by Anne Gracie
How old did she think he was? “I don’t care about the taste; I don’t want it because the last medicine you gave me did strange things to my mind.”
She tilted her head on one side, like a wary little bird. “Strange things?”
“Dreams, hallucinations, that sort of thing. And waking was like trying to rise from a bed of glue.” He had no intention of telling her what sort of dreams—they were deeply erotic and involved her.
“It wasn’t the medicine. You were delirious last night because you were burning up with fever.”
“Fever? So that’s why I’ve been feeling so dam—er—dashed weak.”
She nodded. “You were very sick. The fever broke just before dawn but it will take a while before you get your strength back. Willow-bark tea is harmless and will help with your aches and pains—and don’t tell me you have none, because I can read them in your face.” She thrust the cup toward him again. “It’s in my interests as well as yours to have you recover quickly,” she reminded him.
“Oh, very well,” he said, taking it and downing it on one big gulp. He shuddered and handed her the empty cup. “It tastes atrocious.”
“It’s worse without the honey. Now, I suppose you’ll need this.” She bent and pulled out his portmanteau, handing it to him before she went to fetch the hot water.
He took out his shaving kit and unrolled it, setting out his badger-hair shaving brush, soap, razor, strop, and a bottle of liquid that he unstoppered and sniffed. Eau de cologne, it smelled pleasant and familiar. He tested the razor. A perfect edge.
“Here.” She returned with a tray on which sat a basin of water, a large cup, a hand mirror, and a towel. “Are you sure you can manage?”
“Of course.”
She watched while he lathered up the brush with soap and hot water and vigorously applied it to his lower face.
“I’m perfectly all right,” he told her.
She nodded but didn’t move away.
He picked up the mirror in one hand and the razor in another. He frowned at the razor. It was shaking like a leaf. He gripped it tighter. It was still shaking. What was the matter with his blasted hand? He brought it toward his chin, but it was shaking so much he knew he’d be bloody at the first stroke. He muttered something under his breath.
“You’ve been injured and had a bad fever, and you haven’t yet recovered,” she said softly, taking the razor out of his hand. “I’ll do it. I used to shave Papa when he was ill.”
He wished he’d never thought of shaving, but it was too late to change his mind. She’d think he didn’t trust her—and she’d be right.
Women shaving men? Insanity.
Particularly after he’d insulted her earlier. He devoutly hoped she really had forgiven him. One way or another, he was about to find out.
She ran a thoughtful glance over him. “I could either sit on your legs to do it or—” She caught his eye and broke off.
He tried to repress a smile, but really, she was too innocent for words. Sit on his legs indeed. It was all he could do to refrain from inviting her to do so, with his very good will.
A blush stole up her cheeks. In a brisk, no-nonsense tone, she said, “Swing around so you’re sitting on the edge of the bed, please.”
He obediently swung. He should not tease a woman with a deadly sharp razor in her hand.
But he could not seem to help himself. His legs dangled, bare and hairy, over the side of the bed. The vicar’s nightshirt was not so very long. It reached just to his knees.
She pulled the sheet across and draped it primly over the offending limbs.
He wondered how long it would be before she realized what the only practical stance for her would be.
Her blush intensified. She’d realized it. Slowly, keeping his face as blank as he could, he spread his knees wide and waited.
She hesitated only a moment, then with head held high, she stepped between them. She did not meet his gaze. He was glad of it. If she could see into his heart, he’d fear for his skin.
Oh, he was very glad he’d wanted to shave.
In a calm, businesslike manner, she tilted his head to one side, refreshed the lather on his throat and chin, dipped the razor in the hot water, and placed it against his throat.
He braced himself, trying not to breathe or swallow as he felt the deadly instrument slowly glide up the curve of his throat to the jawbone.
No blood spurted in its wake. He breathed again.
She rinsed the razor in hot water and made the next stroke, smoothly and deftly, and gradually the tension in him loosened.
Another kind of tension took its place.
She shaved him with concentration, a tiny pucker between her slender winged brows, the tip of her tongue peeping out, curled against her top lip.
Her full attention was on the task in hand, and he was free to observe her as closely as he pleased.
Her skin was creamy, redhead-pale, and as fine grained as a rose petal. Across the bridge of her tip-tilted nose lay a scattering of tiny golden freckles. Most women regarded freckles as a flaw, but these were like cake crumbs sprinkled over whipped cream; they made his mouth water.
Her hips were braced lightly between his thighs, and from time to time her arms, and once her breasts, brushed lightly against him as she moved. It wasn’t deliberate, he knew from the infinitesimal tightening of her mouth when it happened.
He tried not to look down. Her nipples were hard and thrusting beneath her drab gown.
She wasn’t the only one aroused. He tugged more covers over his groin.
She turned his head to shave the other side, and all he could see were her ears, small and delicately made, caressed by a cluster of fine fiery tendrils. He longed to taste her there, to kiss the tender place just behind the ear, to nibble on her dainty lobes, to run his tongue around the intricate whorls and make her shiver and squirm with pleasure.
Without thinking, his thighs tightened around her hips and she jumped and nicked him.
