Page 34 of To Claim the Long-Lost Lover
Sarah felt the tension drain from her as they hugged. She was where she belonged. She pulled back and he released her instantly, watching her as if for a cue. She gave it to him. “Pour me a small brandy, too, Nate, then bring the glasses through to my room.”
Her own maid waited, her mouth firmly shut but her eyes full of questions.
“Wilson,” Sarah said, “my husband Lord Bentham will be joining me tonight. Please fetch my hot water now, and then that will be all for the night. Oh! And you had better knock before you bring the water in. I am sure, Wilson, I do not need to tell you and Clarke: not a word to the other servants.”
Wilson nodded, her eyes wider than ever. “Shall I undo your buttons, Lady Sarah—Lady Bentham, I mean?”
Nate reached Sarah’s side, and handed her a glass. “Thank you, Wilson, but I shall be maid for my wife tonight.” He kissed Sarah’s forehead, and Wilson blinked several times before bobbing a curtsey and stammering, “Yes, my lord. My lady. Um.” She bobbed again. “Every happiness. Hot water. Yes.” And still bobbing, she hurried from the room, closing the door behind her.
“Poor Wilson. I am afraid she might burst of curiosity.”
Nate ran his finger down her cheek and then slid a hand down her arm and across onto her breast, driving what she had been about to say completely out of her head.
His voice was husky as he commented, “She should knock before she comes in, should she?”
Sarah sipped her brandy, trying to pretend she was not going up in flames. “I hoped that was a good idea,” she told him.
He sipped his own before answering, his hand continuing its explorations, shaping her breast and then moving to the other. “An excellent idea. But I think I should not strip you naked quite yet?”
She could feel the heat rising in her cheeks. He was bold, this older, more confident Nate. “Nor I, you.” She managed the retort, and her voice barely shook.
“Perhaps a kiss, then?” he asked. His hand slid around her back to hold her firm against him, and his lips descended on hers.
For seven years, memories of their kisses and embraces had fuelled her dreams. Tender at first, almost tentative, this kiss set those memories in the shade from the first, and as the heat rose and his free hand pressed her closer; as she spiralled into a space out of time and place where nothing existed but him, the memories slipped away to be replaced by new ones.
Somehow, the glasses were gone, and both of his hands were on her, and hers on him, untying and stripping off his cravat, fumbling undone the buttons of his waistcoat, pulling his shirt from his pantaloons so she could slide her hands up under it, to stroke and caress his warm firm skin, silk over steel, much more of it than back when he had been a skinny youth just shooting up from boyhood and still inches short of his adult height.
Such random thoughts surfaced and drifted away as he released her for long enough to wriggle out of his waistcoat, pull the shirt over his head, all the while kissing her as if the touch of her lips were keeping him alive.
Then his hands were on her again, and he was kissing her neck and then lower. With her bodice now completely unfastened, her gown slipped down her body to pool around her feet, and she kicked free of it and curved her spine so he had room to continue to feast while she pressed the rest of her body to his.
The knock on the door was repeated twice before either of them surfaced enough to notice.
She left his arms reluctantly, and picked up a robe on the way to the door. “It will be Wilson with the hot water.”
He caught her arm; just a touch, but it was enough to stop her. “Will she be more likely to talk to the other servants about us if she knows the truth? Or if she doesn’t?”
Sarah shook her head. “Wilson will not talk. Not when I have asked her not to do so. But still...”
The knock sounded again, and Sarah opened the door, wide enough that Wilson could carry in the large jug of water. The maid’s eyes fixed on Nate’s naked torso and widened so far, the white showed all around the iris.
“I will just put this on the washstand, my lady. My lord.”
“Before you, go, Wilson, my husband and I wish to speak to you.”
Wilson slopped the water as she put the jug down. “I did not tell anyone, my lady. I will not.”
Sarah nodded. “I know. You have been a loyal servant to me these past two years, since the duke insisted that he could afford to give me and Charlotte a maid each. When I go to live with my husband, I shall still need a maid who is used to my ways and whom I know I can trust. Will you come with me, Wilson?”
“I am heir to an earl, if that helps,” Nate offered.
“I know, my lord. That is, the servants know you have been paying court to my lady. No one knows that you have wed her.”
“Seven years ago,” Sarah told her. “We were wed seven years ago, Wilson, and then torn apart by my father and grandfather, who sent Nate far away and told me our marriage was a lie. But now he is back and we are together again.”
It was the right note to take with a woman who loved horrid novels. Her eyes shone, and she pressed her hands together under her chin. “It is just like a story!” she breathed out.
“We need to tell Elias before we tell anyone else,” Sarah added. “Keep our secret, even within the house, until tomorrow afternoon, Wilson. After that, we will begin to let others know, and at the end of the week, His Grace plans to announce it to the whole of Society at a ball.”
