His big hands were on her bottom, spread and holding her. He ground himself into her as if he couldn’t get enough of her, as if he wanted to stay locked with her forever. But he was only a man after all. He slumped forward, somehow managing to bring her down gently. He disentangled her legs from his shoulders and then laid his head next to hers in the chair seat.
“Temperance,” he murmured, big and heavy and satiated on her. “Temperance.”
She looked at the ceiling of her little sitting room and knew she had to find the words to tell him what he meant to her. Knew she would lose him if she couldn’t let the words leave her lips, however painful and hard it was for her. She stood at a crossroads, and to make no decision was to lose everything instead. Tomorrow. Tomorrow she would find the way.
Tonight she simply closed her eyes.
TEMPERANCE WOKE EARLY the next morning and lay staring at the ceiling in her tiny lonely bedroom. She didn’t want to rise. Her bedroom was up under the eaves. This high in the home, there were only three rooms—hers, Winter’s, and the one Nell slept in when she wasn’t watching over the nursery at night. The rooms were cramped with low, sloping roofs. When it rained, a corner of her room leaked. In winter she was cold, and in summer it was abominably hot.
Dear God, sometimes she wished she could simply fly away. Perhaps that was why she’d indulged in those dangerous interludes with Caire, risking not only pregnancy and a bastard child, but also her very soul. He was a temptation she seemed to have no defense against. Perhaps after all these years of fighting her very nature, it had finally become a moot point. Perhaps the fight itself was never really winnable. Perhaps—
A thump came from the room next to hers—Winter’s room. Temperance frowned and started to rise.
Something crashed next door.
She ran from her room. Winter’s door was shut, of course, so she rapped on it. “Brother?”
No answer.
She rapped harder and when there was still no sound from within, she balled her hand into a fist and pounded. “Winter! Are you all right?”
She tried the door handle, but it was locked. His bedroom was the only room in the house where Winter might find a measure of privacy. She was just beginning to wonder how she might break the door down when it swung suddenly inward.
“It’s all right.” Winter stood in the doorway, but despite his soothing words, all was manifestly not right. Blood streaked his pasty face, running from a gash on his forehead, and he swayed where he stood.
Temperance wrapped her arms about her brother’s waist to keep him from falling. “What happened to you?”
He raised his hand to his face and then seemed startled when he saw the blood on his fingers. “I… I believe I fell.”
His hesitant tone alarmed her more. “You don’t know?”
“I can’t seem…” He trailed off and looked about his tiny, cell-like room. “Perhaps I should sit down.”
She helped him to sit on his bed—there was no room for even a chair—then stood over him anxiously. “Are you ill? When did you last eat?”
She tried to lay the back of her hand on his forehead, but with uncharacteristic irritation, he brushed her away. “I’m perfectly fine; I just—”
“Fell down and can’t remember why?” she said in exasperation. “What did you eat for dinner last night?”
His forehead creased. “Ah…”
“Oh, Winter! Did you eat anything at all?”
“Perhaps some broth,” he said, not meeting her eyes.
Temperance sighed. Winter had never learned how to lie effectively. “Stay here and I’ll fetch some breakfast and bandages.”
“But the school,” he said fretfully. “I must open it.”
“No.” She pushed him back onto his bed, for he’d tried to rise again. “The school can close for one day.”
“We’ll lose the tuition,” he said.
Temperance stared at him. It was true; if the school was not opened, then the students did not pay tuition for that day. “Surely we can afford one day closed?”
He shook his head, his complexion almost as white as his pillow. “We’ve used nearly all the money Lord Caire gave us.”
“What?” she asked, shocked.
“We owed the butcher and baker,” he whispered, “and we hadn’t paid the cobbler for the boys’ shoes this last November.”
Temperance looked about the small room, but there was no one else to make the decision for her. “We’ll be fine. Just don’t try to get up. Promise me, Winter?”
“Yes.” He nodded, and, indeed, his eyes were already closed when she left the room.
Dear God, she’d known they were in desperate straits, but she’d had no idea the depths to which they’d fallen. Temperance hurried down the stairs, trying to order her priorities, but she kept coming back to the fact that Winter was ill, and she just couldn’t run the home without him.
She walked into the big old kitchen, her mind in turmoil, but stopped when she saw who was within.
Polly stood next to Nell, and both women’s faces were fearful. Mary Whitsun huddled in a corner, her little face white. Polly held a still bundle in her arms.
“What is it?” Temperance whispered.
“I’m sorry,” Polly said. “She was suckling fine and then last night…” She pulled back a corner of the blanket. Mary Hope was within, her tiny face red and shining with moisture.
Polly looked up, her face white. “She has the fever.”
Chapter Sixteen
That night, Meg was led into a magnificent dining room. A feast was laid there, but the only one who sat at the table was the king with his little blue bird in its golden cage at his elbow.
The king dismissed the guards and indicated a chair at his right hand. “Come sit by me, Meg.”
Meg sat very carefully so as not to harm her lovely dress.
