"Come, Sabine." He walked into the warm room via a short, right-angle passage constructed so as to prevent a direct line of sight from the first to the second. He heard her following him, and it took all his self-discipline not to look over his shoulder at her. He'd damn near run her into the ground over the last few days, and not a word of complaint had come from her. Not one.
Marble benches lined the walls in this room. Every few yards was a fountain where one could turn a tap for cool, clear water to rinse off the soap and dirt In the middle of the room were two shallow pools, one larger than the other, both with patterned marble bottoms and wide steps into the water. He put their clothes and bathing kits onto the marble bench by the nearest pool and immersed himself in the water. Bliss, he thought, as the water surrounded him. Unadulterated bliss. He opened his eyes and, God, he thought he'd never in his life seen anything as erotic as Sabine walking toward him. Other than the
pestamel
around her waist, she wore nothing. He clearly saw the uneven demarcation of her dyed skin and the pale whiteness of her elsewhere.
At the edge of the pool, he held out his hand. She hesitated. "My love," he said softly.
She slipped off the pattens and got into the water. He didn't regret his promise of restraint He would not disgrace them both by allowing the possibility of one of Eglender's servants interrupting them engaged in something that must be private between them.
"When we are back in England," he said while he scrubbed his arms without looking at her—anything to take his mind off all the things he wanted to do to her, "I am going to build a Turkish bath at Maralee House." That remark required a glance in her direction. She was scrubbing her leg, her head tilted toward him. "Perhaps I'll even hire Turkish servants to staff the addition. What do you think? Shall we have a Turkish bath?"
"That sounds very nice." She stared into the water, keeping her back turned away.
Foye put a hand on her bare shoulder. He was far, far gone from trying to pretend he didn't want her or that he wasn't going to touch her again. He was. As soon as they were private. Just not now, when they were both tired and hungry and nervous with each other with so many things between them unsettled. "You're so lovely, Sabine. I haven't told you that near often enough. Nor how much I admire you."
She looked over her shoulder at him. There were dark circles under her eyes. 'Thank you, Foye."
"What you need," he said, smiling at her, "is your very own
hamam
boy."
She laughed at him.
"At your service," he said.
He stretched for his bowl and used that to scoop water to get their hair thoroughly wet When he'd done that, he grabbed her hand and walked with her to the bench where he'd set his bathing supplies. She had none of her own, of course. He put his between them and set himself to washing his hair. Sabine did the same. He adored the way her short hair exposed the line of her throat and shoulders.
When he poured the last basin of water over her hair, she let her head drop back and closed her eyes. She let out a sigh. "Heaven. This is heaven. I've been dreaming of a bath forever."
Foye stared at her barebreasts because he was too damn tired not to. She was lovely beyond words. While he stared he knew deep in his soul that she was the woman with whom he wanted to share his life; there was no question in his mind whatever. He wanted them to be married now. Yesterday. This minute.
She opened her eyes and caught him staring. Foye didn't bother to pretend he hadn't been. He no longer cared about trying to keep his reactions subdued. Her cheeks turned pink, but she didn't look away from him. He ran his fingertips along the underside of one of her breasts. "When we are alone, Sabine, I will adore you properly, I promise. If you'll let me. If you want me to."
"Oh, Foye," she whispered. "What am I to do with you?"
She was so very young in some ways, with so little experience of men in the usual social sense. She had never been given a season, never been presented to men as a marriageable young lady. She'd had no interactions with men to whom he might be compared so that she could be certain she preferred him to anyone else. She had lived her entire life believing she would always be taking care of her uncle.
"Whatever you like," he said. He was careful to smile so she wouldn't read more into his reply than she was ready to hear. He picked up his soap and worked up a lather. Between them, they washed the dirt and stink from their bodies. He didn't see any reason for modesty between them, so he moved aside his
pestamel
and soaped himself everywhere. He didn't dare do the same for her; he knew where that would lead, and this was neither the time nor place for that.
While she stayed in the pool, he waded out and propped the kit's mirror on one of the ledges above the tap that fed water into the basin. Barton would have been astounded that not even a nick marred his cheeks or throat when he was done. He put his razor under the water to clear away the soap and ended with a thorough rinse of his face.
'There," he said, rubbing his newly smooth chin and checking to see that he'd not missed any spots. "I am as handsome as ever now."
Sabine didn't say anything to that, and when he looked over, he saw why. She was fast asleep. Her head rested against the tall marble decorations carved above the next basin and tap, and her rinsing bowl bobbed in the basin beside her. Her hair was partially dry. One curl, part gold, part brown, was damp enough to cling to the side of her cheek. She'd refastened her
pestamel
around her waist. Drops of water glistened on her skin.
Even though he had touched her body everywhere a man could desire to touch a woman, even though he'd had his mouth on her there, he felt he was seeing Sabine for the first time in his life and falling in love with her like some damn fairy tale in which the monster was redeemed by the maiden. Well. He was a beast, and he was in love with her.
His conviction about the state of his heart left him shaky and uncertain. Had he felt this way about Rosaline? He knew he'd believed he loved her. If anyone had tried to tell him he hadn't he'd have called him a fool. He bad loved Rosaline, that was so. He'd been pleased—no, happy, intensely happy—when she accepted his offer of marriage and had only fallen more deeply in love with her afterward. After they were formally engaged, he'd been faithful to her. A changed man compared to his previous ways. There had been no more mistresses, no more affairs with widows or married women.
But had he ever felt that if something were to happen to Rosaline his life would end? He wasn't sure. He remembered the giddy happiness of loving Rosaline. And how little of himself he had shared with her. Because, he knew, to his shame, that she had not been his equal. Sabine was. And he was quite sure that without Sabine he'd be destroyed. Indeed, he had loved Rosaline, but he loved Sabine in an entirely different way. More deeply. More dangerously.
