“Would you prefer I’d let us all go to debtor’s prison?” Griffin asked drily.
“No.” Thomas raised his face and looked him frankly in the eye. “I’d prefer that I were the one who could save Mother from financial ruin.”
Griffin stared at him for a moment and thought about what it must have cost Thomas to admit that he wasn’t good at something.
He leaned forward and poured his brother some more wine. “Every time you’ve ever made a speech in parliament, Mater has written all about it to me—pages and pages of details, the points you made and the reaction of the Lords.”
Thomas’s mouth dropped open. “Truly?”
Griffin nodded. “Truly. Haven’t you ever noticed her in the ladies’ gallery?”
“No.” Thomas shook his head, looking a little dazed. “I had no idea.”
“Well, now you do.” Griffin set the bottle down and leaned back in the chair. “Besides, what good would two financial geniuses in the family do?”
THE OPENING OF the bedroom door woke Hero that night. She yawned and stretched indolently as Griffin set down the candle he carried and took off his wig.
It was sadly unsophisticated but they’d decided they preferred to share a room—and a bed—at night. So upon their marriage, she’d moved into his bedroom and was in the process of redecorating the sitting room on one side into a dressing room for her.
“You were out late,” she murmured, her voice husky from sleep.
Griffin, who’d splashed water on his face from the basin on his dresser, turned to her with a cloth in his hand. “Thomas wanted to discuss his estates.”
His voice was relaxed—a far cry from the tension in his body when he’d left this evening for his brother’s house. “It went well, then?”
“Well enough. He’s very interested in the new weaving venture.” He threw the cloth to the dresser top and prowled toward her, his gaze roaming over the silk coverlet she held to her chest. “Are you wearing anything under there?”
She lowered her eyes demurely. “No… Well, yes.”
He cocked an eyebrow as he shrugged out of his coat. “What?”
She tilted her head.
His gaze went to her left ear. “Ah. Your diamond earbob.” He tugged at his neckcloth. “Where’s the other one?”
She lifted one bare arm out from underneath the covers and pointed mutely at the table beside the bed.
He dropped his neckcloth and waistcoat onto a chair, then came over to look. Griffin picked up the other earbob. “Is this the one you threw at me?”
“Yes.” She lay back against the fluffy down pillows.
“I see.” He toed off his shoes and crawled over the bed at her, the mattress sinking beneath his weight. “May I?”
She licked her lips, feeling the acceleration of her pulse. “Please.”
He straddled her, kneeling on the coverlet, trapping her beneath, and leaned over her. Gently he took her earlobe in his warm fingers, and she felt him insert the fine gold wire into her ear.
She shivered.
He cocked his head, examining his handiwork. “Beautiful.”
“They are my favorite,” she said.
His eyes moved to hers, amused, aroused, and dangerously possessive. “I wasn’t referring to the earring.”
She arched her brows innocently. “Weren’t you?”
“No.” He bent and licked her throat.
Goose bumps rose over her skin, making her nipples come almost painfully erect.
“I think I first fell in love with you when you threw that earbob at me,” he whispered against her skin.
“How could you?” she gasped. She wanted to take her arms out from underneath the covers, but his weight on the sheets prevented her. “You were making love to another woman.”
“Not making love,” he contradicted her choice of words. “I never made love until I met you. And besides, it doesn’t matter. I forgot her the moment I saw you.”
She laughed, though her lips trembled. “Do you expect me to believe such balderdash?”
“Oh, yes,” he murmured, tugging the sheet lower on her bosom. “Believe me and love me in return.”
He raised his head, and she met his gaze, suddenly serious. “I do. I do love you.”
A corner of his mouth quirked up. “When did you know?”
She bit her lip, wishing he’d go back to kissing her, wanting at the same time to draw this out endlessly. “You’re fishing for compliments.”
“And if I am?” He took the coverlet between his teeth and tugged it down beneath one breast. He hovered over the nipple, close enough that she felt his hot breath, but he didn’t touch her.