“Now, Meg,” King Lockedheart said as he took a gold plate and set meat and sugared fruit upon it.
“I have a question for you.”
“What is that, Your Majesty?”
The king set the plate he had filled with his own hands before her. “I wish to know what love is.”…
—from King Lockedheart
“The lighter wood, I think,” Lazarus said consideringly early that afternoon. “With the ivory inlay.”
He and Mr. Kirk, the piano maker, were in his study. Mr. Kirk had brought half a dozen different wooden boards, each intricately decorated. Lazarus ran his hand over the sample he’d chosen. It was feminine without being overornamented.
Like Temperance.
“A very nice choice, my lord.” Mr. Kirk gathered his samples into an especially made case. “I believe we have something nearly finished. Shall I deliver it to you in a fortnight?”
“No. It’s to be a present. I shall give you the address to deliver it to.”
“As you wish, my lord.” Kirk bowed, backing from the room obsequiously.
Lazarus leaned back in his chair feeling oddly light, almost carefree. He’d given presents to other women—payments for services rendered—but he’d never taken the trouble to pick out the gift himself. Frankly it hadn’t mattered, either to him or the woman. She would regard the trinkets and jewels he bestowed as insurance against the inevitable time when they would part, something easily converted to money. He hoped that Temperance would regard his gift in a more permanent light, that perhaps their relationship itself might one day become—
His dreamy thoughts were interrupted by the door to his study opening again. Lazarus looked up and for a moment wondered if his thoughts of Temperance had conjured her out of thin air.
He stood. “Temperance. What are you doing here?”
“I…” She glanced about his study as if dazed. “I… I thought to visit you.”
His brows drew together. “Are you all right?”
“Yes, perfectly.” But her bottom lip trembled.
Why was she lying to him? “Would you like to sit? I’ll ring for some wine—”
“No!” She started for him. “No, please don’t call anyone. I simply wanted to be with you.”
Her face was pale. The wide-brimmed hat she held in one hand fell to the floor as she came toward him.
“How did you get here?” he asked.
“I walked,” she said breathlessly.
“From St. Giles?” He shook his head. “Temperance, you must tell me what the matter is. I—”
“No.” She took his face between his palms. “I don’t. I don’t want to think about that for a while. I don’t want to think about anything.”
And she pulled his head down and kissed him. Her mouth was desperate on his, not soft and luring, but hot and hungry. His body reacted as if trained to service her and her alone. He found himself with his arms about her, his tongue already in her mouth. She made a sound of satisfaction beneath his lips as he crowded her against the desk. His hands were on her skirts, gathering them even as his mind reminded him that there was no lock on his study door.
“Damn it.” He tore his mouth from hers, sweeping her into his arms.
Swiftly he bore her out of the study, past his startled butler and up the stairs to his bedroom. Small was inside when he kicked the door open.
“Out,” Lazarus said in a voice he no longer recognized as his own.
The valet disappeared silently.
Lazarus laid Temperance on his bed, then began to climb in beside her.
“No,” she said breathlessly.
He froze, watching her.
“I want…” She licked her lips. “I want to do this your way.”
Despite her veiled words, he knew immediately what she meant. Animal desire slammed through him, hardening his cock to the point of pain, drawing his balls tight. Dear God, yes. In a second, he was half mad with the mere thought. He could take her in the way he liked best; she’d asked. But a small part of him withdrew, shaking its head in disapproval. Temperance was different. He couldn’t use her like this.
“Are you sure?” he demanded.
“Yes.”
He leaned over her, a hawk guarding prey before the strike. “Be sure. Once a certain point is crossed, I won’t be able to back away. And you won’t be able to make me.”
Her throat worked as she swallowed. “Please. I want to know what you do. I want to feel it.”
He stared at her a moment longer, trying to read her mind, before shoving off the bed again. His hands were trembling.
“Very well.” He took a step back, afraid to touch her. Afraid to lose control. “Take off your clothes.”
She drew in a breath, her cheeks pinkening, but her hands moved to the laces of her bodice readily enough. He watched, his fingers flexing by his sides, as she stripped off bodice and stays, her skirt and shoes. When she extended a slim foot forward and slowly unrolled her stockings, he began to think she was teasing him. When she pulled the chemise gracefully over her head and threw it to the floor, he knew. She reached up and took the pins from her hair, fluffing it and combing her fingers through the locks. She sat on his bed, entirely nude, her breasts high and proud, one calf under the other leg, and she simply looked at him, waiting for his next command.
He swallowed. God. Could he do this? But she’d wanted it. She’d asked for it.
He turned before he could change his mind and quickly crossed to his chest of drawers. Inside the top drawer was a pile of neckcloths, neatly folded. He grabbed a handful and returned to the bed.
“Lie down,” he said, his voice husky.
She complied, placing her wrists over her head without prompting, near the spools of his headboard. He tied them there, trying to keep his eyes away from her breasts, drawn high by her lifted arms, away from her parted mouth.
