the bedside table, picking up the tray. “Now try to eat something, Samantha. He’s not worth losing your appetite over.” She headed for the door, but paused with her hand on the latch. “And Samantha?”
“Yes?”
“Even when you find yourself a nice barrister, guard your heart,” she whispered, opening the door. “Lock it up tight, like a safe. And never give any man the key.”
Chapter 26
Nicholas had already drawn the curtains and turned the lamps down low. Now he prowled the room, looking at the gilt-framed pictures on the walls, the vase of flowers on the dressing table in one corner. He rearranged the collection of glass bottles on another table. Wasn’t sure why, except that it gave him something to do.
Something other than stare in bleak pain at the woman who lay sleeping on the bed.
Stopping before the hearth, he braced one arm against the mantel and hung his head, gazing down at the hot coals in the grate, unable to feel their warmth. For hours now, he had been trying to think, to plan, but he could only hear a sweet voice in his memory—speaking words that ripped through his heart.
The sound of Samantha declaring her hatred for him.
He shut his eyes, his fingers closing tightly around the polished marble edge of the mantel. He had always known she would hate him if she ever learned his true identity. But the fact that he had anticipated her reaction so accurately hadn’t cushioned the blow in the least.
Unable to sleep, he had found himself drawn here, to her, to the source of his pain. It made no sense, this power she had over him, this connection between them. Nothing seemed able to break it. The force was almost magnetic. As if he were a compass needle and she were true north.
Straightening, he turned to look at her. It was unnerving to discover that, without the shackles, he felt more bound to her than ever.
He noticed that someone had untied her. Clarice, no doubt. A plate of food sat on the night table. Untouched. Samantha had fallen asleep fully clothed, still wearing the blouse and woolen waistcoat and skirt of her riding habit. But she had taken off her shoes... and he noticed the mark around her ankle. The shackles had left what might be a permanent scar.
The same mark they had left on him.
His heart thudding in his chest, he walked back to the wing chair he had placed beside the bed. The huge, velvet-draped four-poster made her slender form seem so small, so... alone.
He sat down, listening to her soft breathing, watching her while she slept. The way he had watched over her during so many long nights in Cannock Chase. And the ache inside him widened and deepened.
He reached out and let his hand rest on the blankets, near hers, but he did not allow himself to touch her. He hadn’t intended to come here until morning, to tell her the decision he had made. A decision that would make her furious—if it were possible for her to be any more furious with him than she already was.
He didn’t look forward to fighting with her again. He was so bloody tired of fighting.
So he did not wake her, wanting simply to look at her, to hold onto one last, peaceful moment.
His gaze traced over her in the gentle glow of the lamplight—from every flawless curve of her face to the way one of her hands clutched a corner of the pillow, while the other lay upturned on the rumpled covers. Her fingers looked so delicate next to his.
Breaking the chain hadn’t changed anything, he thought, his throat constricting. Time and distance had only made him more aware of how important she was to him, had only made his feelings for her stronger.
Samantha Delafield was the most precious treasure he had ever held in his hands. The only one that had ever really mattered to him.
The only one that was utterly beyond his reach.
She stirred, making a small sound—and opened her eyes. Their gazes met.
Both of them went still. Neither of them spoke.
She glanced at his hand, so close to hers, and then she sat up, withdrawing as if afraid he might burn her. “W-what are you doing here?”
It took him a moment to summon an answer—at least, one that he was willing to speak aloud. “Couldn’t sleep.”
She drew her legs under her, perching in the middle of the bed as if she might make a dash for the