Foye returned to his belongings, bundled them up, and went to Sabine. He knelt at her side. "Sabine?" he said. She didn't respond, so he touched her shoulder—God, her skin was soft—and gave her a gentle shake. "Sabine?"
Her eyes twitched under her closed lids.
"Sabine," he said softly. She opened her eyes, but he could see she wasn't fully awake. "Sabine, wake up."
She lifted her head and blinked slowly. "Foye?"
She needed him, he thought Whatever reservations she had about him, she did need him. She was alone, with no family to worry about what happened to her, no one to keep her safe. Her eyes focused and something in him twisted painfully when he saw how she fought to wake herself up. "My goodness. I fell asleep."
"Come, Sabine," he said. He was proud of her and all she had endured without complaint. "It's time we went upstairs."
She more or less succeeded in staying awake from sheer force of will. He tucked away his sexual response to her as he picked her up and carried her into the cool room. There, he wrapped a towel around her hair and two more around her shoulders and waist and settled her on a divan while he went back to fetch their clothes and bath items.
When he returned, she was awake 'and sitting crosslegged on the divan combing out what was left of her hair. She had put on her
shirwal
but left the towels covering the rest of her. Pity, that. She worked a comb through her hair, then switched to the other side, beginning on the tangles there. When she was done, she set her comb very precisely on the table beside her.
"I need help getting dressed," she said.
"Of course." This was accomplished quickly enough. Once they'd bound her bosom again, his primary contribution was to hand her the various parts of her costume. She was all too soon Pathros.
'I'll arrange to get you more suitable clothes in the morning," he said while she adjusted her headdress. "Perhaps Eglender knows someone whose wife or daughter is your size." He threw aside his towel and began dressing. He looked at her sideways while he wrestled to get his shirt right-side out "I'll see about finding a ship to get us home. Tomorrow. Or later today. I've lost track of the days. After we've slept" He glared at his shirt; one of the sleeves was now wrong-side out How had he not noticed that? "I can't think straight anymore."
She left the divan. "Do you need help, effendi?"
Foye let out a short, hard sigh. "Hell, yes."
She took his shirt from him, and he ducked his head for her so they could get the thing on him. They succeeded, eventually, in getting him dressed, while he did his best to ignore the intimacy of her hands on him, touching him, shaking out his clothes, smoothing them out, buttoning, fastening, even tying a very decent knot in his cravat. Hell, he even put a hand on her shoulder for balance when she bent to get his stockings on his feet
He couldn't wait to get her upstairs and both of them undressed.
Chapter Twenty-nine
July 5,1811
About half past seven in the morning.
Bayt Salem,
in the foothills above Iskenderun. An upstairs room with carved cedar cabinets and a painted ceiling. A finch sat in one of the high windows trying to convince a lady (inch to visit his most excellent perch.
FOYE RESTED HIS WEIGHT ON ONE FOREARM AND LOOKED down at Sabine. It was sometime in the morning since there was enough light for him to see despite the room lamps being out She was naked and felt remarkably good tucked against his body. Tenderness welled up in him because she was Sabine and the woman who made his heart whole. He would take care of her. No matter what happened or how she did or didn't feel about him.
She lay on her side, facing him, her hands up close to her face, head bowed toward his chest His uppermost leg was draped over her lower body. The color on her face, although lighter than it had been, remained darker than the rest of her skin, which was immensely and beautifully pale. So very English of her. Her hair was, of course, still a mutilated walnut streaked with gold.
Sabine, still asleep, moved closer to him, burrowing her face against his chest and he was touched that she sought him out. He caressed her shoulder with the tip of his finger, tracing a circle on her very pale skin. She made a soft sound in the back of her throat, and Foye leaned down and kissed her shoulder. She smelled of attar of roses from the scent bottles left on hand in the cool room, and he was viscerally reminded of how he'd felt when he was inside her, when he was looking into her face, sweat between their joined bodies, and her looking at him as if he were the handsomest man she'd ever seen. There weren't many women who looked at him like that.
All in all, he was very much at peace with what they must do. He ought to be more bothered by his predicament than he was; marrying a too-young woman when he'd been so certain he did not want to marry at all. He would be doing well by them both if he could make Sabine content in their marriage. And himself. He kissed her earlobe. He looked forward to returning to England to settle into a country life where the most excitement they were likely to face was whether they would walk to church on Sunday or drive.
"Mm," she said without opening her eyes. "Foye." She stretched slowly, luxuriously, and his belly tightened with desire for her as her body slid against his. "Is it morning already?"
How sublime it was to hold Sabine in his arms, to feel her against him and know the woman he loved returned the emotion and more. He wouldn't trade a single day with Sabine for anything. None of the heart-pounding fear, none of the days fighting his feelings for her. Not a minute of any day since he'd walked into Anthony Lucey's parlor and seen her sitting there.
He shifted himself over her, only partially so that he did not crush her, and slid down to kiss one of her breasts. The minute he did, his cock went full-on hard for her. When his mouth closed over her nipple, she moaned softly and arched into him. She wasn't, after all, despite her small size, the sort of woman who did not like a large and rather beastly looking man. As he recalled, she liked him very well indeed.
Her arms wrapped around his shoulders, and Foye felt himself slip away, far from anything that was right or proper or gentlemanly, and into a world where all that mattered was Sabine, who loved him.
She adjusted herself, and he watched her eyes open and focus on him. He was poised to enter her, but didn't yet. He wanted to be sure she was ready for him and that he had a firm grip on his need for her.