He nudged her gently, hoping she was awake for no other reason than that, in the sultry, musky aftermath of their lovemaking, he wanted her company. “Ivy?”
“Mm.”
He brushed his lips through her hair. “What made you change your mind? About believing me, I mean.”
When she didn’t immediately reply, he realized the foolishness of the question. What did it matter why she believed him, as long as she did?
Then she raised her head and smiled down at him. “I believed you because it was you telling me. Because I knew Simon the man wouldn’t lie to me, and Lord Harrow the scientist would make no such declaration without evidence to substantiate his claims.”
The simplicity of her trust awed him. “It was that easy?”
“Easy? Good heavens. A week ago, and with anyone else, I’d have reached a far-different conclusion. I assure you, sir, my faith has been hard-won.”
With a delighted laugh, he rolled again until they lay on their sides facing each other, and her lips were his for the taking. Arousal stirred anew. “You are a most extraordinary woman,” he said between kisses. “You know that, don’t you?”
Her face grew somber. “But am I still your assistant? Has this changed anything?”
Misgiving closed around him. More than anything, he wanted to reassure her of her place in his laboratory, but as he regarded her heart-shaped face with its large dark eyes and pretty, plump lips, a painful tug in his chest affirmed that
everything
between them had changed.
A week ago, she had been some anonymous youth who first captured his notice with an audacious wave of her hand. In young “Ned’s” essay, Simon had discovered the zeal he had sought in an assistant. Galileo’s teeth, he remembered the same unbridled enthusiasm in everything Aurelia did. And while yesterday and even this morning memories of his wife would have caused him pain, now he found himself able to think about her without a frame of sorrow surrounding her image.
He wondered briefly why that should be, then discerned the very reason poised beside him, waiting with visible consternation for his reply.
“
Have
things changed?” she whispered.
He released a sigh. “How could things not have changed? You are not Ned. Nor are you some brazen young female stealing her way into my laboratory under false pretenses. You are
Ivy
.”
Lovely, incomparable Ivy, with the power to banish the ghosts from his past
and
bring him back from the brink of death. He fingered a tendril of hair that curled against her cheek. How could he make her understand that after the intimacy they’d shared, he could no longer put her at risk, as his experiments, no matter how carefully conducted, certainly would do?
He could not bear the sorrow of another accident, another life lost. And exactly what that sentiment said about his feelings for Ivy . . . Unable and unwilling to consider those feelings, and wishing he could shed them as readily as he had shed his clothing, he shut his eyes. Ah, but the feelings persisted. They were more than skin-deep; they were already part of him, in a way he thought he’d never experience again. In exactly the same way he had been determined to avoid.
“Simon—”
He placed a finger over her lips. “No words, remember? Not while we’re in each other’s arms. As you also pointed out, it is Sunday. I should not have worked today. Neither is it a day for arguing.”
The fight drained from her features and a reluctant, crooked smile dawned. “For today, then. Tomorrow, however, I do intend to continue working, and to argue my right to do so if I must.”
“I see those boys’ clothes of yours have made you brash and stubborn.”
“Which is better than stark raving mad.”
He laughed. “Are you implying something?”
Her eyes sparking mischief, she turned in his arms and wiggled her shapely rear against him. But just as he snaked an arm around her waist and set his mouth to the nape of her neck, she let out a whimper of dismay. Her hand disappeared beneath the coverlet.
“Are you in pain? Did I hurt you?” He rose up on his elbow to peer over her shoulder and follow her gaze beneath the bedclothes. Russet stains streaked her thighs and dotted the linen sheet beneath her.
Her embarrassment was nothing compared with the guilt those stains kindled in him. He’d known full well she was an innocent, yet he’d plundered her just the same.
There was no way to undo the act. He could only summon the strength to avoid letting it happen again. Or . . .
Another possibility shoved through his disordered thoughts. Marriage. Could there be any other outcome to this reckless afternoon of lovemaking?
The old fear of loss rearing up, he feigned a calm he didn’t feel and kissed her shoulder. “Never mind, darling.” He drew her back down against him and gently stroked her breasts. With kisses at her nape and shoulders, he gradually coaxed her to relax.
