To Taste Temptation (Legend of the Four Soldiers #1)(98)

“Oh, dear Lord!” She jumped from the bed and rang frantically for a maid. Then, afraid the summons would take too long, opened her door and bellowed down the hallway like a common fishwife.

She turned back to her room, found a soft bag to pack, and began flinging things into it willy-nilly.

“Emeline!” Tante Cristelle stood in the doorway, hair still in braids, looking horrified. “What has possessed you?”

“Samuel.” Emeline stared at the open bag, clothing spilling out, and realized there wasn’t any time for packing. “His ship leaves this morning. It may have already left. I have to stop him.”

“Whatever for?”

“I have to tell him that I love him.” She abandoned the bag and instead ran to the wardrobe to draw out her plainest frock. By this time, Harris had arrived in the room. “Quickly! Help me dress!”

Tante Cristelle sank onto the bed. “Why there is such a hurry, I do not know. If that man doesn’t know already that you have a tendre for him, he is an imbecile most severe.”

Emeline struggled up from folds of dimity. “Yes, but I told him I didn’t want to marry him.”

“And so?”

“I do want to marry him!”

“Tiens! Then it was very silly of you to become engaged to Lord Vale.”

“I know that!” Good Lord, she was wasting time arguing in circles with Tante Cristelle when Samuel’s ship might be sailing down the Thames right now. “Oh, where are my shoes?”

“Right here, my lady,” Harris said unperturbedly. “But you haven’t any stockings on.”

“I don’t care!”

Tante Cristelle threw her hands up in the air, imploring God in French to come to the aid of her so-deranged niece. Emeline thrust her bare feet into her shoes and hurried to the door, nearly running down Daniel.

“Where are you going, M’man?” her only offspring asked innocently. His eyes dropped to her bare ankles. “I say, do you know you haven’t any stockings on?”

“Yes, dear.” Emeline pressed an absentminded kiss to Daniel’s forehead. “We’re going to America, and they don’t wear any stockings there.”

Emeline left Daniel yelling huzzahs while Tante Cristelle and Harris tried to quiet him. She ran down the stairs, calling for Crabs as she went.

That imperturbable gentleman ran into the hallway looking startled. “My lady?”

“Bring the carriage ’round. Hurry!”

“But—”

“And my cloak. I’ll need a cloak.” She looked frantically about the hall for a clock. “What time is it?”

“Just past nine o’clock, my lady.”

“Oh, no!” Emeline covered her face. The ship would’ve left by now. Samuel would be out at sea. What was she to do? There was no way to catch him, no way to—

“Emeline.” The voice was deep and sure and oh so familiar.

For a moment, she didn’t dare hope. Then she dropped her hands.

He stood in the entrance to her sitting room, his coffee-brown eyes smiling just for her.

“Samuel.”

She rushed at him, and he folded his arms about her. Still she made sure to get a good grip on his coat.

“I thought you’d left. I thought I was too late.”

“Hush,” he said, and kissed her, soft brushes of his lips over her mouth and cheeks and eyelids. “Hush. I’m here.” He drew her into the sitting room.

“I thought I’d lost you,” she whispered.

He kissed her with determination, as if to prove his existence real. His lips gently parted hers, and he tilted her head back. She grasped his shoulders, reveling in this freedom to kiss him.

“I love you,” she gasped.

“I know.” His lips wandered over her brow. “I was going to stay here in your sitting room until you admitted it.”

“Were you?” she asked distractedly.

“Mmm.”

“How very intelligent of you.”

“Not so intelligent.” He pulled back his head, and she saw that his eyes had grown dark and serious. “It was a matter of survival. I’m cold without you, Emeline. You’re the light that keeps me warm on the inside. If I left you, I think I’d freeze into a solid block of ice.”

She pulled his head back to hers. “Then you’d better not leave me.”

But he resisted her urging. “Will you marry me?”

Her breath caught in her throat, and she had to swallow before she replied huskily, “Oh, yes, please.”

His eyes were still grave. “Will you come with me to America? I can live here in England, but it would be easier for my business if we lived in America.”

“And Daniel?”

“I’d like him to come, too.”

She nodded and closed her eyes because it was almost too much. “I’m sorry. I never cry.”

“Of course not.”

She smiled at that. “It’s not the usual thing, to keep a boy by his mother’s side, but I’d very much like to have him with me.”

He touched the corner of her mouth with his thumb. “Good. Then Daniel comes with us. Your aunt is welcome to come as well—”

“I will remain here,” Tante Cristelle said from behind them.