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To the door on the right.

“Jack?” she said softly, pushing the door open a few inches.

He was sitting in a chair, facing the window, but he turned quickly and stood at the sound of her voice.

She let herself in and closed the door gently behind her. “Your aunt said—”

He was right there. Right there in front of her. And then her back was against the door, and he was kissing her, hard, fast, and—dear God—thoroughly.

And then he stepped away. She couldn’t breathe, she could barely stand, and she knew she could not have put together a sentence if her life had depended on it.

Never in her life had she wanted anything as much as she wanted this man.

“Go to bed, Grace.”

“What?”

“I cannot resist you,” he said, his voice soft, haggard, and everything in between.

She reached toward him. She could not help it.

“Not in this house,” he whispered.

But his eyes burned for her.

“Go,” he said hoarsely. “Please.”

She did. She ran up the stairs, found her room, and crawled between her sheets.

But she shivered all night.

She shivered and she burned.

Chapter Twenty-one

Can’t sleep?”

Jack looked up from where he was still sitting in his uncle’s study. Thomas was standing in the doorway. “No,” he said.

Thomas walked in. “Nor I.”

Jack held out the bottle of brandy he’d taken from the shelf. There had not been a speck of dust on it, even though he was quite certain it had gone untouched since his uncle’s death. Aunt Mary had always run a pristine household.

“It’s good,” Jack said. “I think my uncle was saving it.” He blinked, looking down at the label, then murmured, “Not for this, I imagine.”

He motioned to a set of crystal snifters near the window, waiting with the bottle in hand as Thomas walked across the room and took one. When Thomas returned, he sat in the study’s other wingback chair, setting his snifter down on the small, low table between them. Jack reached out and poured. Generously.

Thomas took the brandy and drank, his eyes narrowing as he stared out the window. “It will be dawn soon.”

Jack nodded. There were no hints of pink in the sky, but the pale silvery glow of morning had begun to permeate the air. “Has anyone awakened?” he asked.

“Not that I’ve heard.”

They sat in silence for several moments. Jack finished his drink and considered another. He picked up the bottle to pour, but as the first drops splashed down, he realized he didn’t really want it. He looked up. “Do you ever feel as if you are on display?”

Thomas’s face remained impassive. “All the time.”

“How do you bear it?”