The Accidental Abduction (16 page)

“It's the Colonnade. A first-class establishment,” Harry added, with a trace of anxiety in his voice. “We often lodge our business partners here, although I've never stayed myself.”

Before she could answer, a small army of men and boys in scarlet livery emerged from the hotel, to take hold of bridles and reins, to hold aloft torches and set steps in place so Harry could alight without accidently muddying his boots in the gutter.

“It looks lovely,” Leannah murmured, but not with the level of reassurance she hoped to muster. She felt suddenly and keenly aware of her appearance. During the day, her plain, disheveled dress and windblown hair might have been explained away, as could her lack of bonnet and gloves. But evening was filling up the streets. No woman of substance should be abroad unless she was cloaked, gowned, and jeweled.

“Don't worry,” murmured Harry. He reached over the carriage door to take her hand and kiss the back, right on the edge of her bandages. “I told you, I'm known here. There will be no vulgar mistakes. You wait here for a minute, and I'll go see that my note made it through. It was brief, so there may be one or two details left to sort out.”

But not even the lingering warmth of Harry's smile could loosen the knot in Leannah's chest. A gleaming carriage drew up behind hers. Two ladies emerged from the hotel and descended the broad stairs. The torchlight allowed her to clearly see their suspicious and disapproving glances. She tried to smooth her hair, but it was to no avail. Nothing was improved by the involuntary way she kept trying to calculate the cost of even a single room in this place, never mind the expense of a meal, and of stabling the horses, all of which had to be added up with the sum Harry had already paid out to rescue herself and Genevieve.

Genny only did this because she wanted to secure us the money her marriage to Mr. Dickenson would bring.
Her speech to Uncle Clarence came ringing back.
If I marry Mr. Rayburn, we are taken care of and she's free to make a different choice, a better choice.

At the time, she'd meant those words to convince him to conduct the ceremony and sign the license. Now, enlarged and echoing, they sounded like the calculations of a gazetted fortune hunter. Or something much worse.

I can't go through with this.
Panic descended and Leannah clenched her cold hand around the gold and diamond band on her little finger. The bit of jewelry had taken on the weight of an iron fetter.
It was an awful, selfish idea. I won't do this to him, or to myself. I'll tell him it was a mistake. I'll thank him for going through with the ceremony in order to get Genevieve back home, and I'll leave him here. I'll tell Genevieve . . . something. Something will occur to me. There's surely been no time for scandal to erupt yet. We'll work out what to say. Almost anything will be more believable than the truth.

“Why, Mrs. Wakefield!” cried a woman's voice. “I was certain that was you!”

Oh, no.
With the slow, syrupy sensation of impending doom that took hold in the worst of nightmares, Leannah turned. A closed carriage had halted alongside her barouche and a mature woman leaned out the window. Torchlight gleamed on her plum velvet cloak and the half a shop's worth of jewels that glittered in her dark hair.
Not Dorothea Plaice.

If there was a greater and more persistent gossip of her acquaintance than Miss Plaice, Leannah could not think of her name, or his. A permanent and unusually wealthy spinster, Dorothea had helped raise her flock of nieces and nephews. This seemed to have given her a particular taste for knowing and managing everyone else's business.

“I'm so glad we've met!” cried Dorothea before Leannah even had a chance to say good evening. “I heard the most dreadful rumor at Mrs. Ibbotson's this morning. Now you can absolutely contradict it.”

There was no hope at all this rumor could be something small, like the price of a gown, or Mrs. Spinnaker patronizing yet another young painter.
Nothing to do but face it out.
Leannah rallied nerve and sense. “I'd be glad to contradict it if I can, Miss Plaice. What is this rumor?”

“Why that little Genevieve eloped yesterday! Mrs. Ibbotson said she heard it from her maid, who heard it from her cousin . . . well, never mind the daisy chain.” She waved it all away with a wild flutter of silk-gloved hands. “The point is, if Genevieve had eloped, you would not be sitting here so calmly.” She paused, and seemed for the first time to take in the state of Leannah's dress and general appearance. “Would you?” she concluded rather more sharply.

But Leannah never spoke her answer, because just then Harry trotted down the hotel steps.

“Everything is ready for us and . . . I beg your pardon. I didn't mean to interrupt.” He bowed to Miss Plaice.

