“I caught a mermaid,” he said with a carefree laugh, striding toward the gate. The coachman splashed ahead to open it. She heard it shut behind them, enclosing her in a private world with Nicholas.
“A drowning mermaid.” Antonia curled her arms around his neck and turned her face into his chest.
He’d told her she smelled like paradise. She couldn’t smell half as wonderful as he did. Clean male with a hint of laundry soap. And fresh, fresh rain. Rain that she prayed would wash away her sins.
Today, slung high in Nicholas’s arms as he headed through a dripping garden to a large white house, she felt virginal. As if he drew her out of the storm and into a haven of safety and peace. As if he carried her over the threshold like a bride.
The bride she’d never be.
Her arms tightened around his neck and she pressed closer. The rain’s icy bite made her shiver. In contrast, Nicholas was endlessly warm. A shelter against the weather. A shelter against unwelcome qualms.
She’d promised herself one night of passion. One night without future or past before she returned to Somerset and a life of perfect and stultifying virtue. Nothing would steal this away. Nothing. Not God. Not the devil. Not society. Not even her vulnerable heart.
With unmistakable purpose, Nicholas marched inside. Anticipation ripped through her. On this gloomy evening, the house was dim and mysterious. Antonia gathered a vague impression of a black and white tiled corridor lined with closed doors, then an imposing entrance hall in white marble that reflected the torrential rain falling against the windows.
Nicholas climbed a curved staircase flanked by huge, dark landscapes. As promised, she saw no servants.
“Welcome to my lair,” he murmured, shouldering open a door.
It was a joke, but she couldn’t contain a premonitory shiver. The room was shadowy, chilly. The candles offered little defense against the darkness.
“Damn me for a thoughtless dog,” he said gruffly. “You’re cold. I should have waited, got Bob to fetch an umbrella.”
“No, I’m all right,” she said huskily. Nicholas had taken much the worst of the weather. Her cloak was damp but underneath, she was relatively dry.
He carried her to the huge four-poster bed and after whipping her cloak away, laid her down with heart-stopping gentleness. The thick mattress sagged beneath her weight and the pillows were soft beneath her head.
He shucked the sodden greatcoat and joined her. As he knelt above her, he looked serious and intense. She’d arrived expecting blazing passion that would incinerate all her qualms. His care made her yearn hopelessly for more than just this one night.
“That’s a pretty dress,” he murmured, his eyes skimming her with glittering approval. Everywhere he glanced, her skin took fire.
“It’s old.”
The soft rose gown was hopelessly out of date. She hadn’t worn it before although she’d packed it for her elopement with Johnny. She’d often wondered why she kept it. Except that it was pretty and expensive and it indicated dour Miss Smith hadn’t completely subsumed Antonia Hilliard.
When she dressed to meet Ranelaw, her hand had automatically fallen on the garment. It belonged neither to Johnny Benton’s adolescent lover nor to Cassie’s frumpy companion. It was a dress without history—today she wanted to be a woman without history.
A ghost of a smile flickered. “It’s from before you were Antonia Smith.”
Startled, she met his gaze, although he must know or guess her entire sorry story by now. “Yes.”
His voice deepened into rawness. “I need to see you.”
For a fraught moment, emotion vibrated in the air. What she felt was strong enough to shift mountains. “Then undress me, Nicholas,” she whispered.
His Christian name emerged perfectly naturally. She stroked the side of his face with a gesture that conveyed the tenderness blossoming inside her.
He kissed her softly. It wasn’t a passionate claiming. Instead it was like the kiss he’d given her by the brook in Surrey, the kiss that had nearly broken her heart. This was the kiss a man gave the woman he loved. She blinked back stinging tears. She tried so hard to armor herself against him, but he put her completely at his mercy.
He undressed her with a dispatch that would disturb her if she hadn’t noticed how his hands shook with desire. She emerged from her trance when only her filmy chemise remained. It was white silk embroidered with pink roses, another relic of reckless Lady Antonia Hilliard. Her hair tumbled around her shoulders in brazen disarray.
“Wait,” she said in a thready voice she barely recognized. When she placed her palm on his chest, she felt his ragged breathing.
“Dear God, Antonia, don’t torment me,” he bit out.
“I need to see you too,” she murmured, bunching his shirt in her hand and hauling him closer. “You’re dressed for a duchess’s garden party.”
He laughed with the hint of self-deprecation that always beguiled. He caught her hand, pressing it again to the front of his trousers. “I’d shock the duchess.”