Stranger in My Arms(67)

“Of course.” Lara blinked, her lashes tickling his chest. “I’m sorry.”

“For what?”

“For making the evening such a trying one.”

“Well…” His fingers entered the cleft between her thighs with a gentle twist that made her quiver.

He reached far inside the depths of her, exploring with subtle, diabolical knowledge. “You’ll make it up to me,” he murmured. “Won’t you?”

“Yes… yes And her lips parted against his chest in a sigh of pleasure.

“Mama. Mama.”

Lara yawned and opened her eyes, squinting as the early morning sunlight assaulted her. To her dismay, she saw Johnny standing beside the bed, his small face level with her own. He stood in his nightshirt and dirty bare feet, while shocks of black hair stuck out at the top of his head.

Realizing the child had found her in Hunter’s bed, Lara glanced behind her and saw her husband beginning to awaken.

She kept the covers pulled high and turned back to Johnny. “why are you up so early?” she asked.

“The chickens are hatching.”

Groggily she remembered the nest of hen’s eggs they had been watching for the last several days.

“How do you know that, darling?”

“I just went out to look at ‘em.” His innocent gaze passed from her to Hunter, who sat up and rubbed his own disheveled hair, the sheet falling to his waist.

“Good morning,” Hunter said calmly, as if the situation were an everyday occurrence.

“Good morning,” Johnny replied cheerfully, and returned his attention to Lara. “Mama, why aren’t you in your own bed?”

Wincing at the question, Lara decided that the simplest explanation was best. “Because Lord Hawksworth invited me to sleep here last night.”

“where is your nightgown?”

Her cheeks pinkened, and she steadfastly avoided looking at Hunter as she replied. “I was so sleepy last night, I must have forgotten to put it on.”

“Silly old Mama,” he said, giggling at her oversight.

Lara smiled back at him. “Go find your robe and slippers.”

As the child disappeared from sight, Hunter reached for Lara, but she rolled away and slipped from the bed. Finding his discarded shirt on the floor, she snatched up the garment and used it as a temporary cover for her nakedness. She held the front closed and looked at the long sprawl of her husband’s body as he stretched on the bed. Their gazes met, and they exchanged a tentative smile.

“How are you?” Hunter asked softly.

Lara didn’t answer for a moment, struggling to name the feeling that seemed to saturate her from head to toe. It was a strange, warm gladness, more complete and certain than anything she’d felt before. She didn’t want to leave him even for a minute, wanted to spend the day with him, and tomorrow, and every day after that until she had learned everything about him.

“I’m happy,” she said. “So happy that I’m afraid.”

His eyes were as dark and soft as molasses. “why afraid, my love?”

“Because I want so badly for it to last.”

Hunter gestured for her to come to him, but she ventured close enough only for a quick, glancing kiss, and then danced out of his reach.

“where are you going?” he asked.

Lara paused at the doorway and smiled back at him. “To get dressed and see the chickens, of course.”

Chapter 15

SOMETHING HAD TO be done with the prison children while the orphanage was being enlarged. Leaving them in their current circumstances was out of the question. Lara couldn’t abide the thought of any of them spending one more night in the foul, dangerous places they had been consigned to live in. The only solution was to convince the people of Market Hill to take the children into their homes until the orphanage was ready to receive them. Unfortunately that idea was met with a general reluctance that astonished her.

“How can they be so coldhearted?” Lara complained to Hunter after she had made a morning of calls, during which her requests on behalf of the children had been politely refused. Wandering farther into the library, she removed her bonnet and tossed it to a chair, and fanned her overheated face. “The only people I’ve asked to take in a child or two are families with more than enough means to support them-and it’s only for a matter of months! Why won’t anyone lift a finger to help?

I was so certain I could count on Mrs. Hartcup, or the Wyndhams-” “Practical considerations,” Hunter replied matter-of-factly, pushing his chair back from his desk. He pulled Lara to his lap and began to unfasten the detachable ruff from around her neck. “All charitable impulses aside, my sweet, you have to recognize that you’re not asking them to take in ordinary children.

The good citizens of Market Hill regard the prison orphans as criminals in training-and who could blame them?”

Lara stiffened in his lap and shot him a glance of displeasure. “How can you say that when Johnny has been such an angel?”

“He’s a good lad,” Hunter acknowledged, smiling wryly as he cast a glance toward the window. It was only then that Lara heard a snapping, popping noise and realized that Johnny was outside indulging in his favorite pastime, pounding tiny gunpowder caps with rocks, or firing them in his toy pistol. “But Johnny is the exception,” Hunter continued. “Many of the other children need special care and attention.