How I Married a Marquess (36 page)

“But—but the War Office,” she stammered, just as confused now as she'd been at the start of the conversation when he'd first unlocked the cell door to set her free, when she was convinced he was leaving her behind, condemned to a life without him. “That was the reason you came here, why you sent for Lord Bathurst—you wanted to be an agent again.”

“I did want that once.” He gently brushed the tear from her cheek. “But now I want you more.”

“You want me…,” she repeated breathlessly. She blinked as the truth slowly dawned on her. “Everything that happened tonight—the gaol
break, Colonel Grey, the robbery…”

“It was all to keep you safe.” He exhaled a long, hard breath. “Even as recently as tonight, I thought leaving you behind was best for both of us, that I could deny my feelings for you and just walk away. You deserve a perfectly safe, normal life, and I was afraid I couldn't give that to you, that I couldn't make you happy.”

She smiled through her tears. “You've already made me happ—”

He touched a finger to her lips and silenced her, then lifted a brow. “I practiced this all the way into town, so let me get it out.”

She nodded silently against his finger, not daring to utter another word.

“When I met you, I felt healed for the first time since the shooting. I needed that—I needed
you
, Josephine.” His finger at her mouth began to caress her lips, and his eyes grew intense as they stared deeply into hers, so deeply that a warm shiver rushed through her. “I still do. And I always will.”

Then he sank to one knee in front of her on the stone floor, taking both her hands in his and raising them to his lips to kiss them.

Her eyes widened. “What are you doing?”

“I'm proposing.”

“But we're in a gaol
—”

“Damnation, Jo.” He rolled his eyes in impatient frustration. “I'm trying to be
romantic
. So be quiet and let me do it, all right?”

She nodded, her pulse racing and her breath coming shallow and fast.

He laced his fingers through hers. “I have never met any other woman like you, and I know that I never will again. You are the most challenging, stubborn, determined woman who ever—”

She blinked. “
This
is romantic?”

Except for a twitching of his lips, he ignored her comment and continued, “—who ever graced my life, along with a beauty, kindness, and loyalty beyond measure. I cannot imagine the darkness that would have continued for me if I hadn't met you. But now, with you, I see nothing but a life of happiness and hope ahead of me.”

Her throat tightened with emotion. “Thomas,” she choked out in a whisper. Tears dropped down her cheeks.

His own voice cracked. “Will you marry me?”

“Yes, I will.” She threw her arms around his neck, falling down into his embrace and tumbling onto the floor with him. Her tear-streaked face buried into his shoulder, and she couldn't hold back her sobs of happiness. “Oh yes!”

His arms went around her and pulled her close. Then he kissed her tenderly, with so much desire and love, with so much of his soul, that she trembled.

He shifted away from her just far enough to take her left hand. “With everything that had to be done tonight, I didn't have time to buy you a proper engagement ring, but perhaps this will do until we're in London.”

He slipped his gold signet ring tenderly onto her hand, and it dangled huge on her dainty finger. He frowned. One by one, he tried the ring on all her fingers, finally giving up and sliding it onto her thumb.

Laughing with happiness, she cupped his face in her hands and kissed him with all the love she carried inside herself.

This, she thought as he wrapped his arms around her and held her close,
this
was what truly belonging to someone meant. She had her family, and now she had him, and for the first time in her life, she didn't fear the future. She welcomed it.

L
ady Matteson, Marchioness of Chesney, eventually Duchess of Chatham…
Thomas's wife
.

Josie smiled to herself as she ran the list of names through her mind again. The last one was the best of all.

Too excited to sleep despite all the tiring events of the past few days, she sat curled up in a chair in front of the fire in her bedroom, her legs tucked beneath her and her toes sticking out from under the hem of her night rail. Around her the house slept, dark and quiet, with dawn only a few hours away.

Thomas had brought her safely back to Chestnut Hill as promised, and even now she smiled at the way he'd looked when Papa met them at the front door. This man who was usually so strong, determined, and resolved stood as nervous as a schoolboy as he asked to speak privately with her father. With a reassuring smile at him over her shoulder, she'd been whisked upstairs by Mama, who kept hugging Josie tightly to her bosom and wiping away her tears of happiness.

An hour later—poor man! Papa tortured him for
an hour
—she heard Thomas finally ride off into the night.

Then Papa came to her room and asked her simply, “Do you love this man?”

“With all my heart,” she whispered.

“My darling daughter—” His voice cracked with emotion. “Then your marriage has my blessing.”

