She nestled against his warm chest, reveling in the sound of his heart beating as fast as hers. “Do it again?”
“Give me five minutes,” he mumbled, and lay his cheek against her hair.
They nodded off for a few moments, awakening when the chill in the air permeated their sated embrace.
Lawrence tugged her hem back down to her ankles, then arranged his breeches and slipped his shirt back over his head. Much as Chloe was loath to cover him back up, she enjoyed being the one who could do so.
She helped with his waistcoat and his cravat, not because he needed it but because she wished to. Adjusting the folds of a neckcloth and rebuttoning the jacket they’d tossed aside somehow felt just as intimate as everything they’d done moments before—perhaps more. It was different now. No longer a mystery. They knew what they could have together.
He kissed her forehead. “Shall we tour the rest of the library?”
It took her embarrassingly long to fathom what on earth he was talking about.
Art.
The reason Chloe was allegedly here. In his house, in this room. Thank goodness Lawrence was keeping things on track.
“Yes,” she managed. “The tour would be fascinating.”
He laced his fingers with hers and led her to a different section of the library from the last. Instead of paintings on the walls, there were waist-high fluted columns topped with busts and sculptures.
All except for a single column with nothing on it.
She pointed. “What belongs there?”
The casual joy disappeared from his eyes.
“A vase. My father’s most prized possession, and mine as well.” A tendon flexed in his neck. “When I find the blackguard who stole it…”
“A vase?” she repeated.
“A fine one. It looks like a cherub or an angel.”
She knew the vase quite well indeed. It was sitting back home in the Planning Parlor. But she hadn’t known the vase wasmissing. Old Faircliffe had given it to Bean voluntarily, as compensation for stealing a family heirloom. Then again, Bean had not agreed to the trade. The vase had been imposed on him against his will.
“You’re certain it’s been stolen?” she asked carefully.
“I’ve been through every inch of this property,” Lawrence said darkly. “It was here before the accident and gone after Father died. Someone took it while the house was at its most vulnerable.”
WhileLawrencewas at his most vulnerable.
Chloe gulped. “Er, perhaps it’s not what you think.”
He wasn’t listening. “The Bow Street Runners are investigating as we speak.”
Her stomach dropped. “They are?”
“Between their best investigators and the reward money, I’ll have the culprit before the magistrate in no time.” His eyes were hard. “And then I’ll make him pay.”
Oh, no. Oh, no, no, no…
If only the prideful man hadn’t been too lofty to acknowledge a Wynchester from the start! They hadtriedto exchange their fathers’ possessions. They’d sent countless offers to purchase back the painting, for ever-increasing sums of money.
Chloe had intercepted Lawrence on half a dozen occasions to broker a trade—outside Parliament, in Hyde Park, at Berkeley Square—only to be rebuffed before she could get a word out. Ignored, unacknowledged, time and again.
He’d never truly seen her until the day she stole his carriage. The debt of a favor—no money, no objects—this ruse had been her one chance to ensure he wouldn’t brush her away yet again.
Everything had changed since then.Hehad changed. She couldn’t risk her siblings’ freedom, should one of the Runners take an interest in the wild Wynchesters. There was no choice but to try.
