Hester sat on the bed and continued to drink in the sight of him as he used his tooth powder at the washbasin. “You aren’t telling me this is misguided, Tiberius.”
“I don’t need to tell you that, Hester. If you truly think this is misguided, you’ll cross the hallway to your own room.” His observation held logic, not arrogance; if anything, he was smiling slightly at the basin. “Is Fiona managing?”
“She was exhausted. She did not and does not comprehend the danger she was in.”
“She’ll be a mother someday.” He glanced at her over his shoulder as he dragged a brush through his hair. “Or an aunt. She’ll understand then. I’ve had wires sent to Balfour.”
He would think of that. And then he was stalking over to the bed, looking not competent and practical, but gorgeous, aroused, and heartrendingly dear. “I do not guarantee that I can protect you from conception tonight, Hester Daniels.”
“It doesn’t signify.”
He muttered something, which in Gaelic would have sounded very much like “I do,” but words were not of any interest to Hester when his mouth finally settled on hers. No matter he was not renewing his proposals, no matter she might never see him again; he was kissing her as if she were life and breath and sun all wrapped into one, as if his soul required it of him.
As if there were no tomorrow, which for them—as far as Hester was concerned—was the sad and unavoidable truth.
Hester was upset, seeking reassurances, and making a very great mistake. Tye’s duty was to kiss her forehead and steer her right out into the corridor, then shut and lock his door behind her.
This was the honorable course. His brain knew it, and even admonished him to follow such a course. His body was ignoring such pleas, and his heart had clapped its hands over its figurative ears.
She would not thank him in the morning for following the honorable course; she would look at him with big, bruised eyes and silently reproach him from memory for the rest of his blighted days. And if she wasn’t yet carrying his child, Tye could hope to effect such a miracle on what might otherwise be their last night together.
Duty and honor be damned, this was the woman he loved, the woman he was meant to go through life with, though she’d denied his every proposal.
Tye’s self-restraint in the past was nothing compared to the discipline he applied now. He laid Hester down on the enormous four-poster where he’d tossed and turned away the past week of nights, and came down over her. When he’d feasted for a time on her kisses, he worked his way south, treasuring her breasts, her soft, feminine belly, her sex.
She denied him nothing, not her kisses, not her sighs, not the sweet, secret female parts of her body. When he tucked her legs over his shoulders, he knew a passing regret that he hadn’t put a pair of his socks on her feet, the better to stroke his back with.
But only a passing regret. He deluged her with pleasure, showered her with it until he was certain she’d be sore for a week. And when at last he joined his body to hers, he vowed he’d wreak yet more pleasure upon her, so much pleasure that she would recall this night of loving for all her days.
He kept that vow, but when her body was convulsing around him, wringing the last drop of passion from their joining, Tye’s self-restraint collapsed, his good intentions disappeared, and he followed Hester into a pleasure as intense and as soul deep as it was bittersweet.
“This is my mother’s direction in Edinburgh. You should not need it, but I don’t like sending you off without even a maid.”
Hester’s lover from the previous night was nowhere to be found, except perhaps lurking in the green eyes of this serious, handsome man. “We’ll be fine, Tiberius. I’ve gotten quite used to traveling about by train.”
Fiona swung Hester’s hand. “I’ll be fine too. Will you say good-bye to Albert for me?”
“Of course, and let me stow this fellow for you.” Tye held up the carpetbag housing the rabbit. “You’ll have to watch that he isn’t nibbling through the fabric, Niece. A rabbit loose on Her Majesty’s rails will not do.” He stuffed the bag on the overhead rack, and the train whistle sounded a warning blast.
“I wish you were coming with us, Uncle, and Flying Rowan too.”
“I’ll write to you, Fiona, and I don’t want to hear about any cheating at cards either.” In the cramped confines of the compartment, he went down on his haunches and hugged the child tightly. “You are my favorite niece. Never forget it.”
“I’m your only niece.”
And again, for the hundredth time in twenty-four hours, Hester’s heart broke, this time simply from seeing Fiona share her favorite-niece joke with Tiberius, proof positive the man was secure in the child’s love and affection.
“Aunt.” Fiona tugged on Hester’s skirts, forcing her down into what was nearly a huddle with the child and the earl. “You must tell Uncle you love him and you will miss him.”
She’d spoken in Gaelic. With childish good intentions, she’d driven spikes into Hester’s composure and into her heart. Hester managed an answer only haltingly, and not because she stumbled over the Gaelic.
“I will miss him badly, but it’s like with the fox, Fiona. Spathfoy needs to be with his family, and they need him. They need him desperately.”
“We’re his family.”
Hester could only nod and rise to her feet, feeling older than Aunt Ree on a wet, chilly night. Spathfoy took her hand in his without even sparing a glance at the passage beyond the open door.
“You will write to me if there’s need?”
Another nod, while a lump as wide as the Highlands formed in her throat. The damned man kissed her forehead, and when he would have stepped back, Hester held on to him. “Tiberius, I am sorry.”
The train whistle blasted twice, and the look he gave her was torn. “I cannot fathom what you’d be apologizing for. Please get word to me when you’ve arrived safely in Ballater. I want a wire, Hester, not some damnable polite letter arriving after Michaelmas.”
“Uncle said a bad word.”
He tweaked Fiona’s braid. “I’m expressing strong feelings, probably not for the last time.” Then he swung his gaze back to Hester. “My dear, I must leave you now. There are things I must resolve with my father and my sisters before I am otherwise free. You will send word?”
He was harping on this. Hester finally realized he was concerned that she was with child. “I will send word if there’s need. Good-bye, Tiberius. Read your brother’s will.” The words had slipped out. She might send a wire, a few sentences of platitudes, but this admonition she’d give him in person.
The train whistle sounded three times, and on the platform, the conductor was bellowing the “all aboard.”
“Good-bye, Uncle. I won’t cheat. I love you!”
“I love you too, Fiona. Safe journey.”
A swift, hard kiss to Hester’s lips, and then he was gone. Hester took the backward-facing seat as the train began to move, the better to stare at Tiberius’s tall, still figure growing smaller and smaller, until a bend in the tracks took him entirely from her sight.
“But when are we going to get there?” Fiona’s question had long since taken on the singsong quality of a child determined to pluck the last adult nerve within hearing and pluck it hard.
They’d made the transfer smoothly enough in Edinburgh, but now, not twenty miles north of the city, the train had stopped dead on the tracks.
And not moved for an hour.
“I do not know when we’ll make Aberdeen, Fiona. Would you like to play another game of matches?”
“No. It’s too hard to spread out all the cards in this stupid train.”
“Shall we walk beside the tracks for a moment?”
