She made no move to leave the carriage. "I thought we were going to the London office of Merewether Shipping when we finished at Lady Upworth's."
"You need some rest." His eyes were softened with compassionate understanding. "It's been an eventful afternoon."
Emotion she did not wish to name filled her chest. She could not afford to weaken toward Drake now.
"I'm not so fainthearted." Besides, she didn't have time to waste. Uncle Ashby was at risk until they unmasked the thief. "Proceed to the office."
His eyes widened at her peremptory tone.
She sighed. "Please."
"Whatever my lady wishes." He followed his sarcastic comment with immediate action, waving the footman back from the curricle. "Inform my aunt that we will be out this afternoon. We will return in time for tea."
The footman nodded his understanding and stepped back as Drake set the horses in motion.
Something inside Drake had shifted and settled when Thea snarled at him like an angry tigress for calling himself a bastard. She didn't deny the circumstances of his birth, but she wouldn't allow him to belittle himself because of them. The reason, he knew, was because those circumstances did not diminish his value in her sight. He looked at her out of the corner of his eye. She sat perfectly erect, as if she were still irritated by his comment.
She could not possibly know what her ready acceptance meant to him. The only people who had ever accepted him at face value his entire life had been his grandfather and his mother. Even the rest of his family defined him by his status as a bastard. His own aunt had felt compelled to warn Thea just what she was getting when she became entangled with him.
He wanted to kiss the stubborn, delicious woman beside him until she melted against him and forgot what she was angry about. He needed to show her how much her belief in him mattered. He had given up on tender feelings after the debacle of his courtship of Deirdre, but he didn't think lust alone described his current emotions.
Although it was certainly an element of what he felt. Images of her smooth naked body stretched out on the narrow bed in his stateroom filled his head, and he realized that he wanted to do much more than kiss her. He wanted to bury himself so deep inside her she wouldn't know where she ended and he began. He wanted the right to sleep in her bed every night and rejoiced at the thought of planting a child in her womb.
Hard arousal pressed against the buttons of his fly. Bloody hell. She'd better change her mind about marrying him soon. Not that she showed any signs of doing so. Intractable wench.
As his body responded to his thoughts, he began to wonder if waiting to make love to her again until they were married was the best course of action. It had seemed the most honorable line to take on the ship. Her refusal to consider marriage had convinced him to stay away from her, first out of anger because the thought that she considered him in the same league as her father still rankled, then in the hopes that she would miss what they had experienced and want it enough to risk marriage.
Although sound reasoning, it didn't appear to be working. She acted as if she didn't remember the way her body responded to his. He could think of numerous ways to remind her, ways that would give them both satisfaction. How better to convince her that marriage to him was the right choice? He would show her that the afternoon in his cabin was just the beginning of what they could experience together as man and wife.
She would be forced to realize that she belonged to him.
Thea's voice pulled him from his thoughts. "Do not think that your lamentable tendency to refer to yourself in such inappropriate terms has made me forget your words to my aunt."
"She deserved to know my intentions."
"That's ridiculous. Your intentions are neither here nor there as far as my aunt is concerned."
She truly was naive about the ways of the ton. "Do you remember my aunt's reaction to me visiting you aboard ship?"
"Yes, but that was a temporary aberration. Look at how calmly she reacted to finding us kissing in the hall."
His aunt's so-called calm reaction was the result of him telling her he had every intention of marrying Thea before the Golden Dragon had ever sailed into port. She knew once he made up his mind, he let nothing stand in his way. Not even headstrong women with independent natures and not enough sense.
"The gossip that will undoubtedly start to circulate once she begins to introduce you to Society will cause a reaction in your aunt similar to the one mine had on the ship. In other words, she won't take it calmly at all. I didn't want her to worry, so I told her my intentions were honorable."
After all, Lady Upworth had reason to doubt it. He was his father's son. As much as he would like to forget that fact, Society never would.
Thea stirred next to him and placed her hand on his arm. She gave it a gentle squeeze. "That's very thoughtful of you, but don't you think she'll be disappointed when we don't marry?"
He had no intention of disappointing her aunt or himself. "Don't worry. She's more likely to be relieved in the meantime."
A huge breath of air escaped from between Thea's lips. "I wish everyone would give up this idea of introducing me to Society. It's just complicating everything and is bound to take time away from my investigation. Can you imagine the hours I'll have to waste shopping for new clothes?"
Thea made shopping for clothes sound like a fate worse than death. "Come, don't you think you will enjoy the time with your aunt? Besides, I have yet to meet a lady who wasn't interested in her wardrobe."
He watched her take her lower lip between her teeth and wanted to stop the carriage and cover that little lip with his own. Then he would trail kisses down her neck. She would make sexy little noises in the back of her throat. He would touch her breasts, first through the fabric of her gown, and then peeling the fabric away, he'd put his hands on her naked skin.
His already hard body began to ache. He almost missed her answer to his statement.