Theblissof that notion this moment.
“And perhaps you’d like a bath, as well,” he added.
Her face must have registered surprise, even wariness, because a screen of cynicism moved across his eyes.
“To be clear: you are safe with me, Alexandra. And from me.”
In other words: not even the prospect of her nude in a bath would tempt him to touch her.
Fair enough.
“Yes,” she said quietly. “I should like to sleep. And eat. And I would like a bath.”
Baths were not included with room and board at The Grand Palace on the Thames, their charming and genteel proprietresses had delicately informed them. There would be an additional cost.
And so of course, that meant the bath was his, too. She was wildly, wildly tempted to say it. Why not continue to court catastrophe? What did she have to lose? Perhaps with enough practice she could field catastrophe with the panache of Brightwall swinging a musket at a highwayman.
He draped her dress on the back of the settee as gently as if it was a living thing. “I’ll speak to the proprietresses about preparing one for you. And a meal.”
He turned toward the door, then paused with his hand on the knob, and turned back to her. “We’ll talk when you’ve rested.”
It sounded like a warning.
Chapter Five
Alexandra catapulted awake, her heart pounding, limbs flailing.
Oh no! She’d fallen asleep! Her shoes! Bunty would take her shoes!
Memories clattered into place like falling dominoes: A carriage ride. Prison. And the last one:
Brightwall.
Whereupon her heart gave a hard, sharp lurch. Not unlike an allegedly stolen carriage being pulled to an abrupt halt.
She gulped in steadying breaths and in came sweet, clean air, scented with hints of blossoms and linseed oil lovingly applied to furniture. She exhaled in relief.
Not her own bedroom, with its canopy bed. She was now in a room at a boardinghouse improbably named The Grand Palace on the Thames.
Thank God.
Albeit in a suite she would apparently be compelled to share with her erstwhile husband.
She had clearly gotten as far as the bed, but she didn’t remember anything that had happened between that moment and this one. She musthave toppled into a black and dreamless sleep straightaway.
She was still buried beneath her estranged husband’s wool coat and... what was this?
Her fingers skimmed another layer she seemed to have acquired. A pink knitted coverlet.
She didn’t recall pulling it over herself.
She tentatively gathered a handful of its dense, soft weight. She knew it represented hours of careful feminine labor and it smelled faintly of lavender. Which reminded her of her mother, who had died when she was thirteen years old.
And something about that coverlet made her feel more cherished than she had in longer than she could remember.
Her eyes began to sting. She gave her head a rough, admonishing shake.
She was not a child anymore. She was just tired.