Bella fell against his chest with a sighing moan.
He climbed out of the bath and turned to help her. She held on to his arms. “I feel so languid. My legs are weak.”
He rubbed her briskly with a large fluffy towel until her skin glowed. “Hungry?”
“A little.”
Draping the dressing gown around her, he swept her up and returned to the bedroom. “I’ll go down to the kitchen and see what I can find in the pantry. There’s bound to be some bread, ham, and cheese.”
“Oh. Lovely.” Bella yawned and snuggled down in the bed.
When Derrick returned with the tray, he found her fast asleep. He sat in a chair and ate his repast, watching her. He wanted to have her in his bed always. A foolish dream.
***
“Bella?”
“Mm?” She felt his breath on her cheek, faintly tinged with brandy, and opened her eyes. He was smiling. He’d brought her some milk.
“Milk?”
“I can’t make tea or coffee.”
“I don’t imagine you can,” she said with a giggle. She trailed a finger over his jaw where a roughened beard had sprung up. “Does your valet shave you?”
“I prefer to shave myself.”
He drew her close and buried his face in her hair. “It’s close to dawn. The servants will be up in an hour. I think we should go soon.”
“Oh. Yes.” She didn’t want to leave him. The night hadn’t been nearly long enough. Impossible to accept that they’d never be together like this again.
“I’ll write to Maudling when I return home.”
“There’s no need for him to know it was you.” She continued her exploration of his face, tracing his blade of a nose and smoothing his hair back off his forehead.
He caught her hand and kissed it. “He’ll take little notice otherwise.”
She frowned, knowing she sounded irrational, but she no longer wanted him involved. “Maudling will come after you. I can’t allow that.”
“What can he do to me? Spread gossip?” He gave a grim smile. “I have a plan to deal with Maudling should he become difficult.”
“What plan?” Bella asked as mixed feelings rushed through her.
He pressed a light kiss to her lips. “Nothing that includes violence. Strictly business.”
Derrick was so much cleverer than Maudling. He could employ his shrewd business acumen as a means to threaten the lord. But she remained uneasy as she left the bed and began to dress.
“Let me tell Maudling,” she said.
“And place yourself at the mercy of that devil? He’s shown you scant respect; he might decide to sample what he believes he was promised.”
She drew in a nervous breath, her mind racing as Derrick tied her corset laces and buttoned her dress. Once dressed, she attempted to put up her hair with the pins he’d gathered from the library carpet.
He kissed her neck, his tawny eyes meeting hers in the mirror. “Ready?”
She nodded and bit her lip, afraid she’d cry. She stood at the door with one final glance at the bedroom where she’d experienced so much happiness. She would never see it again.
They walked downstairs as sounds came from the lane, where the early-morning deliveries had begun.
“We’ll have to walk round to the stables. I’ll rouse a groom.”
“I can go home in a cab,” Bella said.
His arm came around her in a charming protective gesture. “You will not. I shall see you to your door.”
At the stables, Bella pulled her hood down low over her face as a yawning groom came to hitch the horses to a curricle. “I often drive through the park in the early morning,” Derrick said as he assisted her into it.
“Don’t you sleep well?”
He took up the reins and urged the horses to walk on. “Not always.”
She glanced at the man she’d come to love. He was a complex soul. She would worry about him until his part in this business was over. There would be no peace for her for some considerable time. Her father’s disappointment when she failed to marry Maudling would make life unbearable at home. She gazed at Derrick’s handsome profile. Perhaps she’d read about his nuptials in the newspaper one day. A shaft of jealousy tightened her ribcage and almost made her lose her breath. Annoyed with herself, she watched the houses pass by in the greyed light as he guided the horses onto the Ring Road in Hyde Park. Surprised, she turned to him. It was a roundabout route. Did he, like she, wish to delay their parting?
Mist curled through the trees, the air moist on Bella’s skin. She pulled her cloak closer.
“Cold?”
“No.” She just dreaded the coming days, weeks, and months ahead. They would never be together like this again.
He turned to study her as if he sensed her lowering spirits. “I wish things could be different, sweetheart. I have a responsibility to—”
“Halt!” The cry came from a masked man. He’d stepped out from behind a tree ahead of them, a pistol in his hand, aimed directly at them.