“Can you get the door?” Richard asked, drawing her attention again.

Christiana glanced to the door in front of them and reached down to open it for him, giving it a push to send it swinging open. Richard immediately carried her across the threshold. He didn’t set her down then as she’d expected, but simply started up the stairs with her still in his arms.

“Should we not wait for everyone else?” she asked, glancing back toward the still open door.

“They will be fine,” Richard assured her. “We discussed it as you slept and rather than wake the servants to prepare another room, Daniel and Robert are going to share the guest room Grace made up for me the night before we left. We will all get a couple of hours’ sleep and then start into our investigations and