“Sodding Bradleys,” Rafe muttered, running his fingers through his curls and leaving them charmingly disheveled. Louder, he called, “I’ll be out in a trice.”
“I’m waiting,” Mr. Sutton announced, his voice grim.
“Let a man take his morning piss in peace, will you?” Rafe shouted back. “I’ll meet you in the mews in ten minutes.”
She would have flushed at his candor, but she was naked in his bed, and his tongue had been on her most intimate flesh. It was rather too late for her to be shocked.
“I’ll give you five, and then I’ll haul your arse out myself,” Mr. Sutton warned.
“Fine,” Rafe agreed, tossing back the bedclothes and rising.
She watched, too afraid to speak, as he stalked across the room and pressed his ear to the door. Her heart was pounding as fast as it had last night. She pressed a trembling hand to it, holding the counterpane over her bare breasts as if it were a shield.
What manner of scrape have you managed to find yourself in now, Persephone? So close to reaching your majority, and you have fallen into bed with a seductive rogue and courted scandal and ruin.
Rafe turned back to her. “Jasper’s gone now. We need to get you dressed and back to your room before anyone sees you.”
The return to her own chamber loomed. It was not far, and yet it may as well have been on another continent. So many chances for discovery.
She wetted her suddenly dry lips. “You needn’t worry over me. Your brother is awaiting you. I will find my way to my rooms.”
“That ain’t the way of it, lovely.” He strode toward her, frowning, and perhaps it was wrong of her, but she found her gaze lingering on his mouth.
Heavens, what his mouth had done to her. She was shameless, because despite the danger of her carefully constructed walls of lies crumbling around her, the place between her legs thrummed. She pressed her thighs together beneath the bedclothes to subdue the ache, but it only served to heighten the sensation and make her aware she was shockingly wet.
What had happened to her?
Rafe Sutton.
He was what had happened to her. This dangerous, gl
orious, caring, sweet, passionate man. And now she was not just in danger of losing her position, but her heart as well.
“I’ll be seeing you back safely where you belong,” he said sternly, arriving at the side of her bed with an armful of her discarded garments from the night before. “Come now, we’ve got to get you dressed.”
She had been so caught up in her own musings that she had failed to note him gathering her gown and petticoats. But although she had been quite free with her nudity last evening, and despite the intimacies they had shared, she found herself strangely reluctant to slip from his bed naked by the harsh light of morning.
“Shy?” Rafe asked, his tone so tender she could have wept. “No need for that, lovely. Shall I turn my back?”
He was acting as if Mr. Sutton had not put a time constraint on his appearance. As if the household would not be bustling about when they exited the room. As if nothing they had done was wrong. And she was grateful for it. His easy manner helped her panic to calm.
“Surely you do not intend to help me dress,” she said. “I can do that myself. I have been for some time now.”
Drat. She was once more revealing far too much. But if Rafe found anything to question in her words, he was saving it for another occasion.
Instead, he gave her a grin that showed his dimples. “You don’t need to dress yourself with me about. I’m a dab hand with a lady’s buntlings.”
The reminder that he likely had a vast number of women awaiting his attentions made a fierce surge of jealousy curdle her stomach. To her mortification, she realized she did not want this man to ever touch another lady’s buntlings, whatever they were. Only hers.
It is not meant to be, Persephone.
But what if it was?
Her heart ached.
“If you must,” she said.
“I must.”