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Stephen lowered his head so close his words stirred the hair at her temples. “The idea of being...intimate with you, Lady Partington is the very antithesis of distasteful.” He seemed to relish the words. “If that is what you were suggesting?”
She could not break the lengthening silence.
He was giving her the opportunity to retract her proposition while making clear he liked the idea.
Fire and brimstone, thought Sybil, feeling consumed by it as she closed her eyes, while at the same time the heady thrum of need and want pulsed through her. What did she have to lose? Nothing, surely? And everything to gain...if she only had the courage to follow through.
She opened her eyes when Stephen cleared his throat. She was conscious of the warmth emanating from him. The scent of bergamot and horses assailed her nostrils; a pleasant, manly scent she recognized with a rush of familiarity from the occasion he comforted her over Lizzy Hazlitt’s mare.
He showed no trace of embarrassment and seemed only to want to clarify the matter. “So if your hopes for entering into this unusual coupling are realized, have you thought how you might explain an apparently immaculate conception to your husband?” He seemed amused as well as concerned.
Sybil shook her head and avoided his eye, suddenly wishing she could turn the clock back. How could she have been so bold? Nevertheless, she said truthfully, “I believe Humphry would prefer anything rather than hand the reins to Edgar.” She smiled grimly. “Anything, that
is, except do his duty with me.”
She’d barely finished before Stephen had both her hands in one of his large ones and the other clasped round her waist. Highly irregular yet the most exciting compromising situation she’d ever been in.
“I can see you wavering, Lady Partington, so am spurred on to encourage you not to lose heart. I believe it is an excellent idea, and I accept with the greatest delight—on one condition.” He was smiling and she saw the excited anticipation swirling in the depths of his warm gray eyes.
Her heart thumped even harder as she wondered why she didn’t cast everything to the wind and simply take to her heels like a coward. Instead she whispered, “What is your condition?” as his face filled her vision and she was conscious of his gently curved lips drawing nearer.
“That you regard this...solution...as more than just a conscious act of duty.”
A tremor ran through her as she closed her eyes, relishing the light caress of his hand over her hair. Her body tingled with expectation; so that she could fully pledge her commitment when he added, brushing her lips with his fingertips, “And that you respond to me accordingly.”
Chapter Seven
Stephen followed her into her bedchamber before she could change her mind. She was sweet and shy and his desire was raging. Lady Partington was no innocent debutante playing coquetry with no real knowledge of the consequences. He’d had plenty of those. They were diverting cameos played out in a public place and while he enjoyed flirtation, this was the real thing. His breathing was labored, his erection painful.
In front of him, the hesitancy in Lady Partington’s step suggested she was reconsidering but Stephen guided her forward with one hand on her bottom.
At the door, she turned. She looked so desperately concerned when she stammered, “I don’t make a habit of inviting young men into my boudoir,” that he nearly laughed.
Instead he simply smiled and touched his lips to her brow. “If I thought you did, Lady Partington, I wouldn’t be as excited as I am.” He closed the door behind them then led her gently but firmly toward the four-poster. “Now unless you’ve changed your mind about providing a solution that will make your husband and ultimately both your daughters happy, let us proceed.”
Her maid had already prepared her for sleep and a candle on a low table added to the glow of the one she held.
He was conscious of his voice, intimate and full of promise—and hopefully of reassurance—when he murmured, “It sounds like you’ve had a lonely time of it in this room. Unlikely we’ll be disturbed, eh?”
He was glad she kept her head held high rather than slumping from the inference of her husband’s lack of interest.
With brittle pride, she said, “Humphry has visited me less than half a dozen times in this room during twenty years of marriage. No, we will not be disturbed.”
She blew out one candle, stared at him, then seemed to banish all indecision. Nothing in her gestures now suggested this was anything other than a purely practical solution to the collective family’s problems.
“Please turn your back, Stephen. Oh!”
She had obviously not expected to find him standing so close. Or to be taken in his arms. He was disappointed she didn’t go limpid but he did manage to chase some of the steel from her spine as he gently massaged the nape of her neck. Still, he wanted her to throw herself into the pleasure of it. This would be no fun at all if he was unable to bring her to rapture at his touch.
“No, don’t blow out the other candle,” he protested mildly, arresting her hand, which he placed on his heart. “Do you feel it racing?” He’d thought to place it on his cock to reassure her that he certainly found her desirable, however he feared she might find that too confronting.
“But, I—”
He removed the candlestick from her grasp and set it down on the table. He could see she was shivering uncontrollably when he slipped his hands beneath the silk of her shawl to hold her.
The mattress dipped under his weight as he drew her onto his lap.
“Put your arms around me,” he instructed softly, holding her head against the hollow of his neck. “Now,” he murmured, “you didn’t answer my question.” Again, he took one of her hands and rested it against his heart. “Do you feel how fast it beats?”