They lay like that for another half hour or so, until Simon remembered that they were not alone in the house, and that servants relished gossip as much as they did holidays from work.
“Stay here,” he whispered, and slid out of bed. He dressed quickly, and handed Ivy her dressing gown. “Put this on.”
“Shouldn’t I get dressed?”
“Not yet. I’ll be back.” After a parting kiss, he made his way downstairs and found Mrs. Walsh.
His request made the housekeeper scowl with indignation. “A bath? In the middle of the day? For a
servant
?”
“Mr. Ivers is hardly a servant, Mrs. Walsh. He is my assistant, and he risked his life earlier to save mine.”
He paused as the woman’s sallow complexion darkened to crimson. “The rest of us were merely following your implicit orders never to enter your laboratory uninvited, sir.”
“Yes, well, thank goodness Ned experienced no such reservations. But I fear the lad received an electrical shock as he helped me stabilize the equipment. A hot soak will help ease the muscle spasms. Oh, and the poor chap also managed to cut himself. Got him lying in bed at the moment nursing the wound. The linens will need to be changed.”
“I’ll see to it right away, sir.”
“Indeed. Oh, and Mrs. Walsh ...” He glanced about the dusky central hall in which they stood. “This house has grown almost dingy these past months. Please give orders for a thorough cleaning.”
For a fleeting instant a mask of disbelief held the woman’s stern features immobile. After all, it had been Simon’s enraged bellow for peace and quiet that had brought his servants’ housekeeping duties to a near halt over a year ago. Then, their bustling activity had served only to remind him that the woman who had once guided their efforts was gone . . . never to return. Surely, he admitted now, allowing dust to coat the woodwork and dim the brilliance of the chandelier’s crystals was no way to honor Aurelia’s memory.
Mrs. Walsh’s lips twitched with uncharacteristic delight. “Yes, sir. Right away, sir.”
Ivy waited beside the steaming tub, her dressing gown buttoned to her chin, until Simon’s valet, Ellsworth, and his team of footmen exited single file from her room. Ellsworth paused in the doorway with one last questioning glance.
“I can manage on my own. Thank you.” She raised an eyebrow to convey her impatience for the man to be gone. Once the door closed behind him, she ran and turned the key in the lock, as she always did before disrobing. She could not chance a servant walking in on her and discovering her secret.
She shed her robe and, without looking down at the stains on her thighs, eased into the sudsy water. A chafing sting persisted between her thighs. Despite the discomfort, she savored the sensation. Leaning back against the side of the tub, she tilted her head against the rim, closed her eyes, and conjured images of their lovemaking until heated threads wound through her, as steamy as the soothing water.
She drifted in sensual oblivion until a touch on her shoulder sent her bolting upright with a splash.
“It’s only me.” Simon leaned over to kiss her.
Her heart raced, spilling its beat into his palm, which had slid to envelop her breast. “Such a fright you gave me. How did you get in? I locked the door.”
His fingertips stroked her in ways that scattered her thoughts. With his other hand, he reached into his waistcoat pocket and drew out a small ring of keys. “It pays to be the master of the house.”
Ivy relaxed against the tub. “Thank you for arranging this for me.”
“You’re very welcome.” His hand drifted upward to cradle her chin. Tipping her face, he kissed her, a slow, languid touch that turned those heated threads of moments ago to bands of fire.
“Are you quite all right?” he asked.
“I should ask you the same. Had I realized how exerting . . . what we did . . . could be, I’d never have allowed it. Not after your brush with death earlier.”
“Not allow it?” He pulled back, lips quirking. “Who is master here and who the assistant?”
When her mouth sprang open to retort, he kissed her again.
“You needn’t answer that, for I know the answer. Of Harrowood, and of my laboratory, I am indeed the master. But here, Ivy, and of this”—his hand ran possessively down her soap-slicked torso—“you are indisputably in authority. I will take no privileges but those you grant me.”
She considered that statement and the one that preceded it, the woman and the assistant suddenly at war with each other. “You never answered my question.”
