Page 145 of Where the Heart Leads
Aghast, Penelope flew across the room to him.
Huntingdon clapped him on the shoulder as he passed. “Good work.”
Penelope wasn’t so sure. She caught Barnaby’s hand—his beautiful long-fingered, elegant, and clever hand—stared at the redness already spreading across his scraped knuckles.“What have you done to your hand?”
To Barnaby’s besmusement, the damage he’d done to his hand—minor, it would heal—consumed Penelope’s mind. All else was relegated to second place. Nothing would do but for her to hurry him home to Jermyn Street so she could tend his wounds. Salve his scraped knuckles.
That Mostyn had taken the boys under his wing, volunteering to take care of them and deliver them tomorrow afternoon to the Foundling House, set the seal on her impatience to be away.
Something Barnaby decided was in his own best interests; aside from all else, he needed to speak with her—now, soon—before his father said anything to make his life more difficult.
Penelope was relieved when he agreed to leave matters in Lord Huntingdon’s and the earl’s capable hands. To her mind, there were capable people aplenty to take charge of the fiend Cameron and do all else that needed to be done. The constables would take Smythe and Cameron to Scotland Yard; Stokes would see Griselda home. Penelope’s only responsibilities were to see to the welfare of the boys, and Barnaby.
The latter stood highest in her mind. When they reached his house, she dispatched the boys to bed in Mostyn’s care and harried Barnaby up to his bedroom. She pushed him to sit on the bed, then bustled into the bathing chamber for a bowl of water.
Returning, setting the candelabra near so she had better light, she examined his hand, and hissed. “Men and their pugilistics.” She felt thoroughly shaken; she wasn’t sure why. “You didn’t need to hit him at all—Griselda could have taken care of it if you’d given her another second.”
“I needed to hit him.”
She ignored the hard, flat tone of his voice. “I’m very fond of your hand, you know.” She immersed the object in question in the cold water. “Both of them. I’m rather fond of lots of other parts of you, too, of course, but that’s beside the point. Your hands—” She realized and stopped.
Drew in a huge breath. “I’m babbling.” She heard the stunned amazement in her tone, but her tongue just ran on. “See what you’ve reduced me to? Ineverbabble—ask anyone. Penelope Ashford has never babbled in her life, and here I am, babbling like a twit, all because you didn’t think—”
He stopped her by the simple expedient of kissing her. Ducking his head, he covered her lips, slowed her racing tongue with his.
His arm slid around her and drew her to him.
Almost instantly, she relaxed against him.
It started off as a gentle kiss—a long, soothing, reassuring exchange for them both. But there was far more between them, more primitive reactions that needed to be assuaged, more powerful needs that rose up and unexpectedly caught them, taking over the kiss, infusing it with passions neither had intended showing, but both desperately needed to appease. To slake. To satisfy.
He angled his head and plundered her mouth, ravaged her senses—and she returned the favor. Shook the water from her hands and plunged them into his hair, spearing through the curling locks to grip his head. So she could hold him steady and kiss him back—claim him as her own just as avidly, as greedily, as hungrily as he claimed her.
As wildly. As unrestrainedly.
When they finally broke the kiss, they were both breathing rapidly, hunger and need—very definitely not just physical—pounding in their blood. The same beat, the same compulsion. She met his eyes, and saw all she felt roiling in the vivid blue—the same tumult of emotions.
The same reason behind it.
The same motive. The same power.
She dragged in a shuddering breath. She’d been meaning to speak; the time was clearly now.
Yet with the moment upon her, one doubt assailed her. He was a confirmed bachelor—everyone in the ton knew that. If she spoke—proposed—and he didn’t agree…their time together would end. Regardless of her wishes, once he knew she was thinking of marriage, if she couldn’t convince him to agree, he would kindly but definitely cut her out of his life…and she didn’t think she could bear that. If she spoke and he didn’t agree, she would lose all they, all she, now had.
If she didn’t speak…she would lose all they might have.
Yet even if he felt the same emotions she did, that didn’t mean he’d see marriage to her as the right path for him.
For the first time in her life, faced with a clear challenge, her courage wavered. Taking this one step…she’d never faced such a critical moment in her life. She searched his eyes for some hint, some clue, as to how he might react. And remembered…She frowned. “Why did youneedto hit Cameron?”
He’d made it sound as if the action had held some greater significance beyond simply stopping the fiend.
He held her gaze, then his lips quirked wryly. He lowered his gaze to her lips. “You said I didn’t think.” His jaw firmed. “You were right—I didn’t. It was…peculiar. I never ‘don’t think’—just as you never babble. But from the instant Cameron seized you I…stopped thinking. I didn’t need to. What I needed to do was perfectly clear without any requirement for thought.”
He paused, drew in a long breath. “I had to hit him because he’d seized you. If he’d grabbed Griselda, I wouldn’t have felt the same—although perhaps Stokes might have. But Cameron grabbedyou,and”—his voice deepened—“some time in the past weeks you’ve becomemine. Mine to protect. To have and to hold. To keep safe.”
He met her eyes, and she saw truth shining in the blue. “That’s why I hit him—why I didn’t even have to think to know I had to. Needed to.” He paused, then went on, “I’ve heard that’s how things can be…with a certain woman. I didn’t think such a thing would happen to me, but with you…it has. If you don’t want to be mine…” He searched her eyes, then, his voice hardening, said, “It’s too late. You already are.”
