Talk of the Ton (Free Fellows League 5)

“Of course, you can.”

“No, really,” she protested. “I’m afraid I’ll see it all in my dreams.”

“Then we’ll just have to give you something else to think about.” Jonathan leaned down and brushed her lips with his. He meant his kiss to be a light, pleasant, comforting sort of kiss, but Jonathan cursed himself for a fool when his dormant desires sprang to life, and his body began to stir beneath her bottom. He tried to will his erection away, but it refused to be dismissed, and Jonathan groaned at the knowledge that resuming sleep had just become an impossible dream.

India looked up at him. “Are you going to ask me to share your bed?”

“You’re already sharing my bed,” he said. “Or rather, we’re both sharing Mustafa’s.”

India grimaced at the mention of the eunuch’s name.

He smoothed away the grimace with the pad of his thumb, then tenderly kissed the corner of her mouth. “Are you going to . . .” India blushed, faltering for words. “Make yourself my lover?”

“No.” Jonathan shook his head. “If I ever become your lover, it will be because we both want it, not because you feel the reaction of my body and think you’re obliged to appease it. You belong to yourself now, Lady India, you’re not obliged to service any man in order to survive.” He made a face at her. “This isn’t the first time I’ve held a woman in my arms and become randy with desire. And God willing, it won’t be the last, but I hope I’m enough of a gentleman to assure you that if you’ll just close your eyes like a good little lady and go to sleep, it will eventually go away.”

“What are you going to do?” she asked before closing her eyes.

“Talk,” Jonathan told her. “I’m going to talk you to sleep.”

“How?”

“I’m going to tell you a story guaranteed to put you to sleep.”

“My nurse used to tell me stories to help me fall asleep,” India confided.

“Then pretend I’m your nurse.”

“Impossible.” India giggled. “My nurse was Indian. She was short with dark hair and eyes. You look nothing like her.”

“Then pretend I’m her tall English lover.”

India giggled harder.

“Now, go to sleep.” Jonathan smiled down at her as she opened one eye to peek at him, then he cleared his throat and began to tell the story.

“Once upon a time there was a little boy of seven who was sent away from London to school in the faraway wilds of . . .”

“Where?”

“Middlesex.”

“No, I meant where was the little boy sent to school?”

“The Knightsguild School for Gentlemen.”

“The Knightsguild School for Gentleman,” she repeated. “It sounds very old-fashioned.”

He nodded. “Indeed.”

“Is there really a place like that?”

“There is indeed,” Jonathan confirmed. “It’s a military academy, and it’s produced some of the finest soldiers and statesmen this country has ever known. And our little boy desperately wanted to join that august roster of heroes.”

“What was his name?”

Jonathan thought for a moment. “Why don’t we call him Johnny? Little Johnny Manners . . .”

India fell asleep listening to Jonathan’s deep baritone as he related the wonderful adventures of Johnny Manners and his friends as they took on the wicked Mr. Norworthy, headmaster at the Knightsguild School for Gentlemen.