the carriage home.”
“Out of the question. At this time of night, with the theaters emptying, we could be stalled in the streets for an hour or more.” He still hadn’t put her down.
She craned her neck to look up at him. “That doesn’t matter. What’s an hour?”
“Sixty minutes too many,” he said testily. “You are wet, and you are cold. You don’t like being cold. Therefore, I despise you being cold. I would go about murdering raindrops and setting fire to the clouds, but that would take slightly more than an hour. Perhaps even two. So we’re here, and you will cease complaining about it.”
His words kindled a flame of warmth inside her. She closed her eyes and buried her face in his chest.
Thank you. You terrible, impossible man. Thank you.
The innkeeper returned, loaded down with the demanded items: a scuttle of coal and tinderbox, and a stack of folded wool blankets. “My girl will be up wi’ the tea directly.”
“Good. Now get out.”
“Milord, if I might ask a question, might you happen to be—”
Ash kicked the door shut. He drew the room’s lone chair away from the wall, and gingerly lowered Emma unto on it. “Can you sit? You won’t swoon again?”
“I don’t think so.”
He heaped coal in the hearth and packed the open spaces with tinder, then sparked an ember with the flint, blowing on it patiently until a true flame took hold. Then he turned to the blankets and unfolded one, inspecting the rough wool.
He flung it aside. “Filthy and hopping with fleas.” He looked about the room, though there was nothing much to see. “We’ll do it this way.”
He flicked the cape and spread it outside-down over the stained straw mattress. The heavy outer layer of wool had done its duty, preserving the lining from damp. The result was a bed of rich, glossy satin. Then he wrestled out of his topcoat and draped it over Emma like a blanket.
A knock at the door announced the arrival of tea. He took the tray and promptly shut the door in the serving girl’s face, rather than allowing her in to pour. Instead, he served Emma himself, squinting into the cup to assess its cleanliness before filling it with steaming tea, milk, and a generous helping of sugar. He withdrew a small flask from his waistcoat pocket, unscrewed the cap, and added a splash of something amber-colored, potent-smelling, and no doubt frightfully expensive.
Emma sat watching all this in silence, transfixed. Reason had fled her brain. His every motion struck her as some sort of acrobatic feat deserving of wild applause. Perhaps she truly was ill. Everything about him, each damp hair on his head and every speck of mud on his boots, was perfect in her eyes. She would not have changed a thing.
“Here.” He brought her the tea.
She moved to take it from him.
He moved it out of her reach. “Not while your hands are shaking.”
He lifted it to her lips, talking her through a series of hot, cautious sips. A sweet warmth traveled down her throat and swirled its way through her chest.
“There we are. That’s better, is it?”
She nodded. “Yes.”
After setting the tea aside, he extended a hand to Emma and drew her to her feet. Hands on her waist, he steered her through a half turn and reached to undo the buttons down the back of her gown.
“We have to get you out of all this,” he said. “If not, you’ll only soak the cloak through and we’ll never warm you up.”
Her quivering lips curved into a smile. “I’m beginning to suspect you planned this entire situation.”
“If I had, I would have found a finer inn and ordered a gown with larger buttons.” He ceased tugging. “To the devil with this. The cursed thing is ruined anyway.” He gripped the edges of the bodice and, with a fierce yank, ripped the buttons from their holes.
Mercy.
Emma reeled on her toes, dizzy again. Her vision grayed at the edges.
“I don’t know what’s happened to me,” she said, rubbing her temple. “I never swoon. Perhaps Mary laced the corset too tightly.”
“I’ll tell you what happened. What happened is that I stupidly let you stand in a freezing downpour, wearing nothing more than a few scraps of silk. You’re chilled to the marrow.”
She supposed that was true. But for a kiss like that, she would have gladly stood there all night long.
He worked quickly and with no hint of seduction, but the care he took in peeling away her layers of drenched clothing—silk gown, sodden petticoats, laced corset—stirred her heart with its tenderness. When his fingertips brushed the wet locks from her bared, chilled neck, she had goose bumps on top of goose bumps.
Once he had her down to her shift, he didn’t pause in kneeling down and gathering it from the hem, bunching the fabric as he lifted it upward.
“Arms up.” The command scorched the nape of her neck.
She obeyed, stretching her arms overhead. As he lifted the soaked linen further, the fabric brushed over her breasts. Her nipples had puckered to cold, resentful knots in the rain, but now they tightened with more pleasant sensations. At last, he drew the garment over her head and arms, casting it aside. Leaving her bare, save for her stockings.
He turned her to him, rubbing his hands up and down her arms and sweeping his gaze over her body. Then he unknotted his cravat with jerky movements and used the fabric as a makeshift towel, rubbing the moisture from her skin and hair.
As the fire threw weak light and smoldering heat into the room, she found a blush warming her neck and face. Her teeth had ceased chattering, and the gooseflesh covering her arms had begun to fade.
When she was cold, he warmed her. This alone was more care than she’d ever known from any man. It didn’t matter that it came wrapped in scowls and sardonic quips.
She loved him for it.
Loved him, loved him, loved him, loved him.
The words pulsed through her brain with every heartbeat. Surely it was the swoon affecting her, but she found it difficult to breathe. She clung to his shirt, as if he could be her salvation—but he was the danger. She was lost. Lost to him, and a stranger to herself.
When he’d done his best with the discarded cravat, he whisked her off her feet once more, moving her to the bed. As he laid her on his cape, the silk lining slid beneath her body. She burrowed under his coat while he pulled off his boots and shucked his damp trousers.
He settled behind her on the bed, spooning around her curled body, drawing her spine against his chest. He was hot as a brick straight from the kiln. His delicious warmth radiated through her, thawing and relaxing her limbs. Her shivering eased.
“You’re not cold anymore?”
“No.”
