“Then you must tell me,” he said, a hint of laughter in his voice and in his eyes, “how I can be of service to you.”
Despite herself, she felt her lips curve. She wanted this, to revel in this moment without fear or shame. She wanted him.
She closed her eyes to the extreme foolishness of what she was doing and simply breathed him in, the scent of his soap, the flavor of his skin, as if she could store up enough sensations to last her for a lifetime.
His fingers stroked the hair by her temple, a tiny, tugging pleasure. His hand cupped her cheek. With his thumb, he traced the shape of her smile, rubbing lightly on her lower lip. Languor invaded her limbs, weighted her eyelids.
She was playing with fire. Inside, she was melting.
She would stop him. In a minute. Not yet.
She opened her mouth, tasting the rough, salty pad of his thumb.
He inhaled sharply.
The door at her back opened with a flood of cool air.
“Cobs. I knew I should have knocked,” a male voice proclaimed in disgust.
Aimée froze.
Lucien stepped back unhurriedly, adjusting the front of his robe. “It’s all right, Martin. You can come back later,” he said over her head.
He was sending his servant away.
For a moment she was glad.
She wanted Lucien to herself, wanted privacy and freedom to savor and explore. To slide her fingers under the silk of his robe. To touch his warm, hair-roughened chest. To gather up memories she could take out and treasure in the nights and years to come, like flowers pressed in the pages of a book.
Only for a moment, before her brain, which had turned to mush as a result of all the lovely melty things going on inside her, reasserted itself and the reality of their situation rushed in.
Finch. She had to think of Finch.
Howard.
Julia.
Aimée’s throat tightened. She really could not bear it if Lucien married Julia now.
She swallowed painfully and took a step back, away from temptation. “No. I will go.”
He raised one eyebrow. “You wanted to talk.”
“I need to speak with you alone, yes. But . . .”
“Martin was just leaving,” Lucien said, without taking his eyes from her. “Weren’t you, Martin?”
“If you say so, sir.”
Aimée glanced at Lucien’s valet, a slim, handsome youth with an expressionless face and dark, knowing eyes. She had no doubt the servant would make himself scarce if ordered to do so. And then what? Would he report in the kitchen on the goings-on upstairs?
What would happen then? Aimée’s reputation would be ruined. The chance to help Finch would be lost.
“No,” she said again, proud of the firmness of her voice. “I find I have miscalculated entirely the danger of being alone with a man in his bedchamber.”
Lucien frowned. “Then you can both stay.”
He truly did not understand. She shook her head.
“You can trust Martin,” he said. “Trust me.”
Did he realize how persuasive she found him? Almost she would agree to anything he suggested. It was very humiliating.
“Perhaps it is myself I do not trust,” she admitted.
Something shifted in his face, flared in his eyes. He took a step toward her. “Aimée.”
She felt a flutter of panic, a quiver of desire. She forced herself to gather her scattered thoughts and emotions, to form a plan. “Lady Basing has asked me to supervise the decorations for the house and ballroom.”
Lucien watched her carefully. “So?”
“So”—she exhaled—“tomorrow after breakfast I will go into the woods to collect what I need.”
It was considered bad luck to bring greenery into the house before Christmas Eve. But there were few flowers available in England in wintertime. She would need to store the boughs in the potting shed and bring them in to decorate the day before.
“You want me to find you in the woods.” Disbelief edged his voice.
In the cold, in the snow, where they could be private. Safe. Fully dressed.
She nodded. “There are a number of fine holly trees in the oak-wood beyond the orchard. Near the gamekeeper’s cottage,” she added, in case he needed further direction.
His gaze searched hers before he bowed curtly. “Until tomorrow, then.”
She moistened her lips. “Tomorrow.”
The word hung between them like a promise. She felt committed to far more than a mere meeting.
Which was pure spinster foolishness, concocted of nothing more than loneliness and imagination. Surely by tomorrow she would be herself again. She had too much sense—didn’t she?—to lose her head or her heart or her virtue to a man who was courting her cousin.
She met Lucien’s heavy-lidded gaze and flushed.
However much she might want to.
The door clicked shut behind her.
“It’s not like you to have a woman in your room,” Martin observed.
“I did not have her,” Lucien said.
Damn it all. He didn’t know whether to curse his luck or bless his escape. He must have lost his mind. He knew better than to take advantage of a gently bred virgin in his bedchamber, no matter how lovely or willing.
Aimée’s blue eyes, shining with trust and desire, seared his memory. You would never hurt me.
God.
If Martin had interrupted them only a few minutes later . . . Lucien broke into a cold sweat just thinking about what he had almost done.
What he’d lost the chance to do.
Martin snorted as he laid out scissors and gauze on the dressing table. “And I suppose you didn’t arrange to meet her for a little romp and tumble in the woods tomorrow, either. Let me see that hand.”
Lucien scowled. The skate blade had cut from the fleshy side of his palm to the knuckle of his little finger. Not deep, but painful. “A proper servant would pretend not to have heard that.”
Martin pressed a pad to the wound. “Likely so,” he agreed. “But a proper servant would be nagging for proper wages.”
Guilt and frustration roiled inside Lucien. He gritted his teeth. “You know I cannot afford to pay you now. If you prefer to return to Maiden Lane—”
“I’m not going back to that henhouse.” Martin wrapped the pad with gauze. “Anyways, you ain’t never abandoned us, and I’m not abandoning you. A gentleman needs a valet.”
“I’m not a real gentleman,” Lucien reminded him. As far as this world was concerned, he was the Earl of Amherst’s bastard.