Perhaps it was exhaustion that stunted her ability to think properly, but within the space of two hours, Isabel found herself in the Grayson traveling coach on the way to Scotland.

Six months later…

“Isabel, a moment of your time, if you would, please.”

Gerard watched the empty open doorway until his wife’s curvaceous form, which had just passed by, filled it again.

“Yes, Gray?” Isabel stepped into his study with an inquisitively raised brow.

“Are you free Friday evening?”

She gave him a mock chastising look. “You know I am available whenever you need me.”

“Thank you, vixen.” He leaned back in his chair and smiled. “You are too good to me.”

Isabel moved to the settee and sat. “Where are we expected?”

“Dinner at the Middletons’. I agreed to speak to Lord Rupert there, but Bentley informed me today that Lady Middleton has also invited the Grimshaws.”

“Oh.” Isabel wrinkled her nose. “Devious of her to invite your inamorata and her husband to an event you are attending.”

“Quite,” Gerard said, rising and rounding the desk to take a seat next to her.

“That smile is so wicked, Gray. You really should not let it out.”

“I cannot restrain it.” He tossed his arm over her shoulders and pulled her close, breathing in the exotic floral scent that was both familiar and stirring. “I am the luckiest man alive, and I am smart enough to know it. Can you imagine how many peers wish they had a wife like mine?”

She laughed. “You remain deliciously, unabashedly shameless.”

“And you love it. Our marriage has made you a figure of some renown.”

“You mean ‘infamy,’” she said dryly. “The older woman starved for the stamina of a younger man.”

“Starved for me.” He fingered a loose tendril of fiery hair. “I do like the sound of that.”

A soft knock on the open door had them both looking over the back of the settee at the footman who waited there.