He tenderly kissed her forehead, his eyes glistening, and he led her mother from the room as Mama began to cry even harder.

Her brothers would be told at breakfast, although Josie suspected they already knew. The fact that they hadn't beaten Thomas senseless was definitely a positive sign regarding future family gatherings.

As for her, would the happy tingling in her toes ever stop? Oh, she hoped not! For the entire ride from the village to the house, she'd sat behind him on his horse with her arms tight around him, but she'd felt as if she were flying. She'd never thought she could feel this way about anyone, to want to find a way to wrap him inside not just her arms but also her heart, to hold him close there forever.

In a fortnight she'd be in London. While the details of the marriage contract were being settled, she would meet his family, plan for the wedding, and shop on Bond Street for her trousseau, and her mother had promised her a new wardrobe befitting the fiancée of a marquess.

But she didn't care about any of that. All she cared about was seeing Thomas again.

“Josephine.”

The deep voice rained through her and replaced the tingle of excitement in her toes with a different kind of tingle, a different kind of excitement. She scrambled to her feet and faced him, stunned to find him in her room, leaning casually back against the closed door. Her heart leapt into her throat. She hardly dared to believe—

“Thomas,” she whispered, smiling happily to herself at the realization that he'd picked the lock on her door to sneak inside her bedroom. That old spy trick…
her
spy.

His sapphire eyes moved deliberately over her. “All ready for bed, I see.”

His words were a simple statement, surely not meant as a double entendre, but goose bumps sprang up across her bare arms and calves just the same. “Yes.”

“Good,” he murmured.

Oh,
that
wasn't just a simple statement! The single word trickled through her, heating her from the inside out, and when she licked her suddenly dry lips, she saw his hungry gaze linger at her mouth.

He pushed himself away from the door and stalked toward her. He stopped in front of her, close but not yet touching, and she swallowed, her stomach already beginning to flutter with longing and anticipation. He'd broken into her house, stealing through the darkness to her room—risking his very life if her brothers found out he was there—and she leaned toward him to once again lose herself in his strength and his warmth.

The nearness of him was heady and dizzying, and she drew a deep breath to calm her racing heart. “I thought you'd left for London.”

“Soon.” He took her chin and lifted it to touch his lips to hers. Gentle, soft, but with enough promise to stir arousal low in her belly. “But I wanted to see you again before I left.” His lips caressed the corner of her mouth. “After all, we have a marriage to settle.”

Already her heart had begun to race, her mind growing foggy, and his kisses were still light and fluttering, with none of the passion she yearned for.
Yet
.
“But I thought you settled everything with Papa.”

“Not everything.”

She stiffened despite the erotic sweep of his tongue between her lips and pulled back just far enough to stare into his eyes. “He told me you'd offered for me, and he accepted.” She paused, a stab of fear piercing her. “Have you changed your mind?”

“God, no! You belong with me, Jo. Nothing's stopping that.” With a quick peck to her lips, he released her and knelt in front of the fireplace. “But your father isn't you, darling. Your happiness is what matters to me, and I want to settle the marriage agreement with
you
.”

A thrill jolted through her. She was important enough to him that he not only wanted to marry her but also wanted to make certain the marriage terms were exactly what she wanted, exactly what would make her happy. As he stirred up the fire and added more coal until it cast a bright light and warmth into the room, she rested her hand on his shoulder.

“Leave that,” she ordered softly. His hard muscles quivered beneath her fingertips, and the small reaction thrilled her. She didn't want his attention on the fire—she wanted it completely on her. She wanted him in her arms, kissing her, loving her.

“But we'll need this, I think,” he murmured, brushing his hands down his thighs to wipe away the dust, “for what we have to do tonight.”

“What do we need to do that involves a fire?” she asked warily. The last time he'd been concerned with a fire, she'd thought he'd destroyed the book, and with it all chances at a future together.

“I told you. We're negotiating our marriage.” He stood and shrugged off his jacket, then tossed it carelessly over the chair and deftly removed his waistcoat. “We'll probably want to see each other well when we do it.” He voice lowered to a seductive growl. “And I certainly want to see you.”

As he stripped his shirt over his head, leaving himself tantalizingly bare from the waist up, she realized he planned on doing far more tonight than discussing their upcoming marriage. Sweet anticipation licked at her toes.

“First.” He tossed the shirt aside and bent down to pull off a boot. “When would you like to be married?”

Her eyes drifted shamelessly over him, and she answered a bit huskily, “As soon as possible.”

“Good answer.” He dropped the boot to the floor and grinned. “How soon?”

