He blinked twice but said nothing.
“So are you Lord Pettiwhistle, Charles Daring, Frederick Mortmain, or . . . ?” She looked at the ceiling while she remembered. “Oh, it can’t be.”
He waited quietly.
“A. Fairwether.” She shook her head. “How perfectly . . . apt.” She was too tired, too spent from the day, to find a better word.
Adam stared at her for a moment. Then he picked up his pack and set it on the table across from her. “If you still wish to know tomorrow, I’m happy to tell you. But your majordomo sent you some food. You eat. I’ll air the cot.”
She looked at the bag of food and the cot, a thin, badly stuffed pallet of hay. She couldn’t think; she couldn’t even move. If she had to do one more thing, she would simply sit at the table and cry. She bent her arms to make a pillow and laid her head down on the table.
Adam looked confused for only a moment, then he moved into action.
From the top of the pack, he removed several large packets of food. Bread, slices of roast beef, cheese, assorted sweetmeats, and a very large piece of the wedding fruitcake. He took a plate and fork from the cupboard, wiped both free of dust, then served her hearty helpings of everything.
She took the plate gratefully, eating something of everything. But she was especially pleased when he served her an especially large portion of the fruitcake.
For weeks, she’d been sneaking into the kitchen to pour brandy over the cake and watch it soak. Her mother had made a fruitcake for their Christmas dinner, and it was the one thing about the wedding for which she felt a real excitement. The fruit and spices mingled with the heavy brandy tasted heavenly, and the brandy sauce on top left her giddy.
After she finished her own, she kept trimming pieces off of Adam’s portion, until it grew smaller and smaller. Eventually, with real regret, she felt obligated to leave him a tiny sliver. Then, while Adam wasn’t looking, she took the fruitcake’s paper wrapper and licked it clean.
With the help of the brandied cake, she soon felt in better spirits. Even so she was still exhausted. She needed rest, real rest, before they traveled anywhere, and certainly before she asked Adam to explain why he wasn’t a criminal. He should be a criminal; he kissed like a criminal. She almost giggled out loud at the word, repeating it a few more times in her mind.
Having aired the cot’s mattress, Adam returned to the table, wiping clean her plate, and placing the remaining food on the counter.
“Aren’t you going to eat?” She knew he needed food. Something about his gait suggested that his wound, whatever it was, hadn’t fully healed.
“I will, but I thought you might wish to change out of your wedding clothes. Your butler sent a nightshift and dressing gown as well as a walking dress for tomorrow’s journey.”
Emmeline looked down at her wedding dress, still shimmering to her touch. She hadn’t done any damage that a careful brushing wouldn’t undo. But what would she do with it? It would be a shame to leave it at the cottage for the moths and mice to destroy, especially since it had been one of her mother’s favorite dresses. But she had little desire to wear it again, and even less to remind herself how foolish she’d been in accepting Colin’s proposal in the first place. Perhaps they could find a way to leave it for Jeffreys.
Adam stood watching her. When she raised her eyes to him, he stood still, immobile like a hart in the woods. For a brief instant, she thought she saw desire there—and fear.
“I’ll step outside and let you change.” Adam didn’t wait for her response. He leapt from the room as if he were running from the fires of Pompeii.
Is something wrong? She thought to call him back. But he was unlikely to answer her. Hadn’t he already deflected most of her questions? A criminal, a rake, or a scoundrel wouldn’t have left her to remove her dress alone, so why didn’t he stay? But Adam apparently wasn’t any of those things. Or was he? She couldn’t seem to think clearly. Change and sleep, she told herself.
Tiny covered buttons ran down her spine from between her shoulder blades to the base of her spine. She twisted sideways and unbuttoned the top. But no matter how she contorted her arms, she couldn’t undo any of the others. The buttons were too small, and their holes too tightly fitted. If she weren’t careful, she’d tear the dress at the seams. She stood for a moment, not sure whether to laugh or cry.
She would have to ask for help . . . again.
She opened the door several inches. “Adam, I need your help. I appear to be stuck.” She pointed to her back to show her dilemma.
A pained expression crossed his face, but he did not answer. He appeared to be thinking that if he ignored the problem of her dress, it would simply go away.
She pulled the creaking door open wide. “Adam?”
“Yes, my lady,” he answered without moving toward her.
“I promise I won’t bite . . . unless you do.” She surprised herself with the words, but once they were spoken, she could not regret them. Exhaustion made her giddy.
If he would only look at her with desire, if he would only kiss her . . . she wasn’t certain what she would do if he did, but she knew she wanted it. She’d wanted it since she’d seen him walking through the cemetery to her wedding.
Since her mother’s dress had already been carefully lined with linen, Em’s modiste had seen no reason to leave room in the design for a shift. If he helped her, he would be undressing her almost completely. The thought shouldn’t have thrilled her, but it did. And she put her hand to her lips to hold back the insistent giggle.
He shook his head, refusing to respond. He returned to the cottage reluctantly.
She hurried back into the middle of the room, positioning herself between the table and the cot. She stood so that as he unbuttoned her dress, he could see the cot over her shoulder.
Holding her dress against her bodice in the front, she looked over her shoulder to him. “The modiste chose the smallest buttons available.”
“I can see that,” he growled. Still wearing his gloves, he positioned himself at arm’s length from her dress. He undid the first button with only a bit of trying, but the second wouldn’t give.
“Perhaps you would do better without the gloves,” she said sweetly.
Cursing, he pulled his gloves off and threw them to the floor. Returning to her dress, he undid the first rank of buttons with unexpected precision. The dress released from her shoulder blades to the base of her rib cage. But the buttons against the small of her back refused to give. He tried several methods to create some give in the material, but none worked.
“It might help to hold the material out from my back,” she said even more sweetly. The touch of his hand, even through the material of her dress, made her feel brazen. “You might need to hold the material from the inside.”
He cursed again. But he followed her direction. With delight, she felt the backs of his fingers against her bare flesh. With each button, his fingers brushed down her spine. She imagined him replacing his fingers with kisses, tracing the line of her spine with his lips. She felt her skin tighten with desire.
What would he do if she let the material slide down her hips into a pool around her feet? Would he follow the line of its fall with kisses? Would his face darken with desire as she turned to face him, naked? She closed her eyes, remembering how it felt to love him.
By the time he’d reached the last button, her face felt flushed, and the room had grown stiflingly warm. Even her desire to giggle had faded.
She hesitated, suddenly sober, not knowing what she would do if he rejected her invitation.
She felt the last of the buttons release, her back bare to the cold.
“All done,”