“I'm sure you did not,” Dorothea replied somewhat frostily, drawing herself back inside her carriage. “But I don't believe I've had the privilege of your acquaintance, sir.”

Leannah took a deep breath. For a heartbeat, she met Harry's gaze. She saw there a moment of fear and she understood it.
He's waiting to see if I will deny him.

“Miss Dorothea Plaice, may I introduce Mr. Harry Rayburn. My husband.”

“Husband!”

Leannah allowed herself a small measure of satisfaction at having made Dorothea's jaw quite literally drop.

“Delighted to make your acquaintance, Miss Plaice.” Harry maintained an air of perfect aplomb as he bowed.

“You see, Genevieve isn't married,” Leannah told her. “I am.”

“Well!” Miss Plaice pressed her hand to her generous bosom. “I am astonished beyond measure. I do beg your pardon, Mr. Rayburn.” She bobbed her head. “And do please let me wish you very happy. But it is all so sudden! Everyone is so very fond of Mrs. Wake . . . Mrs. Rayburn I suppose I must say now. There is not one of her acquaintance who has not longed to see her comfortably settled.”

“But you thought perhaps there would be rather more warning of that highly desirable event?” said Harry smoothly. “I do understand. But we wished the thing to be done quietly.”

“Yes, yes of course. Very prudent, I'm sure.” Miss Plaice's eyes narrowed as she began sorting through her copious memory for every little detail it held of Leannah's past.

“So, you will contradict that rumor for Mrs. Ibbotson?” said Leannah, striving to match Harry's matter-of-fact air.

“Oh, I will. I most certainly will!” From the way she said it, Leannah suspected that she would be on her way to meet that lady immediately, never mind that it was well past the hour for paying calls.

They said their farewells and received another hasty offer of congratulations before Miss Plaice signaled her driver to touch up the horses.

“And that's the end of that,” sighed Leannah as the carriage pulled away.

“The end of what exactly?” Harry motioned to one of the linkboys to position the step so he could help Leannah down from the carriage.

“Any chance at keeping us a secret. The whole city will know before breakfast tomorrow.”

This revelation failed to cause Harry to so much as blink. “Well, then there's no bar to us taking the rooms I've arranged. Mrs. Rayburn?” He held out his elbow, and Leannah, with mingled feelings of relief and wonder, laid her arm upon his to be conducted up the stairs and into the glittering hotel.

“W
elcome to the Colonnade, Mrs. Rayburn.” A gentleman in dark coat and trousers stepped smartly up to Harry and Leannah, followed by a woman of middle years in a neat black gown and white apron.

“This is Marshall,” Harry told her as the man bowed. “He'll be looking after us, and this is Lewis.” The maid curtsied. “She'll attend you until your own maid can arrive.”

That she had no maid and hadn't for over a year was not something Leannah felt needed to be mentioned in the public lobby, especially one with so much marble and gilt gleaming in its golden lamplight.
It's a dream. It must be.
She had thought such establishments belonged exclusively to her past.

“We'll see the rooms now,” Harry went on.

As they crossed the mosaicked floor, Leannah felt her attitude alter; spine and shoulders straightened, chin lifted. Her stride smoothed and her face settled into an air of quiet pleasure and dignity. Leannah's education had been as erratic as the family fortunes, but when there had been money, Father had engaged the best available governesses so that both she and Genny could be schooled in the arts of dancing, deportment, and dress.

No one's going to be able to find a speck of fault with my daughters,
Father declared repeatedly.
Morehouses are fit for any and all society, however grand.

At the time, she hadn't known how helpful it was to his own plans to have his daughters proclaimed as perfectly well-bred and ladylike. Whatever the initial reasons for it, all that training came back to her now. By the time they reached the sweeping marble and mahogany staircase, her whole air proclaimed that she was familiar with such surroundings and comfortable in them. She felt Harry's approval of her. It showed in the way he held her arm as they followed Marshall up the staircase and the way he kept his stride so steady. He did not try to hurry or hide her. As far as he was concerned, there was nothing wrong. Both of them belonged right where they were. That air of confidence from him made keeping her own countenance that much easier.

