Page 32 of To Heist and to Hold

Iris,” Heloise called out the following day as she burst into the small greenhouse at the back of the Wimpole Street house. “Are you here?”

A curly blond head popped up over a particularly bushy shrub, one that Heloise would never be able to identify but that Iris no doubt knew every detail about from the tips of its shining deep green leaves to the ends of its twining roots.

She blinked myopically, brushing a strand of hair from her cheek, leaving a smudge behind. “Heloise? What is it?”

Heloise stepped around a collection of heavy pots and made her way down the brick path, even as she recalled with vivid clarity the image of Ethan’s heavily scarred back from the night before.

Though now she had the added memory of the way he’d moved just that morning while dealing with the sundry things needed for the boxing match and the masquerade, how he’d occasionally stretched his arms or given a barely perceptible wince when the skin on his back was pulled.

With Iris’s knowledge of medicinal plants, she might be able to help alleviate some of the discomfort he felt from his scars.

And, she belatedly reminded herself, something of that sort was certain to get him to further trust her.

“Do you have anything that would alleviate pain or tightness from old scars?” she asked now as she reached the other woman.

“Old scars?” Iris’s frown quickly cleared, understanding making her eyes go wide and her mouth form a perfect oval. “Is this for Mr. Sinclaire, then?” she asked, excitement infusing her voice. “I can finally help?”

An affectionate smile curved Heloise’s lips, her chest warming at the enthusiasm lighting her friend’s moss green eyes. “Yes, you can finally help.”

“Wonderful!” Iris exclaimed, clapping her hands together, sending a puff of dirt into the air.

Then, before Heloise could so much as blink, she darted off, racing for the washbasin at the side of the greenhouse.

In a matter of minutes she’d hung up her tools, removed her apron, and washed her hands.

And then she was hurrying from the greenhouse without even a glance back, leaving Heloise to stare after her.

Bemused, Heloise followed. By the time she reached Iris’s rooms, she had already taken down a good quantity of notebooks from her overflowing shelves and was flipping through them with a speed that made Heloise dizzy.

“Just give me a moment,” she murmured, eyes scanning the close, cramped text before her, fingers hurriedly turning over page after page.

Not knowing if Iris’s idea of a moment constituted minutes or hours, Heloise moved to one of the many bookcases that lined the wall.

A hodgepodge of items crowded the shelves, weighty tomes and sketchbooks and framed color prints of plants in various stages of development all interspersed with small jars of seeds, displays of pressed flowers, magnifying glasses and shears and tweezers.

It was as Heloise was inspecting a peculiar large green metal cylinder with a strap that had been propped in the corner that Iris gave a loud exclamation of delight.

“I’ve found it!” She looked up at Heloise, her excitement palpable.

“Have you truly?” Heloise asked, coming closer.

Iris grinned. “Yes! And it will only take a little over a week to complete.”

Heloise, who had begun to grow as excited as Iris, deflated in an instant. “A little over a week?”

Iris nodded happily, returning her attention to the open notebook before her. “If I can locate the necessary materials quickly, then yes.”

“But that will be much too late. The boxing match is in just over a week, after all. And I will need it well before that.”

The smile fell from Iris’s face. “But the extraction. The process to extrude the oils takes time.”

Time that they did not have. Heloise had felt as if a ticking clock were looming over her ever since she’d begun this charade with Ethan.

Now, however, there was something more to it.

Yes, she had worried when she’d begun this whole thing that she would not be able to accomplish all she needed to.

After all, Lord and Lady Ayersley’s anniversary ball was coming fast, the need for that blasted jewelry like an ever-tightening noose about Julia’s neck.

She rubbed at her own neck, thinking that such an analogy was much too close to what could actually happen to Julia if that jewelry wasn’t recovered in time.

Now, however, in addition to that, the end to her affair with Ethan was coming fast, causing a dull throb of pain in her chest. Which was ridiculous.

She didn’t love him, after all. She had not begun this affair out of any affection for him.

This newfound intimacy with him was the means to an end, and nothing more.

