An Improper Governess: An Improper Liaisons Novella, Book 2 (5 page)

“Again, I don’t know what to say, sir, other than thank you,” Abigail said. She supposed she should also thank him for her new room, but the idea of discussing bedchambers suddenly seemed like a topic she should avoid at all costs.

As she turned and exited the library with her brand new bonnet and basket, it wasn’t with a sense of relief or delight, but trepidation. Dealing with her rampant physical attraction to Sir Nicholas was difficult enough. But his acts of kindness made him even more appealing. Dangerously so. She didn’t want to desire him
and
like him.

An inviting pathway to ruin seemed to be opening up before her, and God help her, she prayed she was strong enough not to take it.

N
icholas Barsby
, you are going to burn in hell.

For what felt like the thousandth time that morning, Nicholas tried to focus his attention on the account ledgers, agricultural reports and various items of correspondence strewn around him on the desk in his steward’s office and
not
on the movements of the delectable Miss Adams in the library beyond. To be more precise, it wasn’t what Miss Adams was currently doing that was so distracting—removing books from the shelves and sorting them into great piles all over the floor, and whatever surface she could find—but what he imagined doing with her. The constant ache in his groin was bloody maddening.

To make matters worse, after yesterday’s meeting in the library, he was now certain Miss Adams was attracted to him, at least in a physical sense. When she’d first cast him a frankly admiring glance from beneath her long brown lashes, whenever he’d flirted with her and she’d blushed, his fascination with her had deepened. There was one electric moment in particular when their gazes had locked that had convinced him Miss Adams’s desire might be as powerful as his own.

He sensed she wasn’t a virgin.

That didn’t mean he should seduce her, but brute that he was, it seemed he couldn’t stop thinking about her in a sexual sense. If he were honest with himself, the reason Miss Adams wasn’t on her way to Brighton right now was quite simple—he wanted her. Badly.

Christ, he was even jealous of the footman who had been tasked to help Miss Adams lift some of the heavier books or those out of reach. If the footman and the well-meaning but ancient steward, Mr. Cruikshank hadn’t been here for every blasted minute of the last three hours...

Nicholas blew out a heavy sigh, silently lamenting yet again, that Cruikshank reeked of tobacco and the fusty smell peculiar to the unwashed elderly. The connecting door to the library and the office window had been left wide open in an attempt to reduce the room’s stuffiness, but to no avail. Beneath his cambric shirt, sweat trickled down Nicholas’s back. Although it wasn’t
de rigueur
by any means, he’d discarded his morning coat and had rolled up his sleeves. But then he’d never been one to observe the expected proprieties.

As soon as his business with Cruikshank was completed, he’d be heading straight for the lake. With Regina and his nieces gone from Hartfield, he could enjoy a peaceful dip without the worry of being stumbled upon. Particularly now he needed to cool down in more ways than one.

When Miss Adams entered his line of sight and bent over a pile of books affording him a wonderful view of her gorgeous arse—the thin white muslin of her skirts did little to hide her curves—he nearly groaned aloud. A hot wave of unexpected and completely irrational jealousy surged within him when he noticed the footman frankly admiring her rear as well. The cheeky bastard. Perhaps tomorrow he would task one of the maids to help Miss Adams, or better still, he could offer his assistance.

Yes, he was a bad man.

“Sir Nicholas, I draw your attention to the entries in this ledger,” said Cruikshank, pulling him out of his salacious daydream of pleasuring the governess from behind as she leaned over the arm of the striped sofa by the fireside, her skirts rucked up about her waist. “It concerns the income and expenses for Bridgewater House over the last year. The last tenant’s lease ended in March, but I am confident we will have another expression of interest very soon.”

Nicholas glanced to where the steward pointed with one crooked finger. “Yes. Very good,” he said, without really studying the figures. Cruikshank had been the steward at Hartfield for as long as Nicholas could remember. And because he was so damned good at his work, it meant Nicholas could be an absentee landlord for the most part. Which suited him well. At nine-and-twenty, he believed he still had quite a few years of doing whatever he wanted, whenever he wanted before he even thought about taking a wife. If he ever did.