“Four months?”

“Two.” His heated gaze never leaving hers, he removed the second boot.

“But Mama wants a grand wedding, and I can't cheat her out of the fun she'll have planning for it, all that fussing over details.”

“Three?”

She nodded at the compromise, and he dropped the second boot to the floor. Oh, she was beginning to like this marriage negotiation business. A great deal.

He straightened and reached down for the fall on his breeches. “London.”

Her gaze shamelessly lowered to his waist and waited for a glimpse of his manhood in the firelight. “What?” she asked thickly. She was trembling now, all of this making her head swim. She marveled that she could understand anything he was saying.

His lips twitched with amusement at her befuddlement, his hand stilling provocatively with his breeches half-unbuttoned. “The wedding will be at St. Paul's.” Then he shoved his breeches down and stepped out of them to stand naked in front of her, his body magnificent in the firelight. Hard, sculpted muscles in his shoulders, his chest sprinkled with just a dusting of dark hair that led down to…
oh my
. She swallowed. Even half-erect, he was impressive. And he was all hers, tonight and always. “You'll look so beautiful there in your wedding dress.”

If anyone found them together now, he would be a dead man once her brothers finished with him, fiancé or not, and she would be planning a funeral instead of a wedding. But how glad she was that he was willing to risk his life for her tonight. She smiled, far more wickedly than a woman should when discussing a church. “St. Paul's it is, then.”

“And you?” He closed the distance between them with a single step and unfastened the half dozen buttons at the neck of her night rail.

“Me?” She closed her eyes as his hands opened her gown, revealing her neck and shoulders, the tops of her breasts beneath. Already her nipples puckered achingly against the soft cotton in expectation of his hands on her, of his body moving deliciously inside hers.

“What demands do you have of this marriage?” He tugged her sleeve down to bare her right breast, and she gasped.

“Babies,” she whispered as he tugged down the other sleeve, the night rail falling to her elbows and exposing both breasts to his hungry gaze. “I want a house filled with children.”

“Agreed, most definitely.” His eyes flashed like sapphires as he pushed the night rail off her arms and let it fall to the floor at her feet. She stood before him completely exposed, now just as bare and vulnerable as he was. “I certainly plan to do everything I can to fulfill that marriage demand. And often.”

She shivered as he looked her up and down, his eyes lingering with undisguised desire on her breasts and the patch of curls between her thighs, where even now she'd grown hot, moist, and aching.

“What else can I do for you, Josephine?” He slipped his arms around her and pulled her against him, warm body against warm body, soft curves against hard muscles. “What else can I give you to make you happy?”

Her eyes glistened with tears of happiness. “You.”

“Granted.” He lowered his head and kissed her, hot and openmouthed. There was no mistaking his desire and need for her. Sweet heavens, he shook with it!

Shoving his hands into her hair and pulling her head back to expose her throat, he moved his mouth down her neck and across her shoulder, nipping and licking and leaving a hot, wet trail across her skin. She bit back a moan. Her fingernails dug into his shoulders as his hands slid down her back to cup her bottom and lift her against him, his penis now fully erect, hot and hard as it pressed into her stomach. He bit her earlobe, and when she gasped at the sweet possessiveness of the bite, he swirled his tongue inside her ear and sent a cascade of fire raining through her.

“I want you, Josephine.” His large hands slid around to her hips and brushed up her sides until his hands reached her breasts and captured them against his palms. His fingers spread out possessively across them, and he growled, “Tonight and always.”

He rolled her hard nipples between his thumbs and forefingers, and she moaned and arched herself against him. Liquid flames shot from her breasts straight down to the throbbing ache between her legs. Oh, the things this man could do to her with even such a simple touch!

Emboldened by his love for her, she ran her hands down his chest to the flat of his stomach, then lower still. He sucked in a mouthful of air between his teeth as her hand closed around him and began to stroke. She thrilled with this power she held over him, with the way she was able to make him tremble and lean into her so submissively. He wanted
her
, all of her, and she'd never felt so alive, so feminine, in her life.

He groaned out his pleasure, the words indecipherable in his arousal. She laughed lightly and tightened her grip as she stroked him. He grew impossibly hard in her hand, a rod of steel beneath soft, velvet skin. And every inch belonged to her.

His hooded eyes gazed down at her, dark with arousal and need, as if he could devour her by simply looking. Wanting him to do just that, she devilishly folded both hands around him, and as her palm circled over his enlarged head, made slippery from the droplets of his essence that gathered at his tip, he bit back a groan.