Even so, that ache grew, making it hard to breathe.

“Oh, this is awful,” Iris sighed. “And I was so excited I could finally help.”

They stood there for a time, each mired in her own troubled thoughts. But Iris, bless her, was not one to admit defeat so easily. In the next moment her eyes flew open again, her pale brows drawing together in the middle with a surprising amount of determination.

“I may not have the time to extract the oils myself,” she declared. “But give me a day, two at the most, and you shall have what you need.”

Ethan didn’t know what to expect several days later when, instead of going over the nearly completed boxing venue with him upon her morning arrival at the club, Heloise informed him in no uncertain terms that they needed to visit his rooms immediately.

Or, rather, he hoped for a particular outcome, one including the use of his bed for the next several hours. And no clothing.

As luck would have it, there was a no-clothing portion of her plan. Unfortunately, he soon learned that he was the only one participating in it.

“Get in,” she ordered, pointing to the steaming copper tub set up before the hearth.

Hot anticipation filled him as he imagined her, bared and lovely, skin glistening with water, limbs entwined with his. “As long as you join me,” he murmured, reaching for her.

But to his confusion and consternation, she danced out of his way. “Oh, no you don’t,” she declared, wagging a finger at him, a mischievous smile on her face. “I have put entirely too much effort into this for it to be pushed aside so swiftly.”

What the devil was she talking about? It was then he finally took stock of his surroundings.

Much to his surprise, the hot bath was not the only thing she had prepared.

Not only was there a carefully folded stack of clean towels and a basket holding several small glass vials by the hearth, but the curtains were drawn tight against the morning sun, plunging the room into shadows.

His nostrils flared then as he caught a whiff of something new in the air, a sweet floral scent permeating the place.

He looked at her then, at her beaming smile and the sparkle of excitement lighting her eyes. She had done this for him? Something previously petrified in his chest, the one bit she had failed to reach in his week of knowing her and the days he’d been taking her to his bed, began to soften.

“What’s all this?” he asked through a throat strangely thick with emotion.

“It has concerned me,” she said, reaching for him, pushing his jacket and waistcoat from his shoulders, “that you still deal with pain in your scars all these years later. And so,” she continued, deft fingers loosening his cravat, “I had the incredible astuteness to ask my very dear friend—who is a lauded botanist, mind you—to concoct something especially for you, something that will soothe and heal your scars and give you some relief.”

He stared at her, devoid of speech. No one in his life had ever done something like this for him.

Ever. Not even his mother, God rest her soul, who’d had too many troubles and too much to worry over to ever coddle him and his brothers.

Oh, he’d known she loved them. But she had never been a demonstrative woman, even before her husband had left her alone with three young children and broken her spirit.

The way she had expressed her love had been by making certain her children were clothed and fed, and there it had ended.

And he would never think badly of her for it.

This, however, was entirely new, a caring he had not ever thought to receive in his life.

Heloise, who must have sensed a shift in him, stilled in her removal of his clothing, her gaze finding his. She scanned his face intently, as if seeing something there for the first time.

“Ethan?” His name came out quiet, almost a whisper, asking so much in that one word.

Looking for answers he was nowhere near ready to give.

Stepping back from her touch, he took over where she had left off.

But weren’t his fingers shaking as he sat and removed his boots?

A fact that troubled him much more than he liked.

So much, in fact, that he reverted to gruffness with her, a kind of shield.

Though he knew deep down there was no shielding his softened heart.

No, she had already infiltrated that traitorous organ, touching him in ways he had never thought another could.

“What is that smell?” he demanded, as much to distract her as anything, her with her curious eyes that saw too much. He sniffed the air, scowling at the steaming bathwater as he stood and removed the last of his clothing.

“Lavender,” she answered, busying herself with preparing the bed for God knew what.

He swallowed hard, tearing his gaze from her.

When she bent over, that damned delicious arse of hers outlined by her skirts, he was tempted beyond belief.

And, as he was now fully naked, that was not the ideal state to be in.

Clearing his throat, he clasped his hands in front of his groin.