There was certainly something to be said for living the carefree existence of a well-moneyed
ton
buck. He was not ready, at all, to get leg-shackled to a ‘suitable’ wife with innumerable lady-like accomplishments; a young, gently-bred woman from a most respectable family with good social standing and all of the right connections... Someone like Regina perhaps. Nicholas grimaced. A woman like her would either bore him to tears or worse still, harry him ‘til kingdom come.

He definitely wasn’t going to act the part of a prudish old woman like his late brother Benjamin had, which, in the end, hadn’t done him any favors, God rest his soul. Benjamin and both his parents had been taken from this world too soon—Benjamin at the age of thirty, his mother in childbirth when he was but a boy before he’d even been breeched, and his father, when he was in his first year at Cambridge. No, Nicholas Barsby would live the life of a bachelor to the full, because tomorrow this life might be over.

He looked up from the ledger and at that moment, Miss Adams bent over again, but this time she was facing him and he caught an eyeful of her glorious cleavage. She wasn’t amply endowed in the chest area, but Nicholas got the distinct impression her breasts were high and round and as firm as Persian pomegranates. He wondered what color her nipples were: the dusky pink of peaches; the rich red of summer raspberries or perhaps a soft apricot. His mouth began to water and his already half-aroused cock stirred. Sweet Jesus, he was a mess. He definitely needed to cool down. Now.

Cruikshank turned the ledger’s page. “Now, sir, you can see here—”

“Yes, yes.” Nicholas waved his hand impatiently and got to his feet. “I can see everything is in order. As always, you’ve done a first-rate job, but I have other business to attend to.”

“Of course, sir. Only—”

“Later, Cruikshank.” Nicholas strode out of the office, gave Miss Adams a curt nod and quit the library. He might appear rude but he didn’t trust himself to speak to her without stammering, drooling or even worse, making a wildly inappropriate suggestion.

As he made his way toward the Great Hall and then the grounds beyond the front door, he realized his mad obsession with Miss Adams had to stop. But for the life of him, he didn’t know how.

He ripped off his neckcloth and unbuttoned his waistcoat as he marched across the lawn toward the north end of the lake. He was lying to himself. Of course he bloody knew what he should do to end this insane craving for the governess. There were three options.

He could send her away to Brighton.

He could abscond to London and spend a week at his favorite King Street brothel sampling the abundant pleasures on offer until he found a courtesan he particularly liked.

Or he could proposition Miss Adams and have his wicked way with her. Even though there was smoldering fire in the woman’s gaze whenever she looked at him, he doubted she’d acquiesce. She had a tart tongue and from what he’d seen, she wasn’t afraid to use it.

God, her mouth...
What he wouldn’t do to taste it... Taste all of her...

By the time he reached the shelter of the rhododendron hedge by the folly, he was in such a lather, his shirt stuck to his back as he attempted to wrench it off. His boots and damnably tight breeches quickly followed and then he plunged into the blessedly cool waters of the lake and struck out to the far side.

Nicholas was half-way through his third rigorous lap when he decided the best and fairest course of action to take was to send Miss Abigail Adams to Brighton, just like he should have done in the first place. And as soon as he’d completed his business here, he’d return to the capital. And swive himself stupid.

Maybe then he’d feel sane again.

* * *

A
bigail gnawed
at her bottom lip in the wake of Sir Nicholas’s swift exit from the library. He’d looked so stern and indifferent as he’d given her a curt nod on his way out. She wondered if someone or something had displeased him, but she had no idea who or what that might be. She was
fairly
certain it had nothing to do with her. How could it?

She placed Rousseau’s
Julie; or The New Heloise
onto the appropriate pile and pushed a loose strand of hair away from her perspiration-beaded forehead. For the last few hours she had diligently gone about the task Sir Nicholas had assigned her, removing books from the shelves and trying to organize them into broad but logical categories by subject matter: classical literature, history, the sciences, mathematics, geography, art, philosophy, agriculture, and animal husbandry. And then there was the large collection of novels that Lady Barsby purchased from Hatchards. It was a monotonous, laborious undertaking to be sure, particularly given the library was as stifling as an oven, but Abigail didn’t feel like she was wilting. No, not at all.

