Steven groaned as he lost his seed for the second time. He was holding Rose’s hand, his fingers squeezing hers, his face relaxing with his release.
Rose touched his cheek, kissing his lips with her swollen ones, and marveled at what they’d done this day.
***
Steven lay beside Rose long into the afternoon, not leaving her even as the window darkened with the end of the short day. They’d nestled down under the covers, the blankets heavy with their clothes. Steven had pulled his plaid up over the quilts, adding another layer of warmth.
Rose slept for a while, Steven dozing with her. When she’d awakened, she’d smiled at him, a little shy, but betraying no shame. Steven had touched her, savoring her, before his needy c**k had him entering her one more time.
After that they both slept, then awoke and spoke in low voices. About nothing. About everything. Steven heard himself telling her stories about his childhood, how he’d run wild in Scotland with his sister, Ainsley, until their three older brothers dragged them home again. He spoke of the army, his friendships there, his adventures. Rose told him of her life in Edinburgh with her father, her sorrow when he died, her astonishment when a lofty duke asked her to be his wife.
They talked of dreams they had for now and later, and laughed about things they’d seen together. They had only a few memories, two days of them, but it gave them so much to talk about.
Steven could talk to her forever.
The coachman and his wife left them alone. The two downstairs had to know what the two upstairs were doing, and yet, they gave them their privacy. Miles and his wife must have recognized that Steven had come to take care of Rose, and they were letting him get on with it.
“Sittford House tomorrow,” Steven said, kissing her shoulder. “I want your legacy in your hands—I don’t trust Albert not to sell everything sellable before we can go through it.”
“You’re still determined to help me win against him?”
Steven noted the surprise and faint worry in her eyes. “Yes. Why wouldn’t I?”
“Our bargain will soon be at an end,” Rose said wistfully.
“Endings are sad.” Steven brushed his fingertips along the softness of her br**sts. “I don’t like them. Beginnings sometimes can be good. But the middle of the story is always the best part. I like middles.”
Rose laughed. “I like the middle of this one.”
“That’s because all the villains are leaving us in peace.” He pressed his palm against hers, their splayed fingers touching. “So are our friends. I’m enjoying it.”
The look in Rose’s eyes said she was enjoying it too. “We’ll have to go back to the real world sooner or later.”
“Later,” Steven said. “Not right now. Right now is for . . .” He released her hand and slid over her again. “Right now is for loving you. I’m going to do it for as long as I can.”
“Good,” Rose said with a smile.
That was all Steven needed. He was already aching for her again, a pain that eased only slightly as he eased himself inside her one more time.
***
The bloody settee was nowhere in the house.
Steven sat on a dusty couch in one of the attics—the be-damned mansion had five—and looked with disgust at the furniture crammed into it. Couches, divans, chairs, tables, bedsteads, most of it rickety and broken. Nowhere had they found an Egyptian-style settee in ebony and gold, decorated with sphinxlike heads.
Rose stood, dejected, near the dusty window. She’d resumed her black clothes, which hid every inch of her. All very proper, but Steven would never look at her the same way again.
He’d seen her beauty. It glowed from her even now until it filled all the spaces in this dingy attic, and all the spaces inside Steven.
“It’s not here,” Rose said. She made her way carefully through the mess to Steven and sank down next to him. “Albert must have sold it. How could he have known?”
Steven shrugged. “We’ll find him and pound its whereabouts out of him.”
Rose did not look hopeful. She leaned into Steven, an intimate move, one she did unselfconsciously.
Steven turned his head and kissed her cheek, which led to a kiss on the lips. That kiss lingered, brightening the gloom around them.
They’d arrived while Albert had been finishing his midmorning tea. The man, it seemed, rarely left the estate—he’d told his housekeeper he’d be in London the day Rose and Steven had first come searching, only so the servants wouldn’t bother him.
The man was a fool, Steven thought in contempt. He obviously had no respect from his staff, or else he’d have told them he wasn’t to be disturbed, and they’d have obeyed. Steven knew that if servants didn’t like an employer, they could find plenty of little ways to irritate him without going so far as all-out rebellion. A man who had no control over his household was a sorry thing indeed.
Steven, brooking no argument from Albert, took Rose on a search of the house. Rose led Steven into every room on every floor, and they looked into every cabinet, cranny, closet, nook, and niche. They’d searched the cellars, rooms down there no one had opened for years. They’d even looked in Albert’s private rooms when Albert had gone off with his steward to the home farm.
The home farm would be next. Steven wouldn’t put it past Albert to try to hide a priceless antique in the garret of a leaky farmhouse.
The settee, however, was nowhere in sight. They did find the two Egyptian-style chairs depicted in the sketches from the cabinet, but that was all. Steven turned each chair upside down and stuck his hands under the upholstery but found no further clues inside them.