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The sharp, insistent knock at the door came just as Penelope gathered the courage to tell Colin the truth about Lady Whistledown.
“Damn, that must be the servants, no doubt. Bringing over my personal effects,” he grumbled, rising from the sofa to don his discarded clothing.
All thoughts of confession lost, she dragged her lower lip over her teeth as he pulled on his ruffled, dark blue shirt. Feeling strange and bereft without the warmth of his body pressed against hers, she shrank back into the corner of the settee.
Uninhibited and unafraid, she had watched Colin peel back her clothing before the mirror, each layer falling away to expose a piece of her soul. And when he awakened her body, encouraging her pleasures and guiding her toward ecstasy, she had been transformed. She had become a wild, bold version of herself, a carnal creature of pleasure she hadn’t known existed.
Now, with the sunlight streaming through the windows and servants waiting on the other side of the door, she was gripped by a sudden shyness. Conscious of her nudity, she drew the blanket up around her chest like a suit of armor.
In the hours between yesterday’s sunrise and today’s, everything about her easy, familiar friendship with Colin had changed. Only last night had Penelope’s near-engagement to Debling been severed, the glorious but hurried intimacies she shared with Colin in the carriage followed by an even faster surprise betrothal.
Today, Penelope had become Colin’s wife in every way that mattered.
The mirror had revealed their ragged yearning, a desire to claim and be claimed, the taut, invisible tether of longing between them snapping in a collision of limbs and hearts. In the home they would share after they spoke their vows of love and fidelity, they had learned one another’s bodies, her soft curves molding to his sharp, hard angles as they discovered what made each other gasp and quiver and sigh. She had understood in the carriage that he desired her, had felt the proof of his need against her thigh while he kissed and pleasured her with large, talented hands that played her body like an instrument. This then, was what last night’s passion had been leading toward. A miraculous binding of blood and bone and soul, a joining devoid of embarrassment, shame, or fear of interruption.
But when the intimacies ended and the afterglow faded, what did it all mean?
After all the kindness and care Colin had shown her—reviving the embers of her hope by offering marriage, his childlike delight as he bounded into Bridgeton House bursting to share the news with his family, his loyal, passionate defense of her to her mother—every touch and murmur told a story of care and devotion.
Penelope knew she should not hunger for reassurance, but suspended beneath the shining new fullness in her heart lay cracks of darkness and fear. Having worshiped Colin from afar for years, she was no novice to being in love, but receiving unblemished love in return was altogether new. Yesterday she stood on the brink of accepting a practical but loveless union; today she was living out all her most secret, coveted fantasies in a reality so unexpected she feared one false word would bring it all crashing down.
And still she had not told Colin she was Whistledown.
”We shall take my carriage across the park,” he said, removing the dust cover from a chair and sitting down to pull on his boots. “No one will see us.”
She offered a slight nod, still frozen by insecurity and all she had left unsaid.
Now fully dressed, he looked up from his boots and gave her a smile that caused her heart to do a rapid somersault and swept her worries away. Fear, it seemed, could not exist in a world with one of Colin’s smiles.
“My God, you’re beautiful,” he whispered, the fresh longing in his gaze making her shiver. “I do not wish for today to ever end.”
Lips parted in fascination, she watched him gather her clothes and tuck them against his side. Then he swept her up, blanket and all, into his arms. She started to protest that she was too heavy for him to carry but he cradled her high against his chest like she weighed no more than a quill.
“Hold onto me, Pen,” he ordered softly.
Feeling the thudding of his heart against her forearms, she clung to his neck as he carried her through a series of rooms until they reached a small, private dressing chamber outfitted with a small bench, a bureau, a washing stand, and a vanity crowned with a mirror.
“Sit down, sweetheart,” he said, depositing her on the cushioned bench with tenderness. “I’ll be right back.”
She nodded, a tremulous smile playing at her lips at the endearment. Closing the door, he disappeared, presumably to instruct the servants. Sequestered in the small windowless antechamber with echoes of his clean, spicy scent clinging to her skin, she felt safe and protected from the bustling of the servants as they trudged around the house unloading trunks and positioning furniture.
Minutes later, Colin returned with a soft cloth, a basin of warm, soapy water, and a silver box. He knelt on the floor at her feet, then lifted the blanket around her hips to carefully clean the sore, sticky place between her legs and the sensitive skin of her inner thighs.
When she was clean and dry, Colin rose from his knees and crowded beside her on the small bench, bumping against her hip until she giggled, grasping at his shoulders to keep from toppling onto the floor. As usual, he knew exactly what to say and how to touch her. Rather than spoiling their romantic, beautiful day, his gentle little shoves and teasing glances made her feel even closer to him. It was a relief to laugh, to know that despite the ways their lovemaking had shifted their relationship into something deeper, they were still them —Colin and Pen—the best of friends.
Gently, Colin turned her shoulders away from him so he was seated behind her, and Penelope followed his cue, shifting her legs to dangle off the side of the bench. With slow, methodical movements he molded her corset around her ribs and began to lace it, the only sound in the room their soft breathing and the swishing of the ribbons as they obeyed the commands of his long, clever fingers.
In the mirror atop the vanity, she studied his focused expression, his chestnut curls tousled, his lips flushed and swollen from hours of kissing, his eyes dark with remembered passion. He had tickled, kissed, and teased every inch of her skin with maddening, unhurried thoroughness, leaving her body languid and fulfilled. She leaned her back against his chest with a soft sigh of contentment. He lifted his head to meet her gaze, the smile he gave her causing a kaleidoscope of butterflies to take wing in her belly. It was overwhelming—the force of his unwavering attention, those knowing sapphire eyes reading her every desire and expression, imprinting on her soul.
