And now that she knew about this mysterious lady in Decker’s past, the one he had loved… Jo swallowed, knowing she did not dare continue in this vein of thought lest she turn into a watering pot and ruin the afternoon with her friends.
Instead, she turned to Lady Helena. “Enough about me, if you please. I am certain it shall all untangle itself as it ought. How is your campaign against the odious Lord Hamish going, my dear?”
A mysterious flush crept over Lady Helena’s cheeks. “I do believe I may have convinced someone to aid me in my quest to be ruined after all.”
Suddenly, the flush was not so mysterious.
“Tell us everything,” Callie demanded.
A knock at the door heralded the arrival of a maid.
“After I arrange for my biscuits, cakes, and quail eggs, of course,” she amended, grinning.
Eating cream ice without his wife was, Decker discovered, absolute rubbish.
Actually, everything without her was rubbish.
He was rubbish, too.
What sort of businessman abandoned his offices in the midst of the day, closeted himself in his study, and then mulishly spooned melting strawberry goo down his throat? The pathetic sort.
The rubbish sort.
How many times had he just thought the word rubbish within the last minute?
Too many.
“Rubbish,” he muttered, taking another spoon of Claremont’s cream ice. He did rather think his chef could do better, but Jo had heard about it and had been determined to give the place a try. “Rubbish, rubbish, rubbish.”
“What is rubbish?”
Jo’s soft voice, coming from the threshold, gave him such a start that he flung a spoonful of cream ice on his own waistcoat. Cursing, he extracted his handkerchief just in time to watch the pink blob fall to his trousers, landing directly on his now-rigid cock.
Thank you for coming to attention the moment she appeared, old chap.
How mortifying.
He stood, clasping his handkerchief over the cream ice-covered fall of his trousers.
Well, if this was not bloody ballocks, he did not know what was.
Her giggle had him raising his head. Her laughter was, as always, infectious. He found himself grinning at her, his levity joining in with hers. She closed the door behind her and moved toward him, infallibly elegant. She wore a gold silk gown embellished with embroidered scarlet leaves and lace sleeves. The line of abalone buttons running from her neckline to her hem was particularly inviting.
He wanted to pluck them open, one by one.
“Were you eating cream ice without me?” she asked as she approached, bringing with her the luscious scent of orange blossom and jasmine.
“Yes,” he admitted.
Her smile did nothing to make his rampant erection abate. Her hands settled on his shoulders. “How could you?”
Before he could answer, her lips were on his. Lush, full, tender. Kissing him. He opened beneath the tentative thrust of her tongue. Damnation, she had learned a great deal since that first kiss they had shared in his carriage. He ought to know a surge of pride at having been the only man to tutor her. Instead, he resented himself. For he had been the architect of his own demise.
Falling deeper beneath her spell. Venturing into hazardous territory indeed. The sort from which there was no return.
But it was a hell of a thing to stand in his study, kissing his wife, whilst clutching a sticky, cream ice-laden handkerchief over the cockstand tenting his trousers. He cupped her face with his free hand, his mouth responding to hers, scarcely able to stifle his groan of raw need.
Would he ever get enough of her?
Unlikely.
She was the first to break the kiss, tipping her head back, her honey-brown gaze searching his. “Strawberry from Claremont’s?”
Her question wrung another surprised laugh from him. “You could taste it?”
“I could.” Her lips twitched. “But also, Rhees told me I would find you here, and that you had a bucket from Claremont’s accompanying you.”
To the devil with the butler for tattling on him. He ought to give him the sack. Decker would if he did not like him so damned much.
“I am afraid I made a mess of myself,” he said wryly. “Eating cream ice without you is not the same, bijou.”
“You did indeed make a mess,” she agreed, her gaze lowering to his besmirched trousers and the handkerchief covering the stain. “Let me see the damage, if you please.”
He swallowed. Now was not the time for his wife to see the effect she had upon him at all times of the day. There was something about his cockstand hiding behind a strawberry cream ice stain that felt ridiculously