“Really? He has not told me. But he never bothers with that.”
“Fathers can be trying, it’s true,” the viscountess agreed.
Tavy stared at the door. She had nothing to tell him, no new information to impart, not even that she was no longer betrothed. The day after Lady Fitzwarren’s party, Marcus sent her a note announcing that he was suddenly required to leave town to see to his property in the country. He had not contacted her since. Just like Ben.
“See? She is entirely unaware that we are speaking of her.” Constance’s voice came to her slowly.
Tavy righted her thoughts. “What are you saying, then?” She blinked. “Have I a smudge upon my face or some such thing?”
“No, you are lovely.” The viscountess’s eyes were kind. “Only a bit preoccupied, it seems.”
“You should go home.” Constance smiled, a light sweet look. “We have already had quite a day of it and I am perfectly fagged. You must be as well.”
“If you wish.” Tavy rose. Constance did not. “Well?”
“Oh, go along without me.” Constance bussed her upon the cheek. “Valerie was telling me the most diverting tale while you were daydreaming and I must hear the end of it. I will call a chair when I have need.”
“Well, I like that. It seems I am being dismissed.”
Valerie chuckled. “Never. Now, go before you worry a hole in your reticule.”
Tavy released the pressure of her fingers around her purse. “All right. Thank you, I think. But I was not daydreaming. I was merely—”
Constance’s gaze dipped, hiding the expression in her azure eyes.
“—thinking,” Tavy finished lamely.
“Go think at home.” Constance looked up, her gaze uncustomarily vague. When Tavy hesitated, she waved her fingers, gesturing her away. Tavy gave Valerie a crooked smile and hurried to her carriage.
By the time she reached the house dusk had begun to fall. Too late for callers. Alethea and St. John had already departed for a dinner engagement. A footman was lighting lamps throughout the house. Tavy went to the nursery and looked in on her nephew, tiny, sleeping so peacefully, as yet wholly unaware of the tumult of life beyond the cradle. Lal crept across the chamber’s threshold. Before he could make a noise, Tavy stole back into the corridor.
Restive, her skin oddly tight over her flesh, she descended to the parlor. A maid was lighting the fire. She bobbed a curtsy and went to the windows to draw the curtains against the falling night. When she left, Tavy moved to a table before the darkened window and touched the embossed leather cover of the book there. A thick volume, pages frayed from constant use, William Falconer’s Dictionary of the Marine had been Tavy’s bible for years. When her father first gave it to her, she was no more than fifteen, aching for adventure and travel, longing to follow her dreams.
She ran a palm over the book’s smooth surface. She hadn’t questioned why her father bought it for her, simply dove into it, learning and memorizing week after week. Finally he explained. Soon she would be making a lengthy journey by ship, he informed her, thumbs tucked in his waistcoat, chest puffed out with pride. He wished her to be ready for any eventuality she might meet with at sea over the course of this journey. She was—he finished with gravity suitable to the moment—going to the East Indies.
Of the few treasures Tavy took upon her voyage to remind her of home and the sister and father she missed especially dearly, the dictionary was her most beloved. She wrote in the margins, using it as a diary of sorts, commenting on the people she encountered, sights she saw, all of her marvelous experiences abroad.
Two years later, after Ben broke her heart, such childish fancies had abruptly seemed foolish. But she kept the dictionary. She’d no idea how it had ended up on the table in the parlor. It belonged on the shelf stacked with the other works of reference that St. John kept for his business.
Not, however, including its current contents.
Tavy opened the cover and turned back the pages. In the center crease, the yellowed journal clippings crackled softly as she touched her fingertips to them.
A footstep sounded behind her.
Her head came up as hands surrounded her upper arms, large and warm and achingly familiar. She drew in a quick breath, his scent tangling in her senses—linen and leather and that ineffable essence that was Ben alone.
He bent and touched his lips to her shoulder alongside the collar of her dress. Hot, wonderful shivers stole through her. She breathed in deep and his mouth lingered. He kissed the curve of her neck, then the hollow beneath her ear, stirring the tendrils of hair that had escaped pins. She stretched like a cat, arching to encourage the seduction of velvet caresses, and a sigh escaped her parted lips.
His hands slipped along her arms, then to her waist. His body almost touched hers, a tantalizing nearness that sought to unwind the knot of doubt and pain born of the past four days.
“Do you know who is kissing you?” His voice smiled, low and intimate, swelling a bubble of joy inside Tavy. He brushed his lips across her shoulder again.
“I daresay it does not matter,” she replied, her grin feeling honest and so very good, “as long as he is quite, quite handsome and enormously wealthy.”
He went still.
Cold passed along her skin where his mouth had been. She swiveled in his embrace and wrapped her arms around his neck.
“And you.” She drank in the reality of him so close again, his strong hands upon her, his chest pressed against her breasts. That night at Fellsbourne had not been a dream. He was holding her now, again. But his eyes were troubled.
“I’m sorry.” She twined her fingers in his cravat. “That was a poor jest. I told you a long time ago that I am not good at flirta—”
He caught her mouth with his and all thought halted, all regret, everything but the sublime joy of being in his arms again. Like water after a long thirst. He wanted her and she let herself drown in it, the pleasure and happiness tumbling through her now almost worth the pain of the previous four days.
Almost.
She retreated from the kiss reluctantly and he seemed just as unwilling to let her go.
“You did not come,” she said. “I thought you would not.”
“I was obliged to leave town. I did not intend to be gone over a day.” He seemed to search her features, especially her eyes, lines forming between his brows.
“What?” She slid her palm along the edge of his cravat to feel his skin. He was so warm, his jaw rough with whiskers, the slant of his cheek smooth. She wanted to touch all of him again, to be free with his body as she had been during that brief moment at Fellsbourne. “You want to ask me something, I can see. What is it you wish to know?”
He shook his head. “I know too much already.” He leaned in, brushing her lips then bringing their mouths together fully. It was a seeking caress, deeper with each stroke of his tongue along her lips and inside. He sought and Tavy offered, helpless against the pull within her that sought him in return, that burned to entwine everything of theirs together, mouths and bodies and hearts. He dragged her hips tight to him and covered her behind with his hand, fingers spread, owning her again so swiftly as she dreamed and feared. She tasted the desire in his mouth, his possessing hands. Nothing in his touch spoke of caution, only questing, questioning need.
She broke away abruptly this time, her breaths coming fast, fingers tangled in his hair.