When he returned his attention to her corset, she considered her own flushed face in the looking glass, no longer a silly, infatuated girl but a woman in possession of a new confidence and power. She had traced the lean, powerful planes of his body, giving herself to this larger-than-life man whose beautiful voice and tender heart had been the center of her dreams for as long as she’d known what love was. And by some miracle, he had surrendered himself to her in return. The notion that she, Penelope Featherington, could make Colin Bridgerton moan her name and fall apart, breathless and weak, was almost too much to believe.
His warm breath fanned the skin of her neck and shoulders and as he patiently tugged on her laces, he hummed a low sweet melody. Occasionally he stopped to thread his fingers through her tangled auburn hair and press tender, sweet kisses against the back of her neck.
Determined to give him as much love as she received, she turned her head to caress his throat with her mouth, kissing her way up his neck to where it met his jaw.
She felt the vibration of his groan against her lips. “Mmmm, do not test my self-control, Miss Featherington,” he warned, his breath jagged. “Unless you wish for me to tear this corset off and ravage you on the floor.”
“Oh!” she said because she couldn’t think of anything else, but her heart soared and her pulse thrummed wildly at his raw, needy tone.
She grinned, feeling untroubled and light. There was a delicate, sacred intimacy in the way he was caring for her now that was somehow more precious than their lovemaking had been.
Penelope now knew not only what it was to love but to be loved in return.
She moved to stand so she could slide on her gown, but he shook his head, wordlessly kneeling before her like a servant once more to glide the fabric over her thighs and hips, up along her ribcage, his warm hands cupping her breasts as he molded the dress to her bodice, then finally lifting the sheer sleeves over her shoulders. Only then did he help her to her feet and step behind her to refasten the long, hidden placket of tiny buttons.
Not wanting to return home to her mother’s sharp, exacting gaze appearing as if she’d been bedded, she sat down at the vanity to repair her flattened, tumbled curls. Colin was ready for that as well. He set the gleaming silver box he’d arrived with atop the vanity table and opened it. Inside nestled a silver brush, a matching comb, a selection of hairpins, and a hand mirror, all decorated with tiny sapphires.
She gasped in wonder at its beauty, her eyes flying to his face in the mirror. Perhaps he had acquired the set from one of his sisters. “These are exquisite, Colin, and much too dear to borrow.”
“They are new.” He shrugged as if it did not signify but the heightened color on his cheeks and his shaking fingers betrayed his nervousness. He picked up the comb and began to carefully untangle her wayward mane, his Adam’s Apple bobbing in the mirror. “It is a gift—for you. I bought the set in Florence while I was abroad this summer. I was walking through these little alleys, lost in thought, and saw the set in a shop window. At the time I didn’t know why, but I simply had to have it. Now I know it was meant to belong to you.” His hand stilled on the comb, and when he met her gaze in the mirror, the love there stole the breath from her lungs. He lifted one of her hands from her lap and brought it to his mouth, kissing her knuckles. “As I belong to you.”
Happy tears blurred the reflection of his beloved face. Rather than rushing to collect herself and dashing the wetness away, she smiled, letting the tears roll down her cheeks without shame. “Thank you,” she whispered.
Colin returned to combing and pinning her hair, every movement of his fingers practiced and gentle. Her mind wandered, and she wondered if he had done this for other women, perhaps for the Parisian beauties he had journaled about. The thought bothered her more than she cared to admit, far more than the idea of him sharing his body. A frown creased her brow.
“No,” he said, hoarsely, his jaw working as he answered the question before she could ask. “I’ve never done this for anyone else. But I have watched my mother and four sisters. Growing up with five women, a man learns a valuable lesson or two.” His sapphire eyes sparkled for a moment, then turned somber once more. “And as for the other…making love to you…I meant when I said earlier. It does not compare, Pen. No one has ever made me feel the way you do. My body, my heart, my soul—everything I am is yours.”
She felt his hands tremble where they rested on her shoulders and realized for the first time that he needed reassurance as badly as she, perhaps even more. Longing to confess how dearly she loved him, had always loved him, she tried to speak around the emotion clogging her throat but no sound came out. Instead, she drew his right hand up to caress her cheek then brushed her lips over his fingers in wordless adoration.
He nodded in understanding, the worry lines on his face smoothing into a soft contentment. They settled back into a comfortable silence as he glided the pins through her thick, unruly tresses.
“Will this pass inspection?” he asked when he was finished.
She turned her head back and forth, admiring his work in the mirror. While they had lain together, he had lovingly called her “his mess,” and he had repaired her tousled appearance with a deft, soul-stirring efficiency that was astounding.
“Rae could not have done any better,” she admitted with a watery laugh. “Never tell her I said so, though. She’s a wonderful ladies’ maid, but she’s truly a born manager. Do you think when we are wed we might make her our housekeeper?”
“You have my blessing to hire and promote whomever you like,” he said smiling. “I trust your judgment, Pen.” Holding out his arm, he treated her to a smile that was pure mischief. “And now, shall we continue the tour? I’m afraid I was too overcome by your beauty to let you get very far earlier.”
She rested her hand in the strong crook of his elbow and stood, pushing up on her toes to press a kiss to his cheek. “Lead the way.”
-fin-