Lady Gone Wicked (Wicked Secrets)(23)

“Goodness me,” she said with a gasp, stepping back a pace.

He slid his body through the window, twisting to accommodate his broad shoulders with a grimace. Then he stood before her.

In her bedroom.

In the middle of the night.

“Goodness me,” she said again.

He smoothed a hand over his coat. “Good evening, Adelaide.”

She came to her senses with a jolt. “It is most certainly not evening. It is past midnight, as you well know. If it were evening, you would have come to the door like a proper gentleman.”

“I did not wish to wake the household,” he said affably.

Too affably.

Nick was never affable.

She put her hands to her hips. He was neatly attired in his dinner clothes, despite his climb to her window. Even his cravat was tied well enough. He did not sway or slur his words. His eyes, however, were a shade too wide and bright.

“Nicholas Eastwood, are you drunk?” she demanded.

“Might be so.”

He had climbed into her window whilst in his cups? Good God. She ran to the window and peered down. “There’s no ladder! However did you get up here?”

“The ivy, of course. I remembered that you keep late hours, and your light was on.” His gaze landed on the chair where she had kept company with Childe Harold. The corners of his mouth turned down in a sulky frown. “Reading, of course.”

At his words, a memory rose up before her, so vivid she could almost touch it. Nick, stealthily slipping into her room while Aunt Bea snored across the hall. Hushed, desperate kisses that muffled cries of passion.

Oh, he could not be here!

“You have to leave,” she said unsteadily.

“Must I? I’m rather tired, Adelaide.” To her horror, he sat down on her bed.

Her bed.

“Not there.” She tugged on his arms unsuccessfully while he watched through half-lidded eyes. His lips twitched with amusement. “Sit on the chair,” she demanded quietly.

“Or the floor?” He slid from the bed to the floor with a thump and a laugh.

“Hush! Oh, hush!” she whispered frantically, kneeling next to him to cover his mouth with her hand. “If someone hears you—”

He took her hand away from his mouth, but he did not release it. Instead, he gazed down at it as though he had never seen a hand before. He stroked his thumb across her palm, then traced the lines with his fingertip. Her breath caught as he moved to her wrist, studying the blue veins he found there.

“How is it so small?” he asked.

She choked on an inappropriate giggle. “It would have to be small to fit properly on my small arm, wouldn’t it?”

He laughed, and her heart beat just a little faster.

A lock of her hair fell forward as she watched him. Distracted from her bafflingly small hand, he slowly wrapped the dark curl around his finger. She kept her eyes firmly lowered, afraid to break the spell. Tighter and tighter he wound it until she felt a gentle tug at her scalp.

She raised her eyes to his. They were so very close, and so very blue. He smelled of soap and brandy, an intoxicating combination of saint and sinner.

He searched her face with the same wonder with which he had examined her hand. “How are you so beautiful?” he whispered.

She was not beautiful, to her great regret. Oh, she was not an antidote, but she was hardly a diamond of the first water. She was small both of stature and of breasts, with features that seemed to operate by laws of opposites—very dark hair, very white skin, a very red mouth, and a nose that was more than enough for her face.

It was the drink that made him say such things. It was the drink that made him touch her like she was something precious.

She, on the other hand, had no such excuse for kissing him.

It was brief. A mere press of lips to lips before she retreated. He was not himself. She had the uncomfortable feeling that she was asserting an advantage she ought not to take. But, oh, what was the harm in it, truly? She would ask nothing of him. She would stake no claim to his person or fortune. She only wanted this one moment, one last taste of him.

“May I kiss you again?” she asked.

“Yes,” he said, surprise in his voice. He raised his eyebrows, as if to say, what other answer could there possibly be?

She leaned toward him, and again touched her mouth to his. The kiss was firmer this time, yet more tender. She wanted to commit the feel of him to memory. She had not had the opportunity to do so before. Their affair in Cornwall had ended suddenly when he was urgently called back to duty. They had not been able to say goodbye.

This would be their goodbye.

He pulled back before she was sated.

“Adelaide,” he chided. “That is not how we kiss.”

She could not help but smile at the mischief in his eyes. “No?” she asked.

“No.” He shook his head and warmth spread through her belly as his expression turned carnal. “We kiss…like…this.”

They clashed together. Lips parted, tongues entered. Her taste mingled with his, brandy and the hot chocolate she’d had with her book. She gave his tongue a hard suck, seeking more of it, and he groaned.

Ah, she had missed his kisses. The tips of her breasts hardened into aching peaks, reminding her that they, too, had once enjoyed his mouth. And lower still was another ache, one that could not be ignored.