bliss, her senses lit with white-hot fire.
A long time later, after the bath had cooled, Lottie dressed in a fresh white nightgown and approached the bedroom table, where Nick was standing. She felt herself color as he stared at her with a half-smile. 'I like the way you look in this,' he said, brushing his fingers over the high-necked bodice of the gown. 'Very innocent.'
'Not any longer,' Lottie said with an abashed smile.
He lifted her against his body, his face rubbing into the cool dampness of her hair. His beguiling mouth found her neck. 'Oh, yes, you are,' he said. 'It's going to require a great deal of time and effort to debauch you completely.'
'I have every faith you'll succeed,' she said, and sat before a plate loaded with ham, vegetable pudding, potatoes, and open-faced tarts.
'To our marriage,' Nick said, pouring a glass of wine for her. 'May it continue in a better vein than it started.'
They raised their glasses and clinked the crystal gently. Lottie sipped cautiously, discovering a rich, spicy flavor that balanced the saltiness of the ham.
Setting his glass aside, Nick took her hand in his and regarded her bare fingers thoughtfully. 'You have no ring. I'm going to remedy that tomorrow.'
Lottie experienced a shameful spark of interest in the idea. She had never owned a piece of jewelry. However, it had been drilled into her at Maidstone's that a lady should avoid the appearance of acquisitiveness. She managed to adopt an impassive expression that would have pleased her former teachers excessively. 'It isn't necessary,' she said. 'Many married women do not wear rings.'
'I want anyone who looks at you to know that you're taken.'
Lottie gave him a brilliant smile. 'If you insist, I suppose I can't stop you.'
He grinned at her obvious eagerness. His thumb brushed over the fine points of her knuckles. 'What kind of stone would you like?'
'A sapphire?' she suggested hopefully.
'A sapphire it is.' He kept her hand as they talked, absently toying with the tips of her fingers and the close- trimmed crescents of her nails. 'I suspect you'll want to see your family soon.'
Lottie's attention was immediately diverted from the subject of the ring. 'Yes, please. I fear that Lord Radnor may have already told my parents about what I've done. And I don't want them to worry that they'll be left destitute now that I have married someone else.'
'There is no need to look so guilty,' Nick said, tracing the thin veins inside of her wrist. 'You had no part in making the bargain-it wasn't your fault that you didn't wish to uphold it.'
'But I benefitted from it,' Lottie pointed out reluctantly. 'All those years at Maidstone's...my education cost a great deal. And now Lord Radnor has nothing in return.'
He arched a dark brow. 'If your point is that Radnor has been ill used-'
'No, it's not that, precisely. It's just...well, I didn't do the honorable thing.'
'Yes, no doubt you should have fallen on the sword for the rest of the family,' he said sardonically. 'But your parents will be just as well served this way. I couldn't possibly be a worse son-in-law than Radnor.'
'You are certainly preferable as a husband,' she said.
He smiled at that, lifting her fingers to his mouth. 'You would preferanyone to Radnor as a husband-you've made that quite clear.'
Lottie smiled, thinking privately that in marrying Nick, she had ended up with a far different husband than she had expected. 'What will you do tomorrow?' she asked, remembering their earlier confrontation with Sir Ross. She was certain that Nick would not relinquish his position at Bow Street without objection.
Releasing her hand, Nick frowned. 'I'm going to visit Morgan.'
'Do you think that he will take your side against Sir Ross's?'
'Not a chance in hell. But I'll at least have the satisfaction of telling Morgan what a damned rotten traitor he is.'
Lottie leaned forward to touch the lapel of his robe. 'Have you considered the possibility that they both are doing what they think is best for you? That it might be in your own interests to reclaim the title?'
'How could it be? My God, I'll be living in a gilded cage.'
'I'll be there with you.'
He stared at her, seemingly arrested by the words. He looked at her so intensely, for so long, that Lottie was finally moved to ask, 'What? What are you thinking?'
Nick smiled without humor. 'I was just reflecting on how much better prepared you are for my life than I am.'
Although Lottie had tentatively invited him to stay the night with her, Nick left after supper, retreating to the guest room a few doors away.
I'll be there with you.Her words had affected Nick curiously, just as her casual remarks at the wishing well had. She possessed a terrible knack of unraveling him with a simple phrase...words so commonplace, and yet invested with significance.
He didn't know what to make of Lottie. Despite the way he had deceived her initially, she seemed fully prepared to act as his partner. She responded to him with passion and generosity, and in her arms he had been able to forget the secrets that had haunted him for fourteen years. He craved more of that sweet oblivion. The past few hours had been extraordinarily different from what he had experienced with Gemma. When he made love to Lottie, his lust was enmeshed with a deep tenderness that made his physical responses unbearably acute.
She kept reaching through his defenses without even seeming to know what she was doing, and he could not allow anyone that kind of intimacy. At this rate, it was only a matter of time before Lottie discovered the demons that lurked inside him. And if that happened, she would withdraw from him in horror. He had to keep a certain distance between them, otherwise she would eventually come to regard him with disgust. Or pity. The thought made his skin crawl.
He had to maintain his detachment, while even now he longed to go back to her. In all his twenty-eight years, he had never felt this painful need for someone. Just to be in the same room with her.
My God,he thought with dull horror, going to the window and staring blindly into the night.What is happening to me?
Sir Grant Morgan looked up from his desk as Nick burst into his office before morning sessions. There was no trace of apology in his hard green eyes. 'I see you've spoken to Sir Ross,' he said.
Nick proceeded to give vent to his outrage in the coarsest words ever conceived in the history of the English language, leveling accusations that would have caused any other man either to cower in terror or to reach for the nearest pistol. Morgan, however, listened as calmly as if Nick were offering a description of the weather.
After an extensive rant speculating on the likelihood that Morgan was nothing but a puppet while Sir Ross pulled the strings, the chief magistrate sighed and interrupted.
'Enough,' he said shortly. 'You're beginning to repeat yourself. Unless you have anything new to add, you may as well spare yourself the breath. As to your last charge-that this situation is all of Sir Ross's making-I can assure you that the decision to remove you from the force was fully as much mine as his.'
Until that moment, Nick had never realized that Morgan's opinion was so important to him. But he experienced a genuine stab of pain, a killing sense of betrayal and failure. 'Why?' he heard himself ask hoarsely. 'Was my performance so unsatisfactory? What more could I have done? I solved every case and caught almost every man you sent me after-and I did it by the rules, the way you wanted. I did everything you asked. More, even.'
'There has never been a problem with your performance,' Morgan said quietly. 'You've discharged your duties as ably as anyone could have. I've never seen any man match you for bravery or wits.'
'Then back me against Sir Ross,' Nick said roughly. 'Tell him to shove that writ of summons up his arse-that you need me at Bow Street.'
Their gazes clashed and held, and then something in Morgan's face changed. Damned if he didn't look almost fatherly, Nick thought with sullen fury, despite the fact that Morgan was only about ten years older than he.
'Have a seat,' Morgan said.
'No, I don't-'
'Please.' The invitation was uttered with steely politeness.
