Nick brought his mouth down on Tallie’s, felt the sweetness as her lips parted under his, the instinctive yielding trust to follow wherever he took her. A silent shout of triumph and possessiveness rose in him, overwhelming, extraordinary, beyond anything he had felt with any other woman.
The knock on the door, as discreet as only the most highly trained valet could produce, was like a cannon shot in his intensely sensitised state. Nick froze, the erotic dream he had been immersed in giving way to broad daylight and the appalled realisation that, despite his firm resolve, he was in his bed making love to an innocent virgin who had every right to expect his protection and his respect.
Wrenching his eyes away from Tallie’s face, seeing the softness of sensuality being replaced with a sharp edge of awareness and alarm, he threw back the bedcovers and stalked towards the door. The soft gasp from the bed made him glance down and realise just what a betraying state of arousal he was in.
Nick seized his dressing-gown, praying that after the first startled glance Tallie had closed her eyes.
With the bed curtains partly drawn, she was at least sheltered from the door, he thought grimly, dragging the garment closed and tying the cord.
He yanked the door open to find no one outside, but a tray left on the table. He lifted it and brought it inside, flicking open the folded note as he put it down.
I apologise for waking your lordship but, as you intimated last night a desire to make an early visit to Bruton Street this morning, I thought it advisable. Matthews.
His valet was the only one of his household, other than Roberts the coachman, who had any idea that he had brought a woman home with him last night. With his usual tact Matthews had placed only one cup and plate on the tray, but the jug of chocolate was larger than usual and, instead of the single roll he would normally consume with it, there was a selection of sweet pastries. Matthews never showed the slightest inclination to judge his master, whatever queer starts he got up to. He was fiercely protective of his reputation amongst the other servants and would doubtless swear blind they were all hallucinating if they came in this minute and saw who was in his bed.
There was silence behind the bed curtains. Nick stood regarding them, suddenly conscious of the ache of passion denied competing with the appalling stiffness that racked his shoulder and arm muscles. He grimaced and flexed his arms, welcoming the distraction from his other discomfort while he pondered on what to do now and just what a mess he had got himself into.
The clock stood at quarter past seven. There was time to plan Tallie’s return to Bruton Street with some care. He opened the clothes press and found a thin silk dressing-gown he used when travelling and extended an arm around the curtains.
‘Thank you.’
At least she was still speaking to him. Nick cleared his throat. ‘If you draw the curtain when you are ready, I have some breakfast here for you.’ Again, a polite acknowledgment. ‘Then we need to discuss what to do next.’
That was greeted by silence. Just how long did it take to put on a dressing-gown? But instead of pulling back the curtain Tallie emerged from the far side of the bed, the gown wrapped tightly around her, her bare feet shuffling so as not to trip over the trailing hem. She pushed back the weight of her hair with both hands, an action that caused her breasts to lift and thrust against the thin silk. Nick closed his eyes and turned abruptly to pour chocolate, wishing he kept a bottle of brandy in his bedroom.
Behind him Tallie cleared her throat and then asked in a voice of determined calm, ‘What happened last night?’
She watched Nick turn, his eyes on the cup of chocolate, apparently intent on not spilling it. He set it on a table in the window embrasure and pulled out a chair for her. Tallie stayed standing, wondering if the pounding in her blood was ever going to calm down, or if the throbbing ache in places she had hardly been aware of before was ever going to subside.
Nick added the plate of pastries to the table and said abruptly, ‘Please sit down. If you don’t, I can’t.’
She went to sit where he indicated and pulled the cup towards her, suddenly both hungry and thirsty.
The sweet warmth sank into her stomach and she sighed and sat back, sitting up again with a sharp gasp as her lacerated skin hit the wood.
‘Your back is badly grazed,’ Nick said shortly. ‘I put basillicum powder on it; I do not think it will scar.’
‘Thank you.’ He was obviously not going to make this easy for her. ‘What did happen last night? I need to know.’
‘How much do you remember? My carriage was waiting, but when you told me Mrs Blackstock and the rest of the Upper Wimpole Street household was away I had to think where else to take you. I could hardly return you to Bruton Street to a houseful of servants, stark naked.’ Tallie closed her eyes momentarily at the thought. ‘And you were freezing cold to the bone, scarcely conscious. I did not trust anyone else to look after you, so I brought you here, warmed you up the only way I could think of. I did not intend to stay after you had got warm, but I must have dropped off to sleep. I am sorry.’
Tallie bent her head over her plate and crumbled a roll. ‘It was not your fault, you must have been exhausted. But …’ This was so difficult! ‘I must know—did any thing … happen? I mean, once I was here …’
Nick moved abruptly and stood up. ‘You mean, was I not content with waiting until you woke up to force myself on you? Did I ravish you while you were unconscious?’
As soon as he spoke Tallie knew how insulting her suspicions had been. ‘No, of course not! I just thought … everything is so muddled. I thought perhaps we had … and I had forgotten. And you did not force yourself on me.’ She seized the cup and took a long gulp to hide her burning face.
To her amazement Nick laughed. She stared at him, forgetting how embarrassing it was to meet his eyes, uncertain whether he was mocking her. But no, it was genuine amusement. He came and sat opposite her again, leaned across and took her hand in his. ‘Tallie, my dear, you may have been in a poor way last night, but I do flatter myself that when I make love to a lady she does at least recall the experience the next morning.’
‘Yes, of course,’ she said hastily. Doubtless he had made love to scores of ladies, none of them as insultingly gauche as she was being. ‘And I am sure I would be aware, I mean I would feel …’ Her voice trailed away and she took a desperate bite of roll. Probably it was impossible to blush any redder than she was now, not without bursting into flames.
Nick appeared to pull himself together, which, she reflected bitterly, was a good thing because just at the moment the self-sufficient, practical, sensible Miss Talitha Grey would be unable to deal with a kitten who had stolen her knitting wool, let alone the tangle she seemed to have got herself into.
‘I had no intention of being in the bed when you woke,’ he said firmly. ‘I apologise for my reactions when you did—the result of only that moment waking up myself, which is, of course, an explanation, not an excuse. I should have been able to control myself.’
‘You appeared to be making a very good job of self-control,’ Tallie observed. It seemed that one passed some kind of barrier of embarrassment beyond which it was impossible to feel any more humiliated or shy than one already did.
‘Not good enough. There are things we must discuss, but not now.’
‘Oh, yes,’ said Tallie eagerly, wondering why Nick seemed so taken aback by her response. ‘How did Mr Hemsley know I was going to be at the studio and how did you know that he knew?’
He relaxed. ‘I will tell you about that later. Now, the next thing is to find you some clothes, I can hardly take you back to Bruton Street dressed like that.’
‘You could go back to Mr Harland’s studio and ask him to give you my clothes back.’
‘No, the place might be watched still. I