He came to her, as she knew he would, by dead of night.
Sleep had evaded her these hours past and so when she heard the rattle of stones at her window, it did not startle Posy out of slumber.
The pebbles skittered against the glass again and, afrit that Thorndyke (for it could be no one else) might break the window or rouse the household, Posy rose from her bed and peered out.
‘What are you about, sir?’ Posy hissed, but Thorndyke was already hoisting himself up the apple tree that grew close to the house, its branches almost touching the windows as Posy had had to dismiss the gardener last Michaelmas. ‘Are you mad?’
‘Ill met by moonlight, my dear Miss Morland,’ Thorndyke said, his voice steady despite his exertions. ‘How enchanting you look. So adorably dishevelled.’
Posy was sure she looked neither adorable nor enchanting enveloped in her voluminous, lawn cotton nightgown, with her hair loosely plaited.
‘You must have taken complete leave of your senses if you imagine that I’ll let you in,’ she told him firmly, for only that past afternoon she’d taken her dear friend Verity into her confidence. Although she was a rector’s daughter, Verity had not condemned her, nor judged her either, but she had warned Posy to be firm with Lord Thorndyke.
‘Let no man put a price on your reputation or your heart,’ Verity had said. ‘Though indeed I do suspect that it’s not the fifty guineas he longs to possess but your love, for that has much greater worth.’
Yet, Posy refused to believe that Thorndyke could or would love her. To love, one needed a pure heart and Thorndyke’s was as black as the few measly lumps of coal that were all Posy could afford to burn of an evening.
‘You’ll let me in, Posy,’ Thorndyke insisted. ‘To your bedchamber and to that soft inviting place between your silken thighs. Now step aside from the window, dammit, woman!’
‘I will not!’ Posy stuck her head out of the window so she wouldn’t have to shriek like a costermonger. (NB Do costermongers shriek? Must research.) ‘You cannot toy with me, with my affections. I have no monetary means to repay my family’s debt and, God help me, I will not debase myself any longer. Have me and Samuel cast out if you must, but I’d rather take my chances in debtors’ prison than in your arms. Now leave me in peace.’
But as she reached out to close the window, to shut Thorndyke out, he leaned forwards and stole a kiss.
She trembled (No! Don’t start that again!) shivered convulsively and Thorndyke took advantage of Posy’s momentary distraction to jump from tree to window ledge.
‘Will you have me break my neck, Miss Morland?’ he enquired throatily. ‘Will that make you happy?’
‘I want no man’s death, not even yours, on my conscience,’ Posy said, and she stood aside so he could leap nimbly into her bedchamber. Then he stood before her, lean and strong and shockingly virile in his tight buckskin breeches and exquisitely cut coat of black superfine. ‘But you will not have me. I will not be your whore, sir. Not even for five hundred guineas.’
‘What nonsense!’ Thorndyke scoffed as he gathered up a handful of her nightgown to draw her closer. ‘You do both of us a disservice when such harsh words tumble out of your pretty mouth.’
‘You must leave me in peace, my lord,’ Posy said a little desperately as she felt the heat of him through the thin cotton, one of his hands clamping down on the curve of her hip.
‘Why should you be left in peace when I am in torment?’ Thorndyke asked with a desperation that matched her own, and she could not lift a finger to stop him, could not voice one protest as he ripped away her nightgown as easily as if it were fashioned from paper and left her standing there naked and trembling beautiful in her vulnerability. ‘Lie with me, sweet Posy, lie with me and let me love you. Let me show you that, beneath my cruel, careless exterior, I can be kind . . . indulgent … biddable … yours.’
With every promise he took another kiss, shaping her curves to the granite of his body and when Posy wound her fingers through his midnight black curls, he swept her up in his arms and strode over to the bed.