Page 26 of Irresistible
“I did. You’re sure you don’t want to use it?”
“While you were bathing, I went to ask Polly to bring hot water to the dressing chamber. I should have thought of that sooner. But all is well.” He stepped out of the dressing chamber. “I’ll just let you complete your toilet.”
Jess squeezed past him and firmly closed the door. Nibbling the biscuit, she looked about for her trunk, planning to finish unpacking it. When she’d removed her wet clothing and donned the dressing gown earlier, she’d taken care to remove her other wigs before anyone saw them. She’d put them in a drawer and covered them with underclothing.
Her trunk sat in the corner beneath Dougal’s smaller one, which was not where she’d left it. Lifting his trunk, she deduced it was empty. She opened the lid to verify her assumption, then set it aside. Polly must have unpacked his things. Had she done the same with Jess’s?
A review of her trunk also revealed it to be empty. Jess was now quite proud of herself for hiding the wigs. If she hadn’t, Polly would know about them.
As Jess stacked the trunks in the corner once more, she frowned at Dougal’s. She might have searched it for clues, but it was empty. Should she look through his things? What, exactly, would she be looking for, and would she even know if she’d found it? It wasn’t as if he would document his crimes in a journal and bring it to Dorset while on a mission with his very first partner.
Honestly, she just couldn’t believe he was working against the Foreign Office. He seemed a man who cared deeply about his post and for his country.
Did that mean she wasn’t going to do what the Foreign Office had asked?
As if she even knewwhatto do. She supposed she’d just pay close attention, but she’d do that anyway.
Noises from the bedchamber told her the footmen had come to remove the water and the tub.
Turning from the trunks, she went to the dresser, where she’d stowed her pair of night rails. When she was once again clothed, she set to removing her wig, plucking out the many pins holding it in place. Then she moved on to loosening her plaited hair, which had been viciously coiled and pinned around her head. Sighing with pleasure, she let it down and ran her fingers through the locks, rubbing her scalp.
Finally, after the bedchamber had been quiet for some time, she cracked the door and peered one eye through the opening. “They’ve gone?”
Dougal stood near the fireplace. “Yes, we’re alone until morning—and we won’t be disturbed. I hope you weren’t still hungry, as they also removed the tray.” He massaged the bridge of his nose.
Alone until morning.She couldn’t dwell on that. “I was just doing that to my head,” she said as he moved his ministrations to behind his ears. “Do the spectacles bother you?”
“They take a little getting used to.” He eyed her long plait. “Brown-haired and cosmetic-free once more, I see.”
She touched the end of her hair. “Do you find it dull?”
“Not at all. You look like you.” He dropped his hand to his side.
She didn’t quite feel like herself, however. Though she’d prepared for this, the reality of being alone with him in this bedchamber, pretending as if they were truly married, brought forth a range of emotions: uncertainty, anxiety, and perhaps an inexplicable dash of anticipation.
“And nowyoulook like you—without the spectacles.” Her gaze dipped to his bare feet and calves, dark and muscular. She jerked her attention back to his face.
“Did I look terribly intellectual with them on?” he asked with a smile.
She laughed. “How does one ‘look’ intellectual?”
“I was only hoping. You’re the one who isactuallyintellectual, tossing off poetry as if you’d rehearsed it.”
“I believe I told you I read a great deal.”
“Reading and possessing the ability to recite stanzas at any given moment are not the same skills. You continue to astonish me.”
His compliment flooded her with warmth. Indeed, she could scarcely recall being cold earlier. From the moment she’d slipped off her dressing gown and stepped into the tub, she’d been all too aware of her “husband” in the dressing chamber. That had been enough to raise her body temperature. She reminded herself that he was playing a role, that none of this was real.
Jess moved to the side of the bed. “Where shall we sleep?”
“I was thinking the bed, since it’s quite large enough.”
Rolling her eyes with a half smile, Jess clarified. “Whichsidewould you prefer?”
“Since you’re over there, I’ll take nearer the windows. Let me just put my wig and spectacles in the dressing chamber.” He picked up his spectacles from the mantel and the wig from a chair near the hearth and walked past her.
When he emerged from the dressing chamber once more, he stopped short. “I thought you might already be in bed.”
