaw, she kept her gaze from his. Please. Don’t let him say no.
Gently, his finger beneath her chin raised her gaze to his. Her heart leapt at what she saw.
He smiled. “Yes.”
Chapter Four
Shifting in his lap, Nic ran her fingers through his hair. The faint tug, the glide of her nails, her fingertips brushing against his temple…. Thomas closed his eyes and simply enjoyed her touch.
“Are you going to tell me we should not be here?” She placed a tender kiss at his temple.
A smile tugged at him. “Now, why would I say that, Lady Nicola?”
Against his temple, he felt the shape of her smile. “Because we are seated in your office, and at any moment your clerk could come in.”
His breath caught at the feel of her tongue darting against his skin. “He knows better.” Turning her in his arms, he grinned at her false squeal of protest before covering her mouth with his own.
She opened eagerly, her tongue stroking his as he invaded her mouth. Hands tightening in the small of her back, he allowed himself the pleasure that was kissing Nic, drove himself mad with her taste, the sounds she made, the feel of her against him.
Breaking the kiss, he burrowed into her neck, and loved it that she once again started to stroke his hair. Such a small thing, but now when she touched him, when she smoothed his lapel or straightened his wig or ran her fingers through his hair, it was far from casual. For the past week, the seven days since she’d first come to his chambers, he’d looked forward to when he could pull her into his arms, just like this.
Every day after she’d arrived, they’d argued over his briefs, discussed their politics. In quieter moments, they told of the time they’d spent without the other, or they’d sat like this, kissing and laughing and just enjoying the other’s company. He’d never had that. He’d never just been with a woman, just sat with her in silence and watched as she traced a pattern on his hand.
But that was Nic, wasn’t it? When he was with her, everything was different. She was funny and smart and lovely, and he couldn’t see tomorrow without her visit or the next week or the next month.
He brushed his lips against the delicate skin where her neck met her shoulder. Who was he attempting to fool? He couldn’t see his life without her.
“I read today Lord Ashley is still working with the lower classes.”
He tensed. Taking her hand from his hair, he placed a kiss on her palm before linking their fingers across her stomach. “As far as I know, he’s still touring the slums.”
Her gaze level, she said, “And how are you taking this?”
He looked at their entwined hands. “Fine.”
“Thomas.” The soft way she said his name made him raise his gaze to hers. Concern darkened her eyes. “Are you certain?”
The emotion he’d been holding exploded. “Well, it’s only any one of those children he’s banging on about could have been me, couldn’t it? If not for Lord Harry and Lady Millicent, I’d still be there, stuck in a chimney or locked in the clink or, God knows, something worse.”
“But you did have Lord Harry and Lady Millicent, and they had the good sense to live next to my family. Imagine if we’d never had met?” She squeezed his hand. “Now that would have been a real tragedy.”
A smile tugged, then faded. It was still baffling Lord Harry and Lady Millicent had chosen him out of all the children at the poorhouse. Probably he’d been eight or nine, but with no parents to mark the date of his birth, he had no notion of his actual age. His recollection of that day was vague, apart from the moment a fancy lord crouched before him, his lady stood behind, and asked if he should like to live with them.
Thomas had stared at the lord. He hadn’t known what to think. Lord Harry had waited patiently, and slowly the realization that this was not a dream dawned upon Thomas. He’d nodded. Hand over her mouth and tears bri
mming, Lady Millicent had gasped a sob as Lord Harry smiled. The next hour had passed in a blur, but it had seemed moments only before the lord and his lady had each taken one of his hands, holding him tight as they’d left the poorhouse. Walking between them, gripping their hands tight, Thomas had known what it was to feel safe for the first time in his life.
Now, he looked at Nic. “Why do you think they did it?”
“Take you in?”
He nodded.
“Because they saw something in you, Thomas. They saw your brain and your determination and your…your potential.” She trailed a finger down his cheek. “You have rather a lot of it, you know.”
Troubled still, he caught her hand. “Do you think they’re proud of me?”
“Of course.”
