Page 51 of Captivating the Countess
“Beautiful Bell, bounteous Lady Isobel, my gorgeous ghost hunter, please come back to us. My sisters are looking at us very strangely.” Rain was more focused on the woman in his arms, but he knew his sisters. He was giving them gossip to gnaw on for months.
She sighed a hot breath against his collar. He wished the stiff linen to Hades. He kissed her temple. “You can do it, my courageous Bell. Breathe. Let air into your lungs.” He spoke in his calmest tones while squeezing carefully beneath her rib cage, encouraging her diaphragm to expand and contract.
A moment later, she took a deep breath, coughed, and shook her head, as if to clear it. Rain didn’t want to set her down. He wanted to carry her to bed. But he couldn’t, not with his sisters watching and fretting.
“One of you go to Drucilla,” he murmured over Bell’s head. “See if she’s unharmed.” He had no idea if that had been a child’s cry. He simply wanted his sisters gone.
“That was the child screaming?” Estelle asked worriedly. “If you think Bell is all right, I’ll see to her.” Steady and reliable, his next oldest sister marched off.
“Estelle will see to Dru. She’s good with children,” he murmured to Bell, carrying her over to the settee. He thought she nodded.
“What do you think the spirit meant?” Alicia demanded impatiently. “What does it mean,his voice heals? Whose voice? How?”
Lowering Bell to the settee, Rain turned and caught Victoria’s eye. “Go to Father, please. See if he’s still awake and reassure him that all is well. Tell him we’ll see him in the morning.”
As the eldest, Vicky understood his unspoken command better. She caught Alicia’s shoulder and gestured at Salina. “Bell needs quiet now. Let’s leave her be. We can discuss this elsewhere.”
“Where’s her maid?” Alicia asked, refusing to go quietly. “Bell needs a maid to look after her.”
To everyone’s surprise, Bell raised her head and rubbed at her temple with confusion. “I told Button to wait on the guests first. I don’t need help.”
When Alicia would rush across the room to ask more questions, Victoria prevented her. “Not now. Go to Father, and let Sal and I go to our families.” She all but shoved their youngest sister out the door.
As soon as the panel closed after them, Rain took the place beside Bell and pulled her into his lap. “I simply need to hold you and know you’re breathing.”
She snuggled against him without argument. “Did I drool and twitch?” she asked with resignation. “Did I make a perfect spectacle of myself?”
“You fell asleep in a beautiful bundle of golden curls and frightened me half to death.” Rain tried not to convey his utter terror that they had somehow managed to kill her before he’d had time to know her better.
“You’re a smooth liar.” She sighed and started to straighten.
Rain began unbuttoning her prim bodice instead. “I should loosen that corset. You were not breathing properly, and your heartbeat did not seem regular.”
“Very smooth liar,” she muttered as her bodice opened.
“That’s because I’m not lying. I’m trained to observe, even when I’m having a heart attack.” But his interest now was not that of a physician. She had that part right. Her breasts swelled nicely above her chemise and the short corset. She was breathing normally now. Maybe if he surprised her...
She gasped when he unfastened the corset and ran his hand beneath her chemise to her aroused nipple. Her heart rate increased pleasingly, so he didn’t stop.
“What did the ghost say? Did she say we should do this? How will that help your father?” She didn’t shove him away, as she ought, but let him cup the heavy grapefruit of her bare breast.
Knowing she wanted this as much as he did allowed Rain to proceed slowly despite his raging desire. He was confident that she’d not felt these sensations before, and he wanted her to enjoy the experience, to trust him. “The ghost was her usual insensible self. I think she is too old to remember names and is reacting more than thinking.”
He hadn’t given it any thought until this second, but it sounded right. His elderly patients often forgot names and, sometimes, even why they were in his office. They just reacted to pain or discomfort and ended up where they knew to find relief.
“But what did shesay?” She fiddled with his cravat, attempting to loosen it.
“The same as she’s said before, only this time, she insists someone has a healing voice and someone should enhance it. You need to attract younger spirits.” He helped her unknot the tie and unfasten his shirt studs.
He was hard and ready to take her. He was terrified she would run away if he did. He’d learned his lesson—not every woman wanted him in her bed.
She slipped her hand inside his shirt, found his nipple, and pinched—hard. “You are trying not to hope, aren’t you?”
That did it. She’d offered a challenge. He accepted.
Lifting her easily, Rain stood and carried her into the bedroom.
Bell knew she should resist,but her resistance was nil this evening. She wanted this man as she never had any other. She wanted to know she wasn’t an oddity who could never have a normal life. She wanted... so very,verymuch. How much longer must she go on never knowing what real life was about?
