“I cannot seem to be in a room with you without needing to touch you. Once I touch you, I must kiss you. Once I kiss you…I think you know the rest.”
She gazed up at him. “Oh, Chase, I do love you so.”
“Not half as much as I love you, Amelia.” He sighed, grasped her shoulders and took a step back. “But you have something of import to share, enough so you cut your meeting short. Something about one of the ladies in your club?”
“Indeed. Mrs. Barnes, as I mentioned, is relocating to London. She is a widow of some means, and an editor, who has made an offer on a local publishing house that’s recently available for purchase.”
He strolled to the chaise and dropped onto it, stretching out his long legs in front of him. “Go on.”
“It seems, in addition to the main seller, the stakeholders of the publishing house must agree to the sale, and they’ve made it clear Mrs. Barnes, as a woman investor, must meet certain criteria.”
He crossed his arms over his chest. “Such as?”
She meandered toward him and eased a hip onto the chaise. “She must have experience in the field, which she has, and she must have the blunt.” She thought she heard his soft snort at her use of the colloquialism. “Again, she is most able to meet this requirement. Lastly, she must be connected, socially.”
“Connected,” he said flatly. “What does that mean?”
“Connected as in either a member of an important family or wed to a man of such a family.”
“And she is not, I take it.”
“Correct.”
“I fail to see what I can do to help. I haven’t any spare, well-connected, bachelor friends to whom I can marry the chit.”
She sent him a sweet smile.
Instantly, his dark eyes gleamed with suspicion.
“I thought, as she helped us so well, perhaps the Black Widow of Whitehall might be persuaded to assist Mrs. Barnes in procuring a husband.”
His dark brows furrowed. “A fine idea. Send the woman in her direction.”
Amelia continued to smile sweetly. She leaned toward him, smoothing her palms over his waistcoat.
“Amelia? Why do I get the feeling there’s more to your plan that I won’t like?”
“As she is new to the area, and quite unfamiliar with the ways of London, and has never met Mrs. Dove-Lyon, an introduction—”
“No—”
“Would help smooth the way for her.”
“Absolutely not.”
“I would, of course, dress as Lady MacIvor, the widow.”
“Amelia, this is out of the question.”
“Sir, have I told you today what a wonderful husband you are?”
He glared at her.
“So loving, so fair-minded, so willing to accept your wife for the eccentric woman of the world she is?”
“Dear God,” he muttered, and eyed the ceiling as if seeking divine help.
And then, as if in surrender, he flopped onto his back, stretching out on the chaise which was not adequate to serve his tall frame, but which did not stop him from dragging Amelia across the top of him. “You may as well begin, madam.”
“Begin?” She chuckled, knowingly.
“Plying me with your wiles, having your way with me in order to get your way.”
She giggled at his word play, then feathered kisses over his face. “Will it work?”
“Onlyoneway to find out,” he said in a husky voice, and wrapped his hand around her nape, tugging her mouth to his.
Roddy curled into a ball beside the chaise, sighed contentedly, and proceeded to nap while his master and mistress wrestled each other on the furniture as they seemed to enjoy doing all too often.
The end.
