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Chapter 5

SOME TIME LATER, enveloped in her husband’s dressing goendolyn sat tailor-fashion near the foot of his bed

She had piled a heap of pillows at his back, and he sat with his legs stretched out in front of him—under the bedclothes because she had insisted he keep his feet warm

The debauch in the bathing room had left them famished They had raided the larder and sneaked up to his bedroom with a tray of thick sandwiches, which they’d made short work of

Though the bath, the love, and the ether tranquil

Gwendolyn are of the glances he stole at her fro She wished she knehat those troubled glances signified At present, only one aspect of his character was truly clear to her

Though facing a horrendous death in quicksand, he’d tried to drive her off—because he was afraid she’d fall in

He had been willing to risk medical bedlam and eventual incarceration in ahim

Though informed of the deadly risks of unsupervised laudanum consumption, he had locked hi his miseries

The Earl of Rawnsley, in short, had a protective streak aand three miles deep

Gwendolyn didn’t think she was overestih experience with her father, brothers, uncles, and cousins to recognize this particular ailment

The awareness was doing nothing to restore her clinical detacherous disrepair already

Just looking at him paralyzed her intellect When she recalled what that sensuouswith her heart and every other organ and muscle she possessed, turned to jelly

His low voice broke into her bewildered thoughts

“I don’t think you ought to stay in here,” he said gently

She looked up from her folded hands His carefully polite expression made her heart sink

She could guess why he wanted her out of his sight He’d probably spenta courteous way of telling her he’d rather not repeat the experience

But she’d been rejected countless times before, Gwendolyn reminded herself, and it hadn’t killed her yet

“I understand,” she said, her voice cool, her face hot “I know I behaved shockingly I scarcely knohat to think of myself I have never, ever, in all my life, reacted that way—to anybody”

A muscle worked in his jaw

“Not that I’ve had so many beaux,” she hurriedly added “I am not a flirt, and even if I was, I hadn’t much time for suitors I didn’t want to rew tauter “But girls are obliged to make an appearance in Society, and then of course the ed to pretend that’s true And I must admit that I was curious about what it was like to be courted and kissed But it wasn’t like anything, and not half so interesting as, say, Mr Culpeper’s Herbal If it had been that ith you, I’m sure I should have behaved much more decorously downstairs I should have fastened my mind on a medical treatise and not made a spectacle of myself But I could not behave properly I a I wanted was to reeable to you”

With a sigh, she started to crawl from the bed

“Gwendolyn” His voice was choked

She paused and aze

“You are not disagreeable to htly “Not at all Word of honor”

She ree of theto read his expression

“How could you think I was displeased?” he demanded “I all but ravished you”

Good grief, how could she be so stupid? He was upset with hi protective streak