A Portrait of Love (The Academy of Love #3) - Minerva Spencer Page 0,84

marriage, but he had accepted his part in the scandal and hadn’t behaved as if he were throwing himself on his sword to marry her.

He stirred behind her and she tensed.

“I know you’re awake.” His voice was rough with sleep, and then he pulled her tighter and kissed the back of her neck, his scratchy night beard making her shiver. “Mmm.” He held her closer. “I can almost hear your mind churning away,” he whispered, his lips soft and warm against the sensitive skin.

That part of him was pressed tightly between them and seemed a good twenty degrees hotter than the rest of him.

He turned her onto her back. “What are you thinking about, Lady Saybrook?”

The name made her smile.

“Ah,” he said, his finger tracing the curve of her mouth.

She blinked up at him, barely able to see an outline in the gloom. “You must have eyes like an owl.”

“I do have very good night vision, although you are barely a shadow right now.” He stroked her lower lip. “But you were going to tell me what you were thinking.”

“I was?”

“Mmm-hmmm.” Back and forth he swept.

“You never tell me what you are thinking.”

“Men are easy to read.” His finger moved again, stopping in the middle of her lower lip. “Our needs are basic, our thoughts disappointingly simple.” He pressed lightly and her lips parted. “Food, shelter, rest, a good horse—” His finger pushed and she opened, her tongue acting without instruction from her brain and stroking the rough pad. He pulled out and then pushed back in, the motion just like—

Honey gasped and grabbed his hand, stilling it. “You are wicked.”

He laughed and took her chin, tilting her toward him for a kiss that was disappointingly brief. “I don’t know what you mean, my lady.”

She was too embarrassed to speak. Did he really want to do that? To put himself inside her—

“Now that you know what I am thinking—when I’m thinking at all—it is your turn. What were you thinking about, lying awake in the dark?”

“I was thinking about your niece’s portrait.”

“Liar,” he whispered in her ear.

“Fine. What do you think I was thinking about?”

“Me. Us. This.”

“Are you always so arrogant, my lord?”

“Most of the time.”

She laughed.

“There, that’s better.” He propped himself up on his elbow. “What do you want to do tomorrow? More shopping?” He caressed her throat in the darkness, his big, powerful hand making her feel delicate … vulnerable … aroused.

“Only if it is for you. I picked out too much today.”

“I did my shopping in London. Peel brought it with him. You will no longer have to tolerate a shabby husband.”

“That is a relief.”

He chuckled. “What a sharp-tongued viper you are.”

“Tell me about Everley.”

His hand stopped, and she could tell that, for once, she had surprised him.

“Did you ever ride over and see it while you were staying at Whitcomb?”

“Raymond took me over once but I could only see part of it and didn’t feel comfortable riding up their drive.”

He resumed his stroking. “He should have brought you to meet them; the Amberlies are nice people.”

“Amberlies—why do I know that name?”

“They were at your going away dinner.”

“Ah.”

“They have rented Everley since I was young, raised their family there. Their children were between Wyndam and me in age and we used to run wild together.”

“How old is the duke?”

“He just turned nine-and-thirty.”

Honey had thought he was older.

“Amberlie is an admiral and would be gone for long stretches, even before the War. Their two sons are both naval men themselves, and their daughter, far younger than the rest of us, recently married.”

“So, too young for you to run wild with.”

He traced the inside of her ear and she shivered. “Why? Would that have made you jealous?”

She snorted.

“You are right, she was too young for me and Raymond to run with.” He hesitated, and Honey felt a strange tension in his body. “But their neighbors to the west had five daughters.”

“Who are they? Did I meet them at the party?”

His hand dropped. “No. The local people are not invited to Whitcomb very often. The duke is not fond of country gentry or commoners. He liked the Amberlies because they were friends of our father.” His voice had become cold, hollow, distant—the way it always did when he spoke of his brother.

“You have married a commoner.”

“Ah, but your grandfather was Baron Yancy—bosom beau to my mother. In fact, it is quite possible she might have married the baron had her father not decided a duke was a better catch.”

Honey had

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