that danger to a household with small children. Second, Wilton’s guilt is not something you want to see objectively, my lord, and nobody can blame you for trying to think the best of your father. Third, both in my considerable person and in the bachelor nature of my household, I have more strong arms and hard heads with which to protect the lady.”
“That is logical, Trent,” Darius said. “Wilton makes a bitter enemy, as I well know. You and I can’t afford to antagonize him, and Reston can. I don’t like it”—Darius turned his gaze to Nick—“but I like even less what would have happened to my sister had you not been with her this afternoon. Then too, from my perspective, Hellerington is sniffing around Leah’s skirts because Wilton encouraged it, and to that extent, Wilton is complicit in this mischief if Hellerington is behind it.”
“What do you mean ‘if’?” Nick pressed.
Darius shrugged. “Frommer’s family might have gotten word Leah was to make a match, and taken steps to obstruct it. Wilton might have made an enemy who seeks to take from him his most salable asset and make him look like the miserable excuse for a father he is. Leah might have offended somebody who thought to set her cap for you, Reston. Desperate women are a force to be reckoned with, occasionally a deadly force.”
There was a bleak sort of knowledge in Darius’s dark eyes, and Nick studied the man for some moments in silence.
Nick recalled Leah’s comment that younger sons as a breed tended to shrewdness. “I will pass these thoughts on to my investigator. You make sense, Lindsey, though I wish you didn’t.”
Darius drew Leah against him, pressing his lips to her hair and closing his eyes. “If anything had happened to you, Leah, I don’t know how I would have gone on. You’ll stay with Reston? He’ll have Lady Warne here in no time, I’m guessing, and it won’t be forever.”
Leah’s gaze shot to Nick, who nodded once.
“I will stay here,” Leah said, “with Nick and Lady Warne.”
“So what do we tell Wilton?” Darius asked, turning Leah loose.
“I sent him a note,” Nick said, “telling him Leah had run into Lady Della in the park and would be taking a late tea with her.”
The look Amherst gave him was not exactly friendly. “Believable,” Amherst said, “so why not throw Wilton off the scent further by sending another note saying she’s with me, visiting the children for a day or two?”
“That will serve,” Nick agreed, though he could see matters were moving too quickly from Leah’s perspective. He was not kidnapping her. He was keeping her safe. “Leah, can you live with this plan?” Asking her if she
“I can live with it,” Leah said, “but then what? I can’t hide here forever.”
“Let’s deal with this one day at a time,” Nick suggested. “We are all tired, upset, and flustered. Gentlemen, can I offer you sustenance?”
“I think not,” Amherst said. “I’ve seen with my own eyes that Leah is safe, and we’ve made interim arrangements. If Leah might be visiting me later in the week, I’d best return to home and hearth, and I will want to have a word with my staff as well.”
“I’ll take my leave too,” Darius said, “and go about my usual haunts this evening. There’s always talk, and I can listen for it in a few low places that might yield some useful information.”
After Leah’s brothers had hugged her tightly, Nick walked them to the front door, though leaving his intended alone for even those few minutes flayed his nerves.
“No brooding,” Nick chided when he returned to the library. He sat beside her and laid an arm across her shoulders. “Talk to me, lovey. Tell me what’s on your mind.”
“I am upset,” Leah said, getting up to pace. “I am not keen on being alone, but I don’t want anybody to hover. I feel angry, but also tainted, and I am tired, Nicholas—tired to my
“And then there’s me,” Nick added, sensing the direction of her ire. “I want to marry you, but only by half measures.”
She crossed her arms over her chest. “I know you mean well, you mean to give me refuge from what my life has become, but it doesn’t feel like that, Nick. I wish it did, but it doesn’t.”
He wished it did too, but the only thing he knew to do—take her in his arms and kiss her witless—was a direct road to disaster.
“I will order you a bath,” Nick decided, rising, “and send you up a tray, from which, Leah Lindsey, you will eat something. Valentine will be here soon, and he will play you lullabies before I send him elsewhere, and when I’ve set a few more things in motion, you and I will talk.”
He waited for her to protest, but she dropped her arms. “A soaking bath would be appreciated.”
“If you want me, you need only ring, or just yell. I’m not going out again tonight.”
He gave her another up-and-down look, assessing and weighing what he saw. “Come. I’ll take you to your room and show you where Lady Della will be staying.”
And he did, ensconcing her in a lovely, airy guest room, right across the hall from Lady Della’s quarters—and around a corner from Nick’s suite.
“Anybody seeking to travel the corridor you and Della are in has to pass my room. Your bath should be here in a few minutes. Turn around.”
“Please turn around,” Nick said. “I have one very matronly housekeeper, Leah, who has retired for the day, and a cook who has likely nodded off over her sherry. I seek to unhook your gown, and then I will take my leave of you.”
He did his best to look entirely sincere, maybe even a trifle testy. She turned around and bowed her head, offering him her nape.
The pose was erotic, at least in the estimation of certain parts of Nick’s anatomy. He gave himself about two seconds to envision kissing her nape, and in those two seconds he caught the floral scent of her.
He’d never unhooked a gown quite so quickly. While he was in the neighborhood, he made short work of her stays then stepped away.
“There’s a vanity behind the privacy screen,” he said, “and you can change there while the water is brought in. You’ll find some things of Della’s hanging on the hooks, and the maids will leave you towels and soap.” He regarded her closely, fisting his hands to keep from touching her. “You’ll be all right?”
She nodded, looking to him forlorn, bruised, and much in need of tenderness rather than solitude.
“Then I’ll leave you for now,” he said. “Soak until you pickle, and I’ll come back later for further discussion.”
Nick left, and Leah felt his absence keenly. Nicholas Haddonfield, she realized as she finished undressing, was a toucher. He gathered information with his hands, with the embrace of his body, with his skin and his nose and his senses. He conveyed it too, conveyed caring and competence, and without his presence, Leah felt every raw edge on every nerve and emotion.
Climbing into the steaming, fragrant water helped settle her though, at least enough that she could consider her situation. Nick was coming back to her room to finish the discussion Darius and Trent had interrupted in the library. She had yet to accept Nick’s proposal, and watchdog that he was, he would not rest until she had.
She scrubbed herself from head to foot, then scrubbed herself again. The day’s memories would not wash away, but bathing helped put them at a slight distance. Then too, Nick’s tub was nigh large enough to swim in and shaped to encourage a lady to repose at her bath, and even to close her eyes.
“Lovey.” Leah heard a sound like a chair scraping. “Leah? Sweetheart? Lamb?”
She opened her eyes to find Nicholas Haddonfield looking large and concerned from his perch on a stool by the tub. His sleeves were rolled up, suggesting he’d been sitting there for more than a moment.
“I fell asleep,” she murmured—inane comment. She had sense enough not to sit up, but realized the water and the fading bubbles provided her only so much camouflage.
Nick smiled at her with only a hint of innuendo in his expression. “As long as I’m here, shall we wash your hair? I promise not to peek, and your bubbles hide the best parts anyway.”
