Having managed to unlace her gown, Joseph slipped it off her shoulders and down to pool at her feet. “You sound worried, my love,” he murmured against her throat. He placed damp little kisses beneath her chin while his hands skimmed her diaphanous chemise, working the hem up ever higher.
“Our Rose is stubborn,” she breathed, her blood racing while her practiced fingers unlaced his breeches. She pulled away long enough to tug his shirt off over his head, sighing as she ran her palms down his chest, hard and muscled from countless hours spent in his gardens.
He whisked off her chemise and stepped out of his breeches, and they fell together onto their bed, blissfully skin to skin. She wiggled closer, and he smoothed a hand over one bare hip. A heated tremor rippled through her as he met her mouth for a long, hot kiss.
She would never tire of this—never. Of course, she and Joseph were only forty-five and forty-six, not yet old and gray, but she planned on lying with him until her bones creaked—and then some.
Drawing back, he skimmed one long brown curl off her face. “What will you do next to push Rose and Kit together?”
“Nothing.” The fire on the hearth threw his face into shadows and radiated heat onto their naked skin. She traced his beloved mouth with a finger. “I’ve done what I can. The rest is up to them. But with any luck, we’ll have another wedding night before too very long.”
“Ah, Chrysanthemum.” He claimed her lips once again while his hands went to work below, making her head spin with delight. “You know we’ve no need of a wedding to have a wedding night.”
SIXTY
JUDITH’S wedding celebration had lasted through the wee hours, and Rose had stayed till the end. The sun was high in the sky by the time she awakened the next day, hearing strange noises beneath her window.
Bangs and scrapes and shouts.
Construction.
Kit.
She rang for her maid. “Hurry,” she said when Harriet arrived. “The purple gown—no, the burgundy brocade.” The maid pulled it from the wardrobe and helped her wiggle into it. “Hurry.”
“I’m going as fast as I can, milady.” She laced Rose up the back.
“Tighter.” Rose wanted to look her best.
Harriet pushed her onto a chair and began combing through her tangled curls. “Whyever are you in such a rush?”
Rose gulped down some chocolate and nibbled on some bread. “I’d forgotten that today is the groundbreaking.”
“I see.” The maid twisted up the back of her hair. “I expect you’re more interested in the builder than the building, hmm?”
Rose didn’t care for the sound of that hmm. “Mr. Martyn is just a friend. After the lunacy of court life, I simply crave a sane conversation.” Kit had always been easy to talk to.
Harriet met her gaze in the mirror. “Hmm,” she said again.
“How is your love life?” Rose asked to distract her.
The maid’s freckled face lit with a smile as she chose a burgundy ribbon. “Walter has said he will visit. I believe he will ask for my hand.”
It was on the tip of Rose’s tongue to protest, to tell Harriet she had no business getting married when she needed her. But she was feeling expansive this morning. “Where will you live?” she asked instead.
“We haven’t yet decided. And I don’t really care. Does it matter, so long as you’re together with the one you love?”
Rose’s ebullient mood plunged. Even Harriet was in love.
Love, love, love. All around her, people were in love. In that way, it had been easier to be at court. At least there she wasn’t constantly reminded just how lacking she was in love. At court, lust ruled the day—no one else at court seemed to be in love, either.
Except maybe Nell Gwyn. And Charles’s poor, long-suffering queen.
“Are you finished?” she asked.
“One moment.” Harriet tied the ribbon and stepped back. “You look lovely, milady.”
“Thank you.” Rose darkened her lashes with the burnt end of a cork and slicked on some lip gloss from a little pot. She considered a patch or two, but hadn’t the patience. In no time at all, she was downstairs, out the door, and hurrying through her father’s gardens.
On impulse she paused to pluck a few colorful blooms, gathering them into a makeshift bouquet. Still arranging them, she rounded the corner of the house.
And there was Kit.
Was there anything quite so masculine as a man in charge, giving orders? The greenhouse site looked chaotic, but somehow, at the same time, Kit seemed to have everything under control.
The air smelled of newly turned earth and freshly cut wood. Kit’s raven hair glinted in the sunshine, and a metal T-square flashed as he used it to point here and direct someone there. He’d spread plans on an improvised table balanced across two sawhorses, and he kept looking down at them and back up.
She positioned herself in front of the table, so the next time he looked up, he’d see her.
“Rose,” he said briskly, then looked back down.
“Kit?”
“Hmm?”
She shifted uneasily, stepping closer. “Aren’t you going to ask me if I want a kiss?” she said, trying to tease one of those glorious smiles from him.
“No.” He waved at a man pushing a wheelbarrow full of bricks. “Over there,” he directed, pointing with the T-square. Once again, he consulted his plans. “And you’ve no need to worry,” he added toward the neatly inked lines. “I’m not going to ask you to marry me again, either.”
She should be relieved, but she wasn’t. Something was wrong. She held out the bouquet. “I brought these for you.”
“What for?”
“I’m hoping to celebrate you winning the Deputy Surveyor post.”
He finally met her gaze. “I lost it.”
“Oh, Kit.” The flowers fell to the ground as she moved around the table to lay a hand on his arm. “Tell me.”
“There was a problem at Hampton Court.” He glanced down at her fingers, then scanned the bustle of construction and sighed, setting
