Daniel sucked in a breath and was immediately grateful for the bands of cloth wrapped around his ribs.
“Hmm?”
“Are we in your mother’s house?”
Miranda smothered a yawn, propped herself on her elbow, and shoved her hair out of her eyes. “What?”
Daniel bit back a groan as the circulation returned to his arm and shoulder with a vengeance. “Is your mother in residence?”
The sheet slipped off her shoulders, giving Daniel an unrestricted view of her naked breasts as Miranda reacted, bolting upright in bed, and blinking in confusion. “Here?”
Daniel’s mouth went dry as he stared at Miranda’s unfettered breasts. They were, quite simply, the most spectacular pair of breasts he’d ever seen. Pear-shaped, ivory-toned, and pink-tipped. Big enough to fill his hands, but not weighty enough to droop. He’d known that Miranda was well endowed. The fashions of the day, with their revealing décolletage, made it impossible not to notice her impressive display, but Daniel hadn’t realized how much her revealing bodices concealed, or quite how blessed Miranda was—until now.
He didn’t answer, and Miranda squeaked her dismay as she followed Daniel’s gaze and realized she was as bare breasted as an Amazon warrior and that he had taken full advantage of the view. Blushing to the roots of her hair, she yanked the sheet to her chest and tucked it around her. “Daniel, did you say my mother is here?” she repeated, frantically searching the covers for hairpins. Was it possible that Ned had returned to Curzon Street with the dowager Marchioness of St. Germaine?
“I assumed that must be the case,” he answered. “You tell me.”
“How can I?” Miranda asked. “When I just woke up?”
“As did I,” he told her.
Miranda frowned, clearly puzzled by their conversation. “Then why would you assume my mother is here?”
“You threatened to take me home to your mother,” he reminded her. “I didn’t believe you would do it—until I woke up here with you.”
She glared at him as understanding dawned. “You believe I brought you home to Mother?”
Daniel managed a slight nod. “It’s what you threatened to do.”
“I thought you trusted me.” Miranda sounded hurt.
“I did. I do.”
“You have a fine way of showing it, Your Grace,” she said.
“What was I to think?” he demanded, appealing to her logic. “It’s the last thing I remember clearly.”
“The last thing …” she sputtered.
“Yes.” He squeezed his eyes shut, then opened them once again. He remembered parts of the previous evening, but he couldn’t tell what had happened from what he’d dreamed. “Everything else is fuzzy.”
“You don’t remember anything I said after that?”
Daniel frowned. “Bits and pieces. But nothing clearly.” Something about a wheel of cheese. St. Michael’s Church. And Miranda looking quite fetching in a nightshirt and trousers.
Miranda sighed. “Of course you don’t. How silly of me to think otherwise. Why would you automatically believe the best of me, when I’ve given you every reason to believe the worst?”
Her sarcastic rebuke stung. Daniel did his best to ignore the pounding in his head and the pain in his side as he struggled to push himself up against the pillows. Praying he wouldn’t do himself further harm, Miranda watched as he finally managed to sit up, but didn’t offer to help. “What would you believe if you awoke and found yourself sharing a bed with a person who’d threatened to force a meeting with her mother on you?” He leaned against the headboard.
“I did wake up and find myself sharing a bed with a person who forced a meeting with his mother on me,” Miranda pointed out.
“I caught you before you entered the receiving line,” Daniel replied defensively. “You didn’t have to meet her face to face.”
“The point is that you invited me to your mother’s gala knowing she didn’t want me there.”
“You didn’t have to accept my invitation.”
“Lucky for you I did,” Miranda retorted. “Where would you be if I hadn’t?”