Page 44 of To Claim the Long-Lost Lover
Nate caught him up and gave him a hug. Tony stayed seated, his splinted leg up on a stool before him, but bowed as well as he could. The nursemaid curtseyed. “You and Tony are both wrong,” Nate explained. “Your mama rescued herself. She cut her bonds with a hidden knife, climbed out a window, and reached the roof of the building to which the kidnappers had taken her. She was on the roof by the time Lord Aldridge and I arrived, with the duke, your uncle Drew, and all of his men.”
“Cor!” said Tony.
“Did you hit the bad men, Papa?” Elias wanted to know.
Nate sat for ten minutes, entertaining the boys with edited excerpts from the day’s trials. He left them to their nurse when a footman brought in a tray with bread to toast and butter and jam to spread on it. “Go ahead and reprimand the maid Millie,” he told the nursemaid before he left, “but also tell her that my lady may wish to speak to her about her loose tongue.”
“She is not a bad girl, my lord,” Morris assured him, “but she is foolish. I hope she will learn from this.”
Nate met Drew on his way back to Sarah’s chamber. “Is my cousin well?” the young lord asked.
“A few bruises and scrapes, and very tired. I left her at her bath while I went up to Elias. I’m now going to bind up the wound she sustained when she cut herself free from her bonds. Little more than a scratch, but it will do best not being rubbed on her bedding or sleeves. What news of the villains?”
“Locked up. The magistrate arrested the two women and the bawd pointed the finger at half a dozen of her men. Father has gone with Wakefield to Haverford House, where they expect to find Aldridge, who left not long after you did, and the person who warned him about the kidnapping. Tell Sarah we all send our love.”
Nate agreed. He knocked on the door of the sitting room that Sarah shared with her sister, and let himself in when nobody answered, then knocked again at Sarah’s bedchamber. This time, Lady Charlotte opened the door.
“Lord Bentham. Sarah is still in the bath.”
“Come in, Nate,” called his beloved, and Lady Charlotte stepped back out of the way, colouring almost as prettily as her sister did.
“Elias had heard something of the abduction,” he told her, “and was arguing furiously with young Tony about whether you had been rescued by me or by his hero, his uncle Aldridge.” He knelt by the tub to run a gentle finger over her cheek and smile into her eyes. “I told them you rescued yourself, and Aldridge and I arrived after the fact. They are both very impressed.”
Sarah chuckled, and Nate leaned forward to touch her lips with his, in as gentle a salute as the brush of his finger. She clasped the back of his neck with a wet hand and pulled him in for a deeper kiss.
“I’ll leave the two of you alone, then,” Lady Charlotte said, surprising Nate, for he had forgotten she was in the room. He straightened and looked around, and frowned when he saw the maid was gone.
Sarah guessed his thoughts. “I sent Wilson away. I didn’t need her with Charlotte here and you returning. Charlotte, darling, go and lie down again. Nate will look after me, now.”
She held out her hand to her sister, who took it and bent over to peck Sarah’s cheek. “Sleep well, Sarah. Good afternoon, Lord Bentham.”
“Will you not call me Nate?” he asked, and she turned her smile on him.
“Nate, then. And you shall call me Charlotte. Good afternoon, Nate.”
A large linen towel had been set ready on a chair next to the bathtub. Nate offered Sarah his hand to help her stand and step out of the water, and then wrapped the towel around her. His mouth had gone dry and his blood had rushed south, but he had no intention of imposing on his poor injured wife. “Come here by the fire, my love, and let me dry you,” he said, and if he could hear the strain in his voice, he hoped she could not.
Drying her inch by delicious inch was a torture he did not want to end. The night rail left to warm before the fire was a sensuous concoction in silk that covered but outlined her shape. He helped her put on the matching robe, but it made little difference to the tempting package Sarah presented, warm from her bath, womanly shape almost visible through the concealing fabric, smelling of the herbs and flowers that perfumed her soap.
Her knife cut kept him tethered to her need for care, and he slathered it with the salve he had ready and wrapped it in a bandage, then kissed the poor bound wrist.
“Take me to bed, Nate,” she murmured.
“Yes, of course,” he answered, reminding himself again that she was almost an innocent and an injured one at that. “You must be tired.”
“I am hungry,” Sarah replied, a hint of irritation in her voice. “I am hungry for my husband’s love, and tired of being treated as if I shall break at any moment. Take me to bed, Nate.”
“Do you mean…?”
Sarah stamped one elegant bare foot. “Yes, I do.”
“Thank God,” Nate replied, and lifted her to carry her the few feet to the bed.
* * *
When Nate woke, a few last red streamers of cloud threaded the sky beyond the window. After sunset, then. Sarah slept snuggled into his arm, and he hated to move and risk waking her. Perhaps they should just stay here, and leave all that needed to be done until tomorrow.
She shifted her head, twisted and kissed his shoulder. “What time is it?” she murmured.