“What do you think you’re doing?” she said indignantly. “Look what you made me do!” She dipped a cloth in clean water and applied it to his cheek. It came away with a smear of red.
“It’s nothing,” he assured her. “Sorry I startled you.”
“I’m sorry, too,” she said, mollified. She dipped the razor in hot water again and resumed shaving him. “Your usual valet is no doubt a great deal faster and more efficient than I am. And I suppose all this sitting up is making you tired.”
He didn’t say anything. Tired wasn’t the problem. Temptation was. Having this delicious armful of woman so close he could touch, smell, and almost taste her. Not to take her in his arms, roll backward onto the bed, slowly unpeel those drab clothes from her, and make slow, delicious love to her for the rest of the day was more than any red-blooded man should have to bear.
Why the devil wasn’t she safely married? Or suitably widowed. A married woman or widow would know what he was about, would understand the pleasure that was there for the taking.
But she was an innocent.
And he might not know much about himself, but he was fairly certain he wasn’t the kind of man who’d seduce innocents.
Unfortunately.
She finished shaving him and handed him a damp towel to wipe off the last of the lather while she took the tray away. He rubbed his face all over, then his neck and the back of his neck, and quickly, while her back was turned, gave his torso and armpits a quick rub.
Cologne water on his cheeks made a satisfying sting. “Thank you. I feel like a new man.”
She smiled. “I’m not sure that you look any less piratical,” she said slowly, her eyes running over his face, “but at least no one will think you a ruffian.”
He captured her gaze and held it. “So, I’m a pirate, am I?” he said softly.
She swallowed but didn’t look away. Her eyes were brandy gold and just as intoxicating. She moistened her lips and his mouth dried. He could feel his heart pounding.
He leaned toward her, intending to pull her down to him and kiss her senseless.
She swayed infinitesimally toward him, as if she might welcome it.
“Maddy,” said a plaintive voice from the doorway. “Isn’t it dinner time yet? I’m starving?”
Maddy blinked, and with a palpable effort, tore her gaze from him. “Ten minutes, John. Tell the others—and remember to wash your hands and face.”
He lay in bed, listening to the clatter of cutlery and low instructions as Maddy supervised the setting of the table by the girls.
“Will I take the tray to Mr. Rider?”
There was a low exchange that he couldn’t catch and then the curtains parted and Maddy stood there with a tray. It pulled the fabric of her dress and apron tight over her breasts.
They were, he saw, aroused still, as he was.
Under his steady regard, her cheeks slowly warmed to a soft wild-rose blush, but her chin was held high. She met his gaze with a firm, direct look and said quietly, “Please do not flirt with me. I cannot afford . . . dalliance when I have the children to think of.”
She wasn’t asking for his cooperation, she was stating her terms: step out of line and she’d banish him to the vicarage.
He nodded and with an effort dragged his gaze away. There was also, he suspected, an unspoken admission that she was tempted. A gentleman would respect that. A rake would not. He wondered which he would prove to be.
The tray held a bowl of thick, savory stew sitting on a bed of mashed potato. A waft of fragrant steam rose from it. He willed his stomach not to rumble.
“Jane tells me your name is Mr. Rider. Mr. Robert Rider?” Her brows turned it into a question.
“I haven’t remembered anything. It’s just a name the children and I agreed on,” he said, struggling into a sitting position. It was easier than before. His head only swirled a little, and once he was still again, the nausea vanished and hunger took its place.
“Miss Lucy was worried that I didn’t have a name, so she suggested Rider since I’d ‘rided’ by.”
She set the tray down next to him on the bed and pushed a pillow behind him. “And Robert?”
He shrugged. “We picked it—we picked both names—to go with the R on my handkerchief.”
“We did, did we?” She gave him a rueful look. “I’m sorry, I did tell them not to disturb you.”
“Oh, but they were very careful not to disturb me,” he explained with a wry smile. “They just talked to me. Very quietly.”
Her lips twitched. “That would be John, a born lawyer, able to wiggle his way around any rule. My father was just the same. I hope you like rabbit stew—and don’t worry, it’s quite legal. Sir Jasper gave the boys permission to—” She broke off, then added as if to herself, “I suppose that’s also changed.” She picked up the spoon.
“I can feed myself,” he said firmly. “A spoon is not as dangerous as a razor, and this is not as runny as soup. Besides, I feel much better now.” He added deliberately, “Since I shaved.”
She gave him a sharp look.
He smiled innocently back.
The wild-rose blush deepened and she left him to it. The stew was simple but delicious. He ate slowly. Outside the curtains, he could hear them all eating and clattering and talking over the day’s events. The children took it in turns to tell their tales of the day’s events, and there was laughter and even a little friendly teasing. It was like no family dinner he’d ever experienced.
When he was a boy, he and Marcus took most of their meals in the nursery, supervised over the years by a series of severely starched individuals who all went by the name of Nanny, a different one each year.
Sooner or later Mama always found fault with the current Nanny, and a new one took her place, as strict and humorless as the last.
Mama did not like competition for her boys’ affection.