He sat back on his heels, his hand leaving her breast to trail in the water. “That is because I haven’t reached a decision.”
“You can’t mean to bar me—”
“I mean to do what is right and safe, for you and for any assistant.”
A twinge of panic prompted her to blurt, “I am also here on the queen’s behest. You must not forget that.”
He nodded his acquiescence. “True enough. However, we both know that neither my sister nor the queen’s stone are hidden in my laboratory.”
She started to retort but realized he was right. Her investigation had reached a standstill and would remain stalled until some hint of Lady Gwendolyn’s whereabouts surfaced.
“You were not nearly so cautious with me yesterday,” she murmured, “or all the days preceding.”
“That is neither accurate nor fair.” He pushed to his feet. Grabbing the back of the small dressing table chair, he dragged it beside the tub and straddled it. “I never intended exposing you to undue danger.”
“The queen’s command aside for the moment, did you or did you not hire me to assist you with this electroportation process of yours?”
“I hired you to assist me in making the calculations and corresponding adjustments to my generating equipment. I never intended to risk you or anyone else with the actual experiment.”
“Fair enough. I do not ask that you electroport me.” Gripping the rim of the tub, she pulled up onto her knees so that her face came nearly level with his. “I only demand that you continue to allow me to fulfill the functions I came here to perform, both for you and the queen.”
His hooded gaze drifted over her, reminding her that pulling out of the water had left her wholly exposed from the waist up. His attentions lingered on her nipples, reddened and swollen from their lovemaking and from soaking in the hot water. She shivered as though he had touched her, and his lips twitched in acknowledgment.
“Are you cold?” The backs of his fingers grazed her, and her breath rushed in with a gasp. His smile grew. “No, I’d say not cold. But you are full of demands today, aren’t you?”
Her hand closed over his; she pressed it to her breast and the beat of her heart. “I don’t wish to be treated as females so often are, set aside and sheltered for their own good.”
At that moment, both the teasing Simon and the commanding Lord Harrow faded, and in his eyes Ivy glimpsed uncertainty and a trace of what she could identify only as fear. Then both were gone, replaced by the stern slash of his brows.
“I must think more about this. I’ll give you my decision tomorrow.”
She resisted the urge to splash water at him. “And until then?”
His expression turned devilish as he stood, grasped her hands, and raised her to her feet. “Until then, we must find other ways of occupying our time. Come, you’ve soaked that luscious body long enough.”
And he hauled her, dripping wet, into his arms.
Chapter 15
O
n Monday following breakfast, Simon called after Ivy as she all but raced toward the tower stairs.
“Not that way.”
She stopped short and turned, her face filling with disappointment and even, perhaps, a glint of reproach. “You’ve reached your decision, then?”
He hadn’t, at least not about whether to allow her to continue assisting him. Last night he had lain awake as a far more pressing issue lobbed about his brain. Marriage. Could he walk that narrow precipice again, knowing how easily one or both of them could fall? Yet there were other risks to consider besides those to his heart.
There was
Ivy’s
heart, and her well-being. If they were to marry, then he owed it to her to become the kind of husband she deserved. A woman like Ivy deserved the best, not a hollow wreck of a scientist who feared love and bore little regard for the sanctity of his own life.
Had Ivy not been on hand yesterday, he might have scraped himself up off the floor—eventually—made a few new calculations, and tried walking into the energy stream again. The Mad Marquess . . . had he truly begun to earn the moniker?
Then he must change, be a better man—safer, steadier, more dependable.
“I’ve a meeting with the Galileo Club in town,” he told Ivy rather than answer her question. “We’ll be gathering in Benjamin Rivers’s office in about an hour. I’d like you to accompany me. There is a matter I wish to discuss with you and I cannot think of anywhere more private than in a moving coach.”
“Then you
have
reached a decision. Judging from your somber expression, I shan’t find it a welcome one.” She propped a fist on her hip in a gesture both masculine and oddly sensual. Her voice fell to a whisper. “Let me remind you that my obligation to the queen has yet to be fulfilled. You cannot dismiss me—”