“Oh, of course, the gag. Why didn’t you say you wanted it off first? Here, lift your head and I will reach behind…”
The knot was tied tightly, and it took Gillian, draped across Noble’s heaving chest as she wrestled with the obstinate cloth, several minutes before she could pull the obnoxious item from his mouth.
The spate of profanities that followed confirmed her earlier thoughts. He was very angry. Casting periodic nervous glances at Nick, who gazed at his father with a placid expression that didn’t fool her for one moment, she finally interrupted what appeared to be a lengthy discussion of the tortures Noble was going to inflict upon whoever had placed him in this position.
“I think your plan with the iron maiden and saltpeter is a good one, my dearest, but first I would have you released from this bondage.”
Several minutes later, when Noble could speak without incorporating further plans for revenge in his comments, he replied hoarsely to Gillian’s earlier statement.
“The key is on the dressing table. I’ve been staring at it all bloody evening.”
Nick headed for the table while Gillian sat down on the bed next to her confined husband and absently laid a hand on his bare chest. He was warm. Very warm. “Who did this horrible thing to you, Noble?”
The Black Earl closed his eyes. “I don’t know, although I have a suspicion.”
“You didn’t see who stripped you naked and chained you to a bed in your mistress’s house?”
“No. I was struck on the head when I entered the house.” Noble groaned slightly as Gillian’s hand gently stroked his chest in a reassuring manner. Rather, Noble corrected grimly, it might have been meant to reassure him, but unfortunately his wife’s presence was having another effect that would be all too evident if she continued her present attentions.
His wife’s presence?
“What the devil are you doing here?” Noble roared, startling Gillian out of her reverie. She jumped, her fingers still entwined in the soft hairs on his chest. Noble gave another roar, this time of outraged pain. “You’re supposed to be at Nethercote! I do not recall giving you permission to leave!”
Gillian glanced over toward the dressing table. Nick held up a key and cocked a brow. Gillian shook her head slightly.
“I was not aware that I was a prisoner, to be held captive until you decided to set me free.”
“You’re not a prisoner, damn it, but I expect you to stay where you’re put. When I give an order, it is to be carried out without question.” Noble took a deep breath. Lord but she was pretty, even dressed in the ratty clothes of a boy. As a disguise, it was hopeless. Long tendrils of red hair fell out of a blue knit cap, and no man with eyes in his head could mistake the rounded feminine curves displayed by a tightly fitted black waistcoat and breeches. A movement beyond her recalled his son’s presence to mind. The wave of heat centered on his groin was immediately cooled, as if he had been dowsed with a bucket of snow.
“I see,” Gillian replied to his statement stiffly and, disentangling her hand, stood and moved to the foot of the bed. “I was unaware that you had give me an order, my lord.”
“I did. And you have disobeyed that order.”
Gillian said nothing, but her expression told Noble she wasn’t pleased with that comment. Obviously, she needed instruction on how to order her own life so that she wasn’t always finding herself in situations out of her control. There was no time like the present to begin her training.
“Without order, wife, there is chaos, and chaos in our lives is not to be tolerated — it wastes our time, drains us of energies better spent at other endeavors, and creates worry and concern when the mind should be calm and peaceful. Would you agree with that statement?”
Gillian’s eyes widened and her lips trembled at his words. Clearly she was overcome by his masterful use of imagery. Still silent, she nodded her head abruptly, then crossed her arms over her chest, pulling the short jacket up and throwing the gentle curve of her hips into relief against the wall behind her. Noble cleared his throat and continued.
“I’m doing my best to make order out of the chaos that seems to follow you everywhere, but God knows it isn’t easy.” Had her legs been this long the night before? The breeches seemed to go on forever, stretching over lush, long thighs. Noble thought briefly of the way her legs had wrapped around his hips and decided they were the same length, then dragged his mind back to the task at hand. He wouldn’t think of her legs while his son was present. He wouldn’t think of how long they were, or how the shapely contour of her calf made his mouth go dry, or the silken feeling of her leg as it rubbed down his own…God’s teeth, he’d be shaming himself in a minute. Grimly, Noble envisioned scenes of war, pestilence, and mutilation.
“In order for your life to become the calm, enjoyable existence that I know you long for,” he continued in a gritty voice, his jaw tense and tight, “you must abide by my rules and not question them. Through me, you will gain control over your life and will no longer be subject to such unpleasant experiences as you have encountered since I have known you. You are undisciplined, wife, but not beyond hope of redemption.”
Nick went to stand beside Gillian. She turned and put an arm around his shoulders, pulling the jacket up even higher. The breeches did nothing to hide the sweet outline of her derriere. In fact, Noble thought with a rising sense of panic, they enhanced it. Not even the vision of his son clutched to her side could stop the memory of just how warm that backside had felt nestled against him intimately when he had woken that morning, nor how he had been possessed to waken his bride by means that would guarantee to keep a smile on her face all day. Two pairs of eyes leveled seriously upon him suddenly drove home the point that he was lecturing his wife while stretched out nude, manacled to a bed. “Gillian, the key.”
Gillian took the key from her stepson. “I have one or two questions, if you please, Noble.”
“Release me and I will be happy to answer all of them.” Gillian nodded and reached toward his feet, but instead of unlocking the shackle, she idly stroked the top of his foot instead.
“It’s about this concept of order you have.” Her brow wrinkled as she puzzled it out. “I do not think I understand it fully. When you say chaos, do you refer to those little surprises that make life so very interesting?”
Her fingers ran from the top of his ankle down the slope to his toes. He doubted that she even knew she was touching him. Noble had never before thought of the foot as anything but a useful appendage, but a thousand nerves he did not know he possessed jumped to life and pulsated under Gillian’s magic fingers. He laid his head back and groaned. He heard his wife gasp as she suddenly clutched his foot.
“Noble — that part of you. The broken part. It’s moving!” It took every bit of willpower, but he didn’t look, nor did he meet his son’s eyes. Instead he kept his voice calm and level and thought of the affects of the bubonic plague on the human body.
“Gillian, unlock the blasted shackles.” His voice sounded thick with strain.
“But — are you sure all is well? I believe the damage to your…part…is causing a delayed reaction. One moment you’re swelling, and the next you’re deflating. You cannot tell me that is right.”