His insides churning, he said, “Are you proud of me?”
China-blue eyes regarded him steadily. “Thomas. How could I not be?”
Exhaling, he leaned his forehead against hers. God, he loved her so much. Blindly, he sought her mouth, and he kissed her and kissed her and kissed her.
“Good God, Cartwright, what are you doing?”
Thomas froze. He didn’t want to look. If he didn’t look, then maybe it wouldn’t be true.
But he couldn’t avoid truth forever.
The head of his chambers stood stock still in the door. Disdain and disappointment warred on Lord Draper’s features, a red-ribboned brief held forgotten in his hand.
Thomas swallowed, his throat thick. That was it. All he’d worked for, all Lord Harry and Lady Millicent had given, all destroyed in less than a second.
They would not be proud of this.
“Well, Cartwright?”
Lord Draper’s voice broke him from his stasis. Shoving Nicola from his lap, he stood and raked a hand through the hair her fingers had disordered. “Sir, I can explain—”
If anything, the look of disdain on Lord Draper’s face deepened. “I don’t see what there is to explain. I expect to see you in my office in ten minutes.”
“Sir—”
“Ten minutes. Do not keep me waiting.” With a final disgusted look, Lord Draper left.
Thomas stared at the door. Christ. Christ. How could he have been so stupid, so easily swayed? He had lived most of his life without such flagrant disregard of the rules, had managed to be circumspect in all things. How was it that now, when he was so close to obtaining what Lord Harry and Lady Millicent wanted for him, that he’d ruined it all?
“Thomas?”
Head pounding, he turned. Lip caught between her teeth, Nicola regarded him with worried eyes.
“What?” he snapped.
She squared her shoulders. “Don’t speak to me like that.”
Oh, for the love of—“Like what?”
Her expression hardened. “Like that.”
“Bloody hell, Nic, don’t you realize what has happened?”
Nic shot him a dirty look. “Of course I do. I’m not thick. Allow me to speak with him, and I’ll get this sorted.”
Incredulity robbed him of speech. He would be bloody lucky if he retained his employment. Lord Draper brooked no impropriety in his chambers, as well he should. It was right and it was decent to expect his barristers to employ discretion, and to sneak a woman into his chambers and be caught bloody kissing her was so far beyond the pale, he might as well sever any dreams of a half-decent career right now.
She raised her chin. “Believe me, Thomas, a few well-placed words, perhaps a fluttering of eyelashes, and he’ll forget all about it.”
What did she think that was going to accomplish? “Lord Draper is the head of my chambers. He won’t be swayed so easily, and he won’t forget about it.”
“He will if I have any influence at all.”
“Bloody hell, Nicola!” At the volume of his words, she flinched. “He’s not going to just forget about it! He’s going to rake me over the coals, as he bloody well should.” Viciously, he dug his thumb and fingers into his eyes. “What was I thinking?”
“Thomas, we should discuss how we are going to handle this—”
“We? There is no we. I’m not one of your scandals, that you can make light of in your letters. This is my life. Do you know what this is going to do to my political career? I’ll be the idiot who brings women into his chambers and then gets caught with one in his lap and his tongue down her throat.”
For a moment—a brief moment—she looked as if he’d slapped her. Then, she set her jaw. “Others do it.”
How could she not understand? “Others are dukes or earls or someone who is not the whelp of a poorhouse. Christ, Nicola, can you not understand? This could ruin me. And what is this for you? Just another scandal, right? Well, I will not be just another one of your scandals.”
His terrible words hung in the air. Silence fell between them, tense and strained and full of a hundred different kinds of hurt. He wanted to call back the words, to make them unsaid, but…what if they were true? What if he was just another scandal? What if—
He focused on anger. Anger was easier.
Face pale, she looked at him from eyes too dark and too deep. “Do you truly mean that?”
She sounded small, so small, but the self-disgust and shame in him was too big, too deep, to think of that now. “I don’t know what to think, Lady Nicola. You are back in London less than two weeks, and you have mired me in scandal, from which I may never recover.”