As it transpired, Harry had not engaged a single room, but rather an entire suite on the first floor, where a hotel's best rooms were most generally kept. Marshall threw open the doors to a lovely sitting room. The walls had been papered in pale blue silk. Turkish carpets covered gleaming floorboards and plaster rosettes decorated the ceiling. A fire burned in the spotless marble hearth and the whole place was supplied with all manner of comfortable furniture, including a pair of deep armchairs drawn up before the hearth. The rich blue velvet curtains had been drawn across the windows to shut out the night and prying eyes.

“If you'll follow me, madam,” said the maid, Lewis, “I'll show you your room.”

“Her” room proved to be every bit as delightful as the other. Like the sitting room, it was decorated in shades of blue and cream. The four-poster bed was hung with white lace and covered with white comforters and thick bolsters. A dressing room and closet waited to one side, and all the furnishings spoke to comfort and convenience.

“Yes, this will do very well,” she told the maid calmly. What she really wanted to do was turn in place and clap her hands in delight, like some young miss fresh from the country. “If you'll wait a moment, Lewis, I have a letter I need delivered.”

The room was of course supplied with a writing desk, paper, quill, and ink. Leannah scribbled a hasty note telling Genevieve she had arrived, and where she was staying. She told herself there would not be any emergency. Despite her recent behavior, Genny was not really flighty. She would look after matters at the house, and their aunt and uncle would be on hand to help. All would be well for one more night. She was not being thoughtless or careless. She must not give into guilt for having caused her family trouble. She could have this one night.

Leannah sealed the letter with one of the wafers in the desk drawer, wrote the direction, and handed it to Lewis, who curtsied and left to see to its delivery. Out in the sitting room, she heard the sound of Harry dictating instructions to Marshall. Leannah stayed where she was. She could not have said exactly why, but neither could she make herself walk out to the sitting room. Instead, she sank into one of the armchairs by the fire. She needed this moment, just to breathe, and to assure herself that this lovely room would not vanish if she blinked.

Out in the main room, a door opened and then closed. She turned her head in time to see Harry walk up to the threshold of her chamber, and stop.

“Is everything all right?” he asked.

“Yes. I just needed to write to Genny, so she knows where we're staying in case anything unexpected arises. I hope you don't mind.”

“Not at all. I wrote my family from the inn. Do you like the room?” Harry didn't seem to know what to do with his hands. He put them behind his back, and then in his pockets, and then folded his arms, and then stuffed his hands back in his pockets. Leannah felt herself smile. She sympathized with his uncertainty. There was no accepted form of courtesy to govern their situation. Also, she couldn't help noting the fidgets made him look endearingly youthful.

This caused a whole series of new thoughts to cascade through her mind. “Oh!”

“What is it?” Harry pulled his hands out of his pockets as if he thought he might have to catch something.

“I'm sorry.” Leannah smothered her startled giggle. “It's just . . . I realized I don't know how old you are.”

“Twenty-eight,” he answered promptly. “I hope that will suit? If not, it will be changing on the thirtieth of January.”

“It will suit admirably. And the room is perfect.” She paused. “Are you going to ask my age?”

Harry drew himself up in a great show of being affronted. “You will find, madam, that your husband is the soul of discretion,” he told her stiffly. “With him, you will always be ageless, and any bonnet that arrives from the milliner will suit you perfectly.”

“How terribly discerning of me to have chosen such a man.”

“Yes, it does speak very well of your sound judgment and inherent good taste.”

It occurred to Leannah that Harry was waiting for her to invite him in. He wasn't going to enter a lady's room without her permission, even when he had just married her. It was at once absurdly correct and completely charming.

She held out her hand to him, and she knew she did not imagine the look of his relief as he crossed the threshold to take it, and to bend to kiss it. A soft sigh of warmth travelled through her. They were alone again. No one could wonder at them, or remark on anything they did, and there were so many things she wanted to do.

“I'm twenty-five,” she told him, mostly to see how he responded.

Harry's response turned out to be a surprisingly self-satisfied little smile. “I thought you might be.”

“Are you going to be one of those tiresome men who is always right?”

“Would that bother you?”

“I'm afraid it would, yes.”

“Then I shall endeavor to be wrong at certain discreet intervals.” His brow furrowed in mock consideration. “Mind you, it will take some time to form the habit. I may have to start with small matters.”

“But not the bonnets.”

“Never the bonnets.”