Nursery meals were quiet affairs, attention being paid mostly to table manners. Talking was not allowed.
Even worse were the rare occasions when either or both boys were summoned to the family dinner table, there to have their table manners inspected while being grilled by their father. Unnerving affairs they were, mostly silent, punctuated by a question or criticism shot at them from the head of the table.
But here, outside this curtain, he could hear her asking each child about their day, and there was enthusiastic retelling of stories and contradictions and laughter. Laughter at the dinner table! Papa would have been—
He froze. With a clatter his spoon fell from nerveless fingers. Papa? Mama? Marcus?
His memory was coming back.
“Are you all right, Mr. Rider?” she called.
“Yes, thank you, just a little clumsy,” he managed to respond.
He remembered . . . what? He closed his eyes and tried to think, tried to remember. Who was he? What was his name?
But the Swiss cheese holes in his mind remained. It was all there, he knew, dangling tantalizingly just out of reach, like something glimpsed in passing from the corner of your eye that disappeared the moment you turned to look directly at it.
But he had remembered something. People. His family. He had parents and a brother called Marcus.
What was Papa’s name? And where was that nursery? He could see it in his mind’s eye, a long room, set high in a big gray house. On the western side, where in the afternoon you could stand at the window and watch the sun setting. Looking out over a park toward a forest. And beyond that, mountains.
Its name was on the tip of his tongue.
But he could not remember, dammit. Each time he thought he almost had it, it just . . . slipped away.
“Finished?” She stood there, framed by the faded red curtains, as lovely a sight as any he could imagine.
He glanced down. The dish was still half full.
“You look pale,” she said. “Are you all right?”
“Yes, yes, I’m all right. But . . .” He didn’t know what to tell her. His memory was coming back but he still knew nothing? Better to wait until he knew who he was.
But oh, the relief, that there really were memories there.
“Don’t you like rabbit?”
“No, it’s . . . it’s delicious, but I’m full,” he lied. Not full, just feeling a bit queasy. And that was nothing to do with the food and everything to do with the things he . . . almost remembered.
“Never mind.” She took the tray. “It won’t be wasted. John will eat whatever you leave. He’s at that age where he can eat until you think he’ll burst, and then ten minutes later he’s hungry again.”
He nodded, not really listening, and slid back down onto the bed. The relief was tinged faintly with dread. Who would he turn out to be?
He lay, worrying at it the way you worried at a sore tooth, fruitlessly. Elusive memories danced at the edge of his consciousness, slipping away as he tried to grasp them. Like catching moonbeams reflected in water.
He was only vaguely aware of the sounds of Maddy reading a story to the children, her voice low, the words indistinct but the sound musical and soothing. He listened to her getting the children washed and changed and put to bed and tried to conjure up memories of his own childhood, such as the ones that had come unbidden earlier.
But the harder he tried, the more they refused to come.
The cottage was quiet, the children were in bed. He could hear Maddy moving around, the sound of water being poured out and soft splashes, as if . . .
His attention was suddenly riveted. She was bathing.
In a cottage this size there would be no room for a bath, and any hot water she had would have to be heated over that fire. Which meant . . .
His mouth dried as he painted the image in his mind.
She’d have to stand in something like a basin. He swallowed, his ears straining for every sound, imagining her naked in front of the fire, the light of the flickering flames caressing each delicious curve and hollow as she stood in a small tin bath, washing herself.
He heard the trickle of water. In his mind’s eye, she dipped her flannel in the water, then squeezed it out and soaped it up. He strained in the silence that followed, hearing the faintest sounds of soft movement as she rubbed the moist, soapy cloth over her creamy, naked skin.
What he wouldn’t give to be wielding that cloth now. In Turkey once, he’d been given a bath by two young female slaves—it was a form of hospitality he’d never encountered before. The girls hadn’t seemed unhappy in their servitude; in fact, they’d been a very jolly pair. They’d washed him all over with giggles and sly caresses and it had turned into a romp that lasted half the night. He had very fond memories of that style of—
Another memory! he thought with a surge of elation. And as before, it had come when he wasn’t trying to think or remember. Not thinking about it was the key, then.
More splashing sounds distracted him. It sounded exactly as though she was pouring a large pitcher of water over her soapy body. He could almost see the rivulets trickling down her body.
If he took Miss Maddy to a Turkish bath, would she let him wash her? Would she wash him?
He was aching with desire.
There was just a faded red curtain between himself and her. A gentleman would not look. He was no Peeping Tom.
On the other hand, she hadn’t warned him not to look.
It wasn’t as if she didn’t know he was there, or that he could open the curtains to look out—he’d done it several times before. Yet she’d said nothing. Maybe she wouldn’t mind if he looked.
Perhaps she even wanted him to look.
What if she were trying to seduce him, standing naked by the fire and washing herself? He wouldn’t want to be found wanting. Besides, she’d get cold.
Looking, he decided, was the polite thing to do.
His mouth was dry and his heart was pounding as he leaned forward, slowly, carefully drew back the curtain, and looked out.
The fire danced. A candle flickered. There was no naked, flame-lit siren waiting. The room was empty. There was no one there at all.