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‘What are your plans for tomorrow?’ she asked. ‘Please, feel free to rise at any time that suits you. If you could look in at the kitchen on your way past as you leave this evening and tell them when you would like hot water brought over and breakfast prepared, that would be helpful for the staff.’
Gray wrenched his thoughts away from speculation about how her skin would taste. Plans? Was there any point in staying here other than to torture himself? Gabrielle’s answer to his godmother’s demand that she travel to England was clear enough and he couldn’t blame any woman with a choice in the matter for not wanting to marry George.
On the other hand he had promised to try. A good night’s sleep might present him with an idea and more time might show him a lever to use against that strong will of hers. After all, she did not have to marry George: London was full of eligible young men whom any sensible lady would be happy to marry. After such plain speaking, surely even his godmother would realise that a match with her stepson was a lost cause and would focus her attention on finding her niece an acceptable partner.
Gabrielle was attractive. She had a flourishing vineyard and port business as a dowry. Her connections were good and no one needed know about the lover unless she had an inconvenient conscience and decided to confess. She could make a highly respectable match if she would only control her devastating frankness. He should make some effort to persuade her, he told himself. She might be set against marriage now but, surely, all it would take would be to find the right man.
As a gentleman he could not, with a clear conscience, leave her alone out here even though she showed every sign of being completely in control of her world. As a gentleman, he reminded himself, he should not be thinking about her in the way he was.
Gabrielle cleared her throat and he recalled that she had asked him a question. ‘Plans? I would like to see your vineyards, if that is possible. Learn a little about the production of this elixir.’ He toasted her with a lift of his glass and she inclined her head in acknowledgement. The curl slid across the swell of her breast, and another, he was certain, was about to slip free. Breathe. ‘And this is far better than anything I have. You are right, I should see about adding some to my cellar. I will rely on your advice.’
Gabrielle did not seem too disturbed by his intention to stay a few more days. Perhaps the opportunity to sell him an expensive cellarful of wine counterbalanced the irritation his presence caused her. Perhaps she had failed to notice that he was fighting arousal with all of his willpower. Probably every man she came into contact with simply seethed with desire around her and she ignored them all.
‘Stay, then,’ she said, her voice indifferent, holding neither confusion over that...moment just a few minutes before, nor resentment over an uninvited guest. If she had noticed that his breathing was tightly controlled, then apparently it did not disconcert her in the slightest.
‘I will be taking a boat down to Porto in a few days’ time on business. You could come with me,’ she suggested. ‘I can recommend places to stay until you find a ship to give you passage home, which will not be difficult.’
‘Thank you. That would suit me very well.’ Possibly by tomorrow he would have recovered the use of his brain and could produce some arguments for her returning with him.
‘I am sorry you have had a wasted journey,’ she said as he put down the glass and got to his feet.
‘It is not over yet. Who is to say whether it will be wasted or not? Goodnight, Miss Frost.’
Chapter Four
‘Goodnight.’ Gaby looked at the closing door, then down at the dregs of her port, then back at the door. Neither glass nor wooden panels gave her any insight into why she had made that idiotic suggestion. What was she thinking of, giving Gray the opening to stay for five more days? And then to commit to his company for a day on the river and perhaps another day in Porto was madness.
He was a threat. Not that she believed for a moment that he would succeed in persuading her to go to England against her better judgement. But that was hardly the problem, was it? The problem was that she found herself strongly attracted to him and, it seemed, that feeling was reciprocated. He hid it well because he was a sophisticated, experienced man, but she had recognised the signs. It was merely a physical attraction, obviously, but even so...
She found she was on her feet and pacing. It was really insufferably hot indoors. No, she was insufferably hot. It was a long time since she had lain with a man and, apparently, the hard, distracting work was no longer enough to keep any yearnings at bay.
Gaby rehearsed a string of the riper Portuguese oaths that she had heard at the height of the harvest when everyone was hot, tired and at the end of their tether. They did not help. Why couldn’t she desire one of the numerous charming gentlemen who came her way both in local society and among the English and Scottish merchants and shippers in Porto?
There were enough of them, for goodness’ sake. Intelligent men, handsome men, amusing men. Men she could probably marry if she got to know them better, if marriage was not such an impossible trap. Marry and she lost control of everything, became a chattel of her husband’s, surrendered Frost’s totally to his mercies.
It was cooler out on the terrace with the breeze from the river rustling the creepers on the walls of the house. She closed the double glass doors behind her and walked up and down, smelling the night-perfumed flowers, watching the bats harrying the moths, willing her nerves to calm.
It was time to move on. She had sensed that for a few months now in the restlessness of her body, the way the sharpness of grief had mellowed somehow into sadness and regret. Betrayal was no longer the word if she found another man to...love? No, desire. She had been close to loving Laurent and perhaps, if they had had longer together, then their feelings would have become even deeper, more intense, but she thought not.
If I did find a man I could like and we had a child, but without marrying...
Gaby stopped dead in her tracks. That had never occurred to her as a solution. What was the Portuguese legal position on illegitimate children inheriting? Possibly it was the same as in England and they would have no claims by right, but she could will her property to whomever she wished if she was not married, she was sure of that.
Why hadn’t she thought of it before? It would take a great deal of working out, of course. Gaby paced
more slowly. The position of a child born out of wedlock in this conservative country would be at least as difficult as in England, if not worse. She would have to seem to be married and yet without the legal burden of a husband controlling everything. A widow, in fact.
Now, how—short of marriage and murder—did one achieve that?
* * *
‘O senhor está fora,’ Baltasar informed her as he brought in her breakfast.
‘He is outside? Since when?’
‘He has been there since early. He asked for his hot water and his breakfast for six o’clock and he was already awake when Danilo took them over. I think he has been walking. Now he is sitting on the dock, watching the river.’ Baltasar rolled his eyes. ‘I do not understand these English gentlemen. He is a lord. He does not have to rise so early. He has no work to do. Why does he not sleep?’
‘I think he is a restless man, if he has nothing to occupy him,’ Gaby suggested. ‘He is a man used to action, to having a purpose.’ And that purpose, that sense of duty, however misguided, had driven him here. He had failed in his mission and now he had an enforced holiday.
