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‘Your cousin is a very interesting gentleman.’
‘He is definitely a good one, I believe. I admire his moral certainty and his energy in righting his father’s wrongs. He has set himself a hard path, but I think, with luck, he will flourish in the New World.’
‘Are you sorry he had taken you up on your invitation?’ she asked. She had resolved not to mention it, not until they had both spent a night considering the matter.
‘I could have wished the poor devil almost anywhere else in the universe,’ Gray said, with an intensity at odds with the stillness of his body.
‘Then why are you over there?’
‘Because I am not going to tumble you in a carriage like some member of the muslin company.’ His hand clenched on his thigh. ‘And besides, there is a strong possibility you have thought better of it.’
‘You must think me very fickle, or indecisive.’ She wanted to reach out, touch that betraying fist, but that would be like cutting a cord under high tension—the recoil would send them into each other’s arms and Gray was right, the first time should not be hasty and furtive in a carriage. Even so... ‘I agree about not making love in a carriage—the first time.’
Gray looked at her directly at last. Even in the uncertain light of the carriage she could see the intensity of that regard and her body responded, softening, warming, aching. ‘The first time?’
‘It might be rather stimulating on some other occasion, don’t you think?’
‘I am trying very hard not to think about it at all,’ he said, the growl in his voice reverberating down her spine. ‘Now I doubt I will get any sleep tonight doing just that.’
Thank goodness. He still feels the same way.
She was not at all sure what she would have done if Gray had changed his mind. Dissolved into a puddle of lust on the carriage floor, probably. ‘I had never thought that misbehaving in London would be quite so difficult.’
Gray laughed and the tension became less charged, less dangerous. ‘It is if one party is encumbered with a chaperone and the other is attempting not to compromise her. If it were not for Miss Moseley we could lock ourselves away in your hotel room. If it were not for the risk of you being seen we could take a room for the day at any one of a number of obliging accommodation addresses.’
‘You seem to have considerable experience in arranging this kind of thing.’ It came out sounding sharper than she had intended. Jealous, even.
‘I have not been a monk since my wife died, if that is what you are asking.’ Gray kept his tone even and that deceptive smile was back. ‘But, no, I have never attempted to make a rendezvous in London.’
Gaby did not make the mistake of asking if he was keeping a mistress. No, surely not. Gray was not a man to make love to one woman while keeping another. ‘I beg your pardon, that was inquisitive.’
The smile disappeared, but he laughed again. She found she trusted his laughter more than his smiles. ‘And I parted company amiably with the lady who had been in my keeping two months before I left for Portugal, just in case you were biting your tongue over that question.’
‘I was curious,’ Gaby admitted. ‘Is she a beauty?’
‘Oh, ravishing. A green-eyed redhead.’ His hands moved, sketched curves in the air.
She suspected he was teasing her. And she more than suspected that she was becoming green-eyed herself. ‘Was she too expensive for you? Or had she a fiery temper?’
‘Neither. She was ambitious and had her eye set on a marquess. She lamented that he was balding and stout and that she had the poorest of expectations of his performance in the bedchamber, but what was a girl to do if she is determined on a duke one day?’
‘Goodness, that was a very frank conversation to have with a lover!’
‘Neither of us deceived ourselves that what we had was a meeting of hearts,’ Gray said.
Did he love his wife? Has he known what it is to lie with a lover whom one loves? Gaby wondered.
She had not loved Laurent, she knew now, somehow. But her feelings had been close to love. The loss of him had been an agony, but then the thought of not having known that attachment, that feeling of closeness, that was unbearable. And now she was becoming melancholy.
‘Will I enjoy Lady Altringworth’s soirée?’ she asked, giving herself a mental shake. ‘I have no experience of fashionable London entertainments.’
‘She is a good hostess.’ Gray seemed willing to accept the change of subject. ‘There will be music, intelligent conversation, cards if that is what you want—and excellent food. She is very much of the ton—expect to see only the most fashionable in society, although London is thin of company at this time of year, of course.’
‘Then I must indeed aim to be eccentric, for I have nothing that will pass muster as fashionable. Not yet. Is there a taste for that in London or will I simply succeed in embarrassing myself?’
‘Eccentricity with style and wit is always acceptable. I find myself looking forward to seeing what you create.’
The carriage halted. They were at the hotel, she realised.