She became, if possible, paler. Wrapping her arms about herself, she said, “Why do I keep trying? Am I a glutton for rejection?”
He frowned. “Nic—”
“No!” Glancing toward the door, she lowered her voice. “No. You don’t get to call me that, not anymore.” She dashed her hand across her face, and it was only then he realized her cheeks were wet with tears.
Something wrenched inside him.
“I could have made this go away, Thomas. I’ve been, what did you say? Mired in enough scandal to know how to handle it. Treat it as a joke, as something of no consequence, and all around you believe it to be true. Even if it’s killing you on the inside.” She lifted her chin. “But you don’t need me, do you, Thomas? You are merely humoring me and my silly delusions of us. Aren’t you?” She fell silent, as if she expected him to say something.
He could think of nothing. He, who could argue passionately on behalf of his clients, could only stand there mute, watching as the light in her faded until it disappeared.
Nodding to herself, she pressed her lips together. As if preventing more tears. “I shall trouble you no more.”
Then, she left.
She simply left.
Thomas stared after her. What had just happened? How had it gone so badly, so quickly? He hadn’t meant what he’d said. Bloody hell, of course he hadn’t. He would never—How could he have said such things to her?
“Mr. Cartwright, sir?” His clerk stood in the door uncertainly. “Mr. Cartwright, sir, Lord Draper is asking for you.”
Lord Draper. Reprimand. Dismissal. What did any of that matter, without Nic?
Of a sudden, it was all so blindingly clear. “Tell Lord Draper I’ll be right in.”
His law clerk nodded, and scurried away.
Thomas straightened, tidied his clothes, smoothed his hair. He could start again, join another chamber, obtain new clients. He’d only just begun in politics and none would care overmuch for tales of an extremely junior member’s misstep.
But he would not, could not, lose Nic.
Purpose drawn, he strode from the room. He would face Lord Draper, take whatever the man saw fit to give, and then he’d go to Nic.
He only hoped she would forgive him.
Chapter Five
Her hotel chamber looked as if hit by a furious storm. Clothing spewed from her wardrobe, strewn haphazardly over her bed and sprayed across her dressing table. Shoes littered her floor, and various trunks and cases listed drunkenly around the room. But then, it was always thus, when she packed up her life.
&nbs
p; Nicola stared down at the case before her. It was not right, she was certain. She’d already attempted it three times, but each time it was wrong and she could not make it right. No matter how she arranged the clothes, how she folded them or rolled them or any other configuration, she could not get them to fit.
She pulled them again from the case. They had fit when she’d left Vienna, so there was no reason they shouldn’t now. It was inconceivable that what had always had worked previously should not work no—
Her hands shook.
Staring down at them, panic roared through her. It skittered along her skin, drove her to hurry, hurry. Pack, get away, run away, as fast as she possibly could….
She wrapped her arms about herself. She could do this, if only she were still. A hundred times she had packed her life into cases and trunks and absconded to another city. This time was no different. With luck, she could be gone in no more than a day, and then she wouldn’t have to think on what had happened that afternoon and Thomas’s face as he’d spoken his truth.
The dull ache in her chest flared to pain. No, she could not think on that. If she did, she would curl into a ball and never move again.
Looking out the window, she tightened her arms. Night had fallen. Hours had passed between that moment and this, but over and again, she heard his words—just another scandal. How could he think such a thing? How could he believe himself to be the same as other men? Those others, they’d never been more than flirtations. She’d never talked with them over a wall. She’d never shared all that she was. They hadn’t sat with her and trusted her judgment on legalities and politics, never looked at her and seen more than a pretty face.
She pressed her arms into her stomach. How could he have held her and laughed with her and ever believed she thought so little of him?
A gentle scratch sounded at her door. The maid she’d employed upon her arrival in London entered the room. “My lady, there’s a Mr. Cartwright here to see you.”
Pain flared, so large and so bright it seemed it would burst from her. She couldn’t do it. She couldn’t see him, couldn’t see his anger and his disdain and know that he believed her the cause of it.
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