Silence fell, and as she watched, the humor in Harry's eyes turned to tenderness. Slowly, with that curious grace he possessed, he went down onto one knee before her.

“Leannah.” He laid his palm against her cheek. She closed her eyes and leaned into his touch. “Beautiful Leannah.”

There were a thousand things she should say. Explanations still needed to be offered, reasons and rationalities exchanged. Plans must be made. But Harry was raising her to her feet so they stood face-to-face, almost toe-to-toe. He held her wrists, being careful of her bandaged hands. Leannah felt the delicious sense of dreamlike suspension beckon, just as it had in the moonlight. She might be back in London, but real life was shut firmly outside these rooms. Here, there were none to disapprove or make new demands on her. There was only Harry. This marriage, this man, could still prove themselves nothing but a dream, but it was her dream. For this little space of time, she could be Mrs. Rayburn, and Mrs. Rayburn could do as she pleased with her husband.

Leannah stepped forward. She lifted herself up onto her toes. Harry held himself still, letting her come to him. She brushed her lips against his. The soft sensation sent sparks dancing across her skin. She touched his curling hair, his stubbled chin. His scent of leather, sweat, and country air trickled into her blood and brain along with the warmth of his body. The combination worked on her like a drug, leaving her body lax and heavy with desire.

She moved a tiny step closer.

Harry wrapped his arms around her, drawing her the rest of the way to him. Every inch of his solid body pressed against her. He lowered his head. His mouth brushed her ear, then her throat, and her shoulder. The sensation was at once feather light and bone deep and sent a fresh murmur of desire loose in her blood.

“Now.” Harry lifted her trailing curls aside and kissed her neck once more. “I expect you'll want to get out of these things.” He ran his palm down her sleeve. “You can't be comfortable.”

She made herself blink, and draw back the tiniest bit. “But I've nothing to change into.”

“Oh, dear.” Harry's fingers traced her neckline thoughtfully. “And I thought I'd taken care of everything.”

“I believe that you did.” He moved his fingers to caress her collarbone, and Leannah could not help but sigh. “Except perhaps one point.”

“Oh?” He was kissing her throat again, and her shoulder.

“I've sent the maid away. You'll have to help me undress.”

She expected him to smile, and return another quip, but instead, Harry grew grave. Still keeping one arm firmly about her waist, he smoothed back the strands of hair that had come loose from her pins and let them trail through his fingers. He watched the light elf locks drift down against her cheek. His face though, remained so serious that she could not tell if he was pleased by what he saw.

Doubt threatened. “Harry?” she breathed.

She got no further. His mouth covered hers, and Leannah leaned at once into his kiss. Kisses, for there were many more than one. He tasted the corners of her mouth and traced the shape of her lips with his tongue. He took her lower lip between his teeth and tugged ever so delicately. It was surprising, it was playful and delightful, and the best part was there was no hurry. They could take this time. They could do whatever they wanted. Nothing was forbidden here.

Leannah brushed her bandaged palms across his chest, reveling in the breadth and hardness of it. She ran them up his solid arms and around his shoulders, all the while matching each one of his kisses. The taste of him, the heat of him, it was rich and complex. Each sensation woke her senses to anticipation, acceptance, and to the sheer enjoyment of this man and his touch.

Her hand stole up the back of his head and she knotted her fingers into his curling hair, to hold him still and close so she could take his lip between her teeth. Harry permitted this, for a moment, but then he grasped her wrist.

“Ah-ah,” he breathed. “You're still hurt, remember? We must be careful with you.”

Her free hand rested against his chest, and now it curled into a fist. “I don't want to be careful.”

“But I do.” Harry's voice deepened and his blue eyes grew dark, almost dangerous. “I want to be very careful and very thorough.” He kissed her jaw, her cheek. His mouth found the delicate flesh of her earlobe and kissed her there. “I want to show you how very much I desire you, and your pleasure.” He whispered this directly into her ear so she could feel each movement of his lips as he shaped the words. “Say yes, Leannah.” He turned his hand, and let his knuckles glide slowly down her throat to her shoulder. “Say yes to me.”

What had begun as a sharp thrill broadened and deepened, becoming a dark heat that filled her. Leannah felt the last of her strength flee. She could not resist this man, and what was more, she did not want to.

“Yes, Harry.”