Not with Sir Nicholas in the very next room.

All morning, the air around her seemed heavy, not only with humidity, but with pulsating awareness. Sexual awareness. The kind of awareness that made Abigail’s lower belly ache with longing. The dampness between her thighs had nothing to do with the heat.

Every so often, when she had glanced over to Mr. Cruikshank’s cramped, stuffy study, she had caught Sir Nicholas watching her, his gaze heavy-lidded and more than a little speculative. At one point, he’d arched a dark eyebrow—as if inviting her to do something wicked—and she’d blushed so hotly, she had immediately looked away.

Curse the man and curse her vulnerability. Why did he have to be so sinfully attractive? And why couldn’t she be as dry and dusty and as unresponsive as the ancient, leather-bound tomes she’d been handling?

But she wasn’t. Even now, Sir Nicholas’s tantalizing scent—a potent mix of sandalwood and pleasant male muskiness—wrapped around her, teasing her, taunting her. Making her want things no young woman in her position, or her right mind, should want.

“Miss Adams, where would you like me to put these?” The young footman Sir Nicholas had assigned to assist her with retrieving any out-of-reach or heavy books, was balancing a teetering stack of Shakespeare’s plays in his arms. The man was sweating profusely—sweat stained the underarms of his butter yellow tailcoat and a drop trickled from beneath his periwig. He must be melting in his livery, poor man.

“Ah, just add it to the English literature pile, thank you, Colin.” Abigail wiped her damp palms down her skirts and glanced at the longcase clock beside the door to the study. “I don’t know about you, but I’ve had enough of this room for the moment. It’s almost noon and I think we deserve some fresh air before our dinner hour. Let’s say we meet back here in an hour and a half.”

Colin placed the books where she’d indicated and flashed her a grin as he straightened. “I couldn’t agree with you more, Miss Adams. But I expect Mr. Lawson will want me for one thing or another.”

Abigail smiled back. Colin was a good-natured young fellow and she quite liked him. “Well, be sure to pass by the kitchen and have a small beer. I’m sure Mr. Lawson wouldn’t begrudge you that.”

Abigail was in no mood for small beer or even food for that matter; it was too hot to eat. Tea would be lovely but she’d best wait until it was time to go to the servants’ hall lest she incur the wrath of Mrs. Graham yet again. A walk by the lake and a rest in the cool marbled shade of the Doric temple was just the tonic she needed.

Ten minutes later, her new bonnet in place and Jane Austen’s
Sense and Sensibility
in hand, Abigail braved the midday sun and crossed the lawn toward the lakeside path leading to the folly. The relentless heat beat down upon her like a hammer upon a blacksmith’s anvil and she worried that the bare skin upon her arms might burn. By the time she reached the shaded section of the path by the willow copse, she was panting and sticky with sweat. She couldn’t even bear wearing her bonnet so she tugged at the ivory silk ribbons and pulled it off.

She had just begun to traverse the section of path that ran beside the rhododendron hedge when she heard a splash—a very loud splash—and she stumbled to a halt, frozen.

Oh, good Lord. Could it be...? Why hadn’t she even thought...?

Abigail’s heart skittered then took off at a gallop as she realized Sir Nicholas was probably but a few yards away. Bathing.

Naked.

She should turn around and go straight back to the Hall. How appalling to think she had almost invaded her employer’s privacy.

A few more moments passed and aside from the thundering of her heart in her ears, all Abigail could hear was the melodious warble of a blackbird in the leafy oak canopy above her head. From where she stood, she could see the temple steps and the grassy bank leading down to the water, but there wasn’t anything to suggest a human presence in the area. Perhaps she had been mistaken. Perhaps she had only heard a mallard duck as it entered the water or the splash of a leaping fish. Or even a mute swan.

She couldn’t be certain it was Sir Nicholas she’d heard. She’d walked all this way in the heat of the day; surely it couldn’t hurt to investigate. Take a small peek.

What is the worst thing that could happen?