Chapter Twenty-Six

H ettie lay awake with him sleeping beside her. All the while she thought of all the things she'd heard people say about lovemaking. And she thought of all the things she'd heard from the women she encountered through her charities and their much more realistic, if crude, understanding of physical intimacy. Not a single one of those conversations had prepared her for him. For how he'd made her feel.

The passion and pleasure of their first night together had not been an aberration. If their activities from earlier in the evening had proven one thing to her, it was that Josiah Ettinger knew her body perhaps better than she did herself. It left her feeling disadvantaged in some way. She didn't have the same level of experience to draw from. She didn't know all the things to do that would even the field of play between them. Right now, it felt as if he held all the cards and she was simply being buoyed along by the current he created.

There was one undeniable truth that she would admit, at least to herself if not yet to him. No other man would ever be the perfect combination of dangerous and protective that he was. No other man would ever make her feel safe without also making her feel smothered. That was only him. The man who had fathered her child and whom she was once more counting on to save her life.

He turned over in bed, one heavily muscled thigh draped over her and his arms tightening about her, pulling her back against his chest. And yet he slept on. His deep, even breathing was proof enough of that.

Rather than try to extricate herself from his slumberous embrace, Hettie settled into it, allowing the warmth of his body to seep into her own. It calmed her racing thoughts and eased the grip of fear that held her so firmly in its sway. And that bit of relaxation allowed her to both accept and admit one undeniable truth: There was a sort of inevitability about them. It felt as though they'd been moving in concentric circles about one another, caught up in the currents of their own lives until they were finally brought together. Was that enough?

She had wanted love. Having married once for position and rank, only to suffer terribly for it, she'd clung to the notion that one day she might marry again—and marry a man who cherished her. She wasn't certain that Joss could ever give her that. He could offer her protection. Heaven knew he could offer her pleasure and passion.

"Your thoughts are troublesome enough to keep the whole house awake," he murmured against her ear.

"I thought you were sleeping."

"I was," he said. "But instead of holding a warm and pliant woman in my arms, I find myself holding a tense one—your body is all but rigid with whatever turmoil is brewing in your thoughts."

"I can't help it. There are so many things happening—and I feel like I'm barely keeping my head above water. And you know how I feel about water!"

She felt his smile as his lips pressed against her neck.

"We have time. We have time to figure things out for us," he said. "So that goes on the shelf, at least for a while. And we focus on the things we are not yet fully in control of. Simon and Bates. Once we have them where we want them, then there will be time enough to figure out the rest."

Looking down at her already slightly rounded belly, she made a sound of derision. "We don't have that much time."

"Two weeks," he vowed. "Give me a fortnight, and all of this will be gone from your life. These burdens they have put on you will be lifted. I promise."

"Do not promise things that you cannot possibly deliver," she rebuked softly.

"I do not. I never have," he said. "Two weeks, Hettie. Then we look to the future and what it means for us both."

*

It took some time before she finally drifted to sleep. Gradually, the tension seeped from her and her eyes fluttered closed. And in the faint light that filtered in through curtains they'd not bothered to close, he studied the delicate lines of her profile. The slim, straight, and slightly upturned nose was the sort that most women bemoaned not having. He'd never met a single woman in all his life who was satisfied with her appearance. Yet, Hettie seemed to be. As well she should. In spite of her awareness of her beauty, she lacked any conceit or vanity about it. Likely because she understood it to be a double-edged sword.

His gaze then drifted to the fullness of her lips, slightly parted in her repose. And yet even in the boneless sleep of exhaustion that had finally claimed her, her chin jutted forward in display of her enduring stubbornness. It wasn't a flaw to his mind. It was simply part of her, and perhaps one of the best parts.

Extricating himself from the bed was not exactly easy, at least without doing so in a fashion that would not wake her. Finally, he rose and retrieved his clothing, dressing silently in the dim light. With one last lingering look at her, he turned and left the room. He was about to do something he hated, something that galled him beyond belief. He'd be getting his hands dirty once more, whether he liked it or not.

Padding silently to the door, boots in hand, he exited to the corridor and then made his way downstairs. He didn't question for a moment that Vincent would be awake. He might have sought his wife's bed and her company for a time, but the man rarely slept.

As predicted, the Hound was in his study, sipping a brandy and staring at several documents spread out on the desk before him. He looked up as Joss entered.

"I rather thought we'd seen the last of you for the night. Surely you have better things to occupy your time!"

"The same could be said of you," Joss retorted, taking a seat across the desk from him. "I can only presume we are both awake because of the situation Hettie finds herself in."

"The one where her nephew and a corrupt Runner are trying to pin a murder on her? Or the one where she's having a child that is most decidedly not her late husband's?"

Joss shrugged. "Both warrant an equal amount of urgency, I think."

"So they do. What is on your mind, Joss? You wouldn't be here unless there was something particular you have thought of."

"Bates has a mistress. To my knowledge, she's not a light skirt, not some third-rate courtesan... but they aren't married. And she lives alone in a rented apartment. We need to find out who is paying that rent. Because it can't be her, and it can't be him. Not on what a Runner makes."

"You think he's being paid off?"

Joss nodded. "I do. Maybe not now, but certainly at some time in the past."

"What's the address?"

"Number forty-seven Bedford Court," Joss said.

"Alright. I'll speak to an agent tomorrow about acquiring the property."

"You don't have to buy the bloody building!" Joss protested.

"Maybe, maybe not. If it's a good investment with reasonable and legitimate returns, there is no reason not to do so. Regardless, as a prospective buyer who wishes to retain tenants, I'd certainly be entitled to ask questions regarding how rents are paid and by whom."

It was a solid plan, and one he certainly should have thought of. One he might have thought of had he not been so distracted by other things. "Right. I'm off to the Cock and Crow."

"Why the devil would you go there? If you want to drink something to rot your innards, no doubt Mrs. Ivers will have some poisonous cleaning concoction that would do the trick."

Joss laughed then. "Not going for a drink. There's a fellow I know, someone who used to feed me quite a bit of information when I was still with the Runners. It's a meeting place, as you know. A place where contracts of a diabolical nature are often struck. I doubt very much that Simon Dagliesh managed all this on his own. If I can find someone to place him there, and to place him with known thugs for hire, then I can cast enough doubt on his motives that Hettie would at least not be the only suspect."

The silence in the room stretched, becoming quite uncomfortable. "That's your only destination?" Vincent finally asked.

"Do you mean will I be stopping by the opium den that is operated next door? No. I will not. I mean to visit the tavern, speak to my man there, and return here—hopefully before Hettie awakens to find me gone."

"At what point, if you haven't returned, should we be concerned?"

Joss didn't take offense. He knew that Vincent wasn't only thinking of the temptations that lay ahead of him. "If I'm not back by breakfast, then you should worry."