Page 77 of Sir Durham’s Disarming Asset

*

The next night, they slept. She lay, open-mouthed, in his embrace as he watched her and marveled that she was his.

He had lost count of how often they had enjoyed each other. She had reached completion each time and wanted more. For that, he was proud, but he knew the moment would come soon when what had been a deliberate and sweet union would turn wild with the lust each bore for the other. He vowed to hold himself in check then, too. And then he sank into sleep.

The second morning, he awakened to her kisses. But he declared that now he had a purpose. Loath as he was to say it, he must insist that they part. He must get a marriage license and a vicar. She would remain here until dark, when he would see her safely back to Ashley House. After all, she had come to him in her nightclothes, and he would not have her seen by anyone in such undress.

She pouted when he told her he would leave her. “This is not the end,” she said as she once more draped herself over him in his chair and dropped a kiss to his cheek.

He put one hand to her nape and kissed her like the besotted fiend he was. “You possess me. I am yours. There is no end for us.”

She moved against him, his naked temptation. “I sense you treat me like crystal.”

“You are.”

“I want everything for us, for me, and definitely for you.”

He chuckled. “You are a tease.”

“How wonderful to know I can lure you with words.”

He cupped her cheeks. “With any and all of you.”

“Good.” She settled on to his lap and wiggled in the most provocative manner. But then she stopped and winked at him. “After we say our vows, you will promise to show me new delights.”

“I will.” He suppressed his urge to show her bliss now. “I will not deny you anything you want.”

“Never.”

“Because I love you.”

*

When the sun had sunk below the horizon that evening, Zeph descended the stairs she had climbed to claim him nights ago. Rafe held her hand and led her down, out, and into his carriage.

No one walked the street.

She was pleased at that. Rafe certainly was. But she did not care what Society thought of her. She had the man she had come for—and only that mattered to her.

At Ashley House, Rafe accompanied her inside. With a squeeze of her hands, he let her go. He had kissed her goodbye in his carriage and promised to return for nothing less than a wedding.

“I will send a note with details.” His words uplifted her.

“I will find a gown and pack my trunk.” Rafe had told her he would take her to a small, secluded house north, toward Norfolk, for their honeymoon.

Up in her room, she stood smiling at her surroundings. And at once she frowned at the far wall, where among the other books stood Vaillancourt’s little red one.

She had forgotten about the book, its puzzling codes, and Vaillancourt. But she rang for her maid, a bath, and to be done up for dinner with Kane and Gus. While she waited to become a married woman, she would work on the code.

Perhaps she could offer its secrets as a surprise gift to her bridegroom.

Chapter Twenty-One

20 Grosvenor Square

Mayfair, London

Gus came to Zeph that night, and they sat by her fire and talked.