Page 83 of Teach a Rogue New Tricks
He hauled her up to the top of the bed, laid her head on the pillows, and nestled against her. This he would always remember—that Ada Cavendish slept after orgasm. Every damn time. He chuckled and kissed her nose, watching her, trying to remember every line of her face, every curl of her hair.
Her nose scrunched up. “Didn’t I tell you I don’t like being watched?”
“Does that apply to the bedroom, too? I thought it only a Tower of London sort of thing.”
A happy grin, slow as sleep, spread over her face. “I do apologize for barging in like this. I’m sure you were quite busy.” She yawned.
“I was. Writing my book.”
Her eyes popped open, awake now, full of life and not a little mischief. “Let me read it.”
“It’s not written yet. I just have notes. I tried to write a few paragraphs, but it’s proving impossible. I don’t seem to want to concentrate enough to get from one end of a paragraph to another.”
“Let me see it,” she repeated, her tone a pleasant plead.
“No. You wouldn’t understand.”
She snorted. “Me? Not understand? There’s no language I can’t learn to read. Please?”
He sighed and reached for the notebook on the bedside table. He tossed it at her and then sat with his legs hanging over the edge of the bed and his back turned to her, the notebook a conspicuous puddle of red on the bed between them. He glanced over his shoulder at her.
She pushed to sitting, rubbed her hands together with glee, then took the notebook and opened it. She smiled for the first three pages, but around page four, her smile dissolved into an expression of focus that did not last long. She laughed and flipped through the pages as if she could not read them quick enough, her laughter lifting in harmony with the shuffle of paper until she snapped the book shut and tossed it back at him.
“I partly teased when I told you to write a book,” she said, “but this is marvelous.”
He waved her compliment away. “You don’t have to lie. I heard you laugh.”
“But that’s part of its brilliance.” She shifted to the side and lifted up onto her knees. “It’s so funny.” She slapped a hand over her mouth as her body shook with a loud guffaw, then she moved it briefly only to say, “The cursing!”
He shook his head. “I’d have to cut all that out. It would never be published as it is. Such a shame, too.”
“You must speak with my father. He’ll know a way. And you could get a… ha!… a translator for polite people to turn it into something more—”
“Palatable?”
“Something tame enough for a drawing room, I suppose. Please, Cass, promise me you’ll try.”
He nodded.“If only for a lark. A joke.” If only for her.
“No! Not a joke! There’s so much insight there, too. It’s beautiful.You… you are a beautiful man.”
“Not me. You, Ada Cavendish, are beautiful.” He only just kept from rolling his eyes at himself.
She’d gone completely still behind him, entirely silent.
He needed to change the subject and quick before he revealed further how much of a fool in love he was. “I visited my brother today.” He hung his hands between his legs.
She crept up beside him and rested her chin on his shoulder. “Do you wish to speak of it?”
He nodded. “It went better than I could have ever expected. I think I knew in some part of me that Bax would never send me back to exile if I returned to him with a sincere wish to improve.”
She nestled her nose into his jaw, and he closed his eyes.
“He’s giving you another chance,” she whispered.
“Yes.”
“Cass, I… I am so happy for you. You’ve done exactly what you set out to do.”
