Once Upon a Tartan

“Of course I want children.” Her reply held not a hint of banter. “Every woman is raised to want a family and a home of her own, and I’m no different, except my parents’ union was not happy. My sister is so much more vivacious than I am, so much prettier—she’s tall, you know—I accept that I might have to settle for being a doting aunt.”

“Your sister could not be any more attractive than you are, Hester Daniels.” He hadn’t meant it to sound like a scold, but he’d seen Miss Eugenia Daniels in more than one ballroom. “There’s a difference between pretty and attractive.”

“That is the oddest compliment, but I think you mean it.”

He didn’t exactly kiss her breast, but he opened his mouth against her skin and breathed in the fragrance of her. “Pretty fades in time, and women who rely on their looks alone can all too easily become pathetic, like a man who relies exclusively on his title. You have bottom and sense.”

“Now if only I were seventeen two hands and broke to the bridle, hmm?”

Bottom and sense were to Tye high praise, but it struck him as he nuzzled her breast that Hester Daniels also had a bruised, if not broken, heart. He lifted his head and rolled to his back. “Come here, Hester. If we’re to indulge in the equestrian analogies—which I do not encourage, mind you—then you can mount up.”

She regarded him curiously in the dim light but obliged him, straddling his hips and curling down onto his chest.

He undertook to organize her hair. “Why should you have to settle for being a doting aunt? Why not marry?”

Why not marry me? Except winning the argument in the general case before he put a specific opportunity before her seemed the more sensible course.

She was quiet so long, Tye thought she might have fallen asleep. “I was not… I did not exercise good sense when Jasper proposed to me. I let him conduct a hasty, quiet courtship, allude to an agreement with my father, and impose himself upon me, all without protest on my part. Marriage is designed to make women stupid. We are supposed to be willing to do anything to gain that prize. I see this now.”

For God’s sake, it was exactly the argument his sisters made, frequently and at great volume. They insisted on the right to choose, said the church itself did not countenance women being forced to marry, and flounced off to the next house party completely oblivious to the marquess’s draconian views on the matter.

“But you want children, Hester, and I think you would make a fine mother.”

She cuddled closer and pressed her nose against his throat. “This is a very peculiar discussion to have with you, Tiberius. I did not realize you would excel at prying confidences from me.”

Nor had that been his objective, but another part of him wanted to hear her confidences. “I didn’t discuss Gordie with anybody until I came up here.”

“And then Fee got to you, didn’t she?” Hester shifted on him, letting him have more of her weight. “She no doubt had you maundering on about your late brother, and you all unsuspecting. She’s gotten to me too, and this is the reason why I will eventually waver on the idea of marriage. I love that child. I would die to protect her, and if we discount last summer, I’ve known her only a handful of weeks. She is that dear.”

“Die to protect her?”

“You would too.” She sounded sleepy but sure of her point.

He didn’t argue—a gentleman never argued with a lady—though marrying Hester hardly equated to offering his life for his niece. Instead of arguing, he stroked his hand over the warm, delicate planes of the lady’s back, tracing her bones and muscles, learning her geography by touch.

When he realized he’d let the silence stretch for some minutes, he offered another point for her consideration: “Your husband would give you children, Hester.” A high card, he hoped. “He’d provide for you and those children, keep you safe and comfortable all your days.”

She said nothing. While her breathing evened out and she became a warm, trusting weight on his body, Tye reveled in the chance to explore her. He could reach the delectable curves of her derriere, trace the knobs and bumps of her spine, turn his nose and catch the flowery fragrance of her hair.

He fell asleep trying to find the right words to ask her—ask her in all seriousness—if she might consider marriage, were he to be the one providing her those children.

* * *

Hester awoke feeling safe, warm, and happy. The contentment was a bone-deep bodily awareness, spectacular in its pervasiveness.

“Not only do you have sense and bottom”—a large, warm hand squeezed Hester’s fundament—“but you excel at the marital art of sharing a bed. Good morning.”

Tiberius Flynn, the Earl of Spathfoy, was wrapped around her in all his naked glory. In all of their naked glory. What did one say under such circumstances?

“Good morning, my lord.”

“Miss Daniels.”

She did not dare turn over to peer at him. “Are you laughing at me, Spathfoy?”

“I am cuddling with you, much to my surprise—and delight, of course.”

His voice sounded convincingly serious. Hester peeked over her shoulder and found his green eyes were dancing with suppressed mischief.

“Dratted man.” Wonderful man. Wonderful, warm man, holding her close and making her day start with such a sense of well-being. “The rain has stopped.”

“Ah, the weather. How it gratifies me to know my lovemaking, or perhaps my mere presence in your bed, reduces you to platitudes. And here I took you for the daring sort.”

“You are so naughty. Teach me another word if you don’t want to discuss the weather.”

That shut him up. It chased him from the bed in fact, which was a pity. Hester heard him cross the room, then heard a stream hit the bottom of the chamber pot behind the privacy screen.

She blushed. She listened, and she blushed. When Spathfoy came back to the bed, she caught a minty whiff of tooth powder.

“Will you marry me, Hester Daniels?” He spooned himself around her, making the entire mattress bounce in the process. “I’ve never spent the night with a woman before. I find it rather agrees with me.”

“You have an untapped capacity for the ridiculous, Spathfoy.” Now she got out of the bed, having to struggle a bit to escape his hold. She grabbed the first piece of clothing she could find—his dressing gown—and wiggled into it before leaving the bed. She didn’t need to use the chamber pot, thank a merciful God, but she did avail herself of the tooth powder.

He’d appropriated her toothbrush. Hester set the thing back into the cup that held it and stared.

This was intimacy, to share a toothbrush, to wake together. Last night had been intimate too, but it wasn’t the sexual thrill Hester would miss when Spathfoy departed.

She would miss him—cozy and casual in the morning, laughing with her in the bed, whispering unpronounceable naughty words into her ear, and running his hand over her backside in the most proprietary fashion as she fell asleep on his chest.

Intimacy with him was wonderful, thrilling, and precious at once. She very much feared this combination of feelings was what vapid young ladies alluded to when they said they were smitten with a man.

In love with him.

She felt an abrupt urge to cry, ignored it, and twisted her hair into a thick braid instead.

“What are you doing back there?” Spathfoy’s voice floated from the direction of the bed. “I propose marriage, and you must see to your toilette?”

“Stop teasing me, Spathfoy.” She emerged from the privacy screen while tying a ribbon around the end of her braid. “You used my tooth powder.”

“Come here, and I shall kiss you, then you’ll appreciate my larceny. I could have done that for you.”

He was regarding her braid narrowly. Hester stopped her advance before she got within range of his long arms. “Why aren’t you leaping up, wishing me good day, and scampering off to your own quarters? The sun will soon be up, Spathfoy.”

He looked amused, and perhaps he had cause. His dressing gown hung nearly to the floor on her, swallowing her up in its vast, comfortable folds. Then she realized he was peering at her socks, the only article of clothing to survive the night’s festivities in a proper location.