"Thank you, Foster." She patted his arm. "You always do know the right thing to say."
His elderly face flushed with pleasure. "Get along with you, now, Lady Theo… Oh, Lady Gilbraith and Miss Gilbraith have gone to the physician on Harley Street. They took the barouche."
"Oh, that's wonderful." Theo's jubilant eyes flew to her husband's face. "I mean, I'm sure the physician will be able to help Miss Gilbraith's sniffles and her ladyship's liver… or whatever is troubling her." Her voice faded as she was about to find herself in realms of gross indelicacy.
"In that case we'll take nuncheon abovestairs in the little parlor," Stoneridge said into the moment of silence.
"Certainly, my lord. I'll see to it at once." Foster took himself off to the back regions with his usual stately tread.
"What if they return while we're… otherwise occupied?" Theo looked over her shoulder at Sylvester, her eyes now mischievous. Nuncheon in the little parlor could mean only one thing.
"Get upstairs," he ordered, pushing her ahead of him with a hand on her bottom. "Who's the letter from?"
"I don't know yet. I'll open it later." She skipped up the stairs, wondering if the message was from Neil Gerard. The handwriting was definitely masculine and unfamiliar. She hoped it was confirmation of their arrangement to drive tomorrow. If so, Sylvester mustn't know about it.
"I'll join you in a minute," Sylvester said, turning aside to his own chamber.
Theo hesitated, her hand on her own doorknob. "You're not still going to insist I go back to Stoneridge, are you?"
He regarded her thoughtfully for a minute before saying, "Can you give me your word of honor that you'll go nowhere and do nothing without my knowledge?"
Sylvester waited, then said quietly, "You have your answer, Theo." He stretched out a hand and tugged one of the ringlets clustering around her ears. "Don't look so disconsolate, love. You've been complaining about the boredom in London ever since we got here. I'll join you shortly, I promise."
She still had a few days to prove her point She shrugged, and with relief he took her silence as acceptance.
He ran his fingers upward through the curls, flicking them around her face, saying teasingly, "I'm beginning to get used to this. In fact, it's quite an appealing little gypsy, one way or another." Catching her chin, he kissed her. "Why don't you go and put on a wrapper… make life easy for me for once?"
Playfully she nibbled his bottom lip. "But surely one appreciates what's hard-won much more than what comes easily."
"I wouldn't know," he said. "So far nothing's come easily where you're concerned, so I have no basis for comparison."
"Unjust!" Her tongue darted into the corner of his mouth.
He put her from him and turned back to his door. "Five minutes, and I'll expect to find you prepared to smooth my path."
Theo grinned and whisked herself into her own bedroom, imagining how best to fulfill such a demand. Unbuttoning her jacket with one hand, she broke the wafer on the letter and unfolded the sheet. It was from Gerard, who would do himself the honor of calling upon her at ten the following morning, in the hopes that she would drive with him to Hampton Court if the weather was clement. Until then he was her obedient servant.
Theo refolded the letter and slipped it into a pigeonhole in her secretaire. Gerard couldn't have chosen a better venue for her purposes.
Throwing off the rest of her clothes, she slipped into a filmy wrapper of apple-green muslin edged with lace. Sitting before her dresser mirror, she brushed her hair, enjoying the novelty of her bared neck and the lightness of her head. Her sisters had given her a small vial of perfume on her wedding morning. She rarely used it because she was always in such a hurry to get dressed that such niceties tended to be forgotten, but now seemed like an appropriate occasion. Sylvester wanted her dressed for seduction, so that was what he should have.
She put a few drops behind her ears, at her throat, and on her wrists. Then, with a little smile, she applied the delicate fragrance behind her knees and on the inside of her thighs. Where else did Sylvester like to play? Her navel, the dimpled hollows in the small of her back, the high, arched insteps of her long, narrow feet.
Deciding she must smell like a whorehouse, she cast one last glance at her reflection before leaving the room and speeding barefoot down the corridor to the small parlor overlooking the rear garden, where they spent time when they wished to be private from the household.
Sylvester was already there, pouring wine into two glasses. "No cheese tarts, I'm afraid," he said as she came in. "But there's -" The words died on his lips. Slowly, he set the glasses back on the table, his eyes narrowed as he examined her.
Dark curls clouded around her face, softening her features in a way the plain, uncompromising plaits had never done; her cheeks were aglow, her eyes banked fires at midnight; the wrapper clung to every sinuous line of her body, the narrow girdle accentuating her waist and the slight flare of her hips. London and winter weather had done away with the tanned complexion, leaving her skin the color and texture of clotted cream.
"I really have lost my gypsy," he murmured. "But just look what I have in her place."
"What?" she said, stepping toward him.
"A most beautiful woman," he replied simply. "A wayward and unruly wife, but a most beautiful woman."
"Oh, don't scold," Theo protested, coming into his arms.
"It was a statement of fact, not a scolding," he said, smiling, running his hands down her body, feeling the warmth of her skin beneath the delicate material, the ripple of muscle in her back as she reached against him.
"Take it off, Theo." There was a husky rasp to his voice, and he took a step backward from her.
Her eyes fixed on his face, she unfastened the robe and let it slip to the floor.
His eyes ran slowly down her body, devouring every inch of skin, the firm, jutting breasts, the dark nipples, growing hard and erect under his scrutiny, the flat belly, the cluster of dark curls at the apex of her long creamy thighs. Then he made a little circular motion with his forefinger, and she turned obediently. He gazed at the straight, narrow back, the pointed shoulder blades, the curve of her buttocks, the backs of her thighs, and the softness behind her knees.
He knew every inch of her body, and yet each time it was as if it were uncharted territory.
"Let's eat," he said into the silence, where lust quivered so thick one could almost touch it.
"Eat?" Theo spun round, astonishment and a touch of indignation in her eyes. "Now?"
"Now." He handed her a glass of wine, his own eyes filled with sensual amusement. "No," he said when she bent to pick up the discarded wrapper. "Stay just as you are. I want to enjoy you with my eyes for a while."
"I'm to eat naked?"
"Just so." He pulled out a chair for her. "You'll not be cold by the fire." He bent to kiss the nape of her neck as she sat down, and Theo shuddered with pleasure and anticipation.
This was something they had never done before. It felt most peculiar to sit naked in the room while he was fully clothed. Peculiar but most arousing. The fire lapped against her right thigh, and the embroidered seat of the chair was slightly scratchy under her bottom and thighs. She gave a little experimental wriggle.
Sylvester sipped his wine, watching her. "Open your thighs a little," he instructed softly.
Theo's eyes widened and her tongue touched her lips. She shifted again on the seat and bit her lip suddenly. "How can I eat?"
"You'll manage." He took another sip of wine and deliberately carved a slice from the breast of a cold chicken, placing it on her plate. "Pickled mushrooms?"
Theo nodded silently and he passed her the dish. She took a spoonful, her breasts brushing against the edge of the table as she leaned forward. Her nipples burned, and she sat back with a little gasp. "I can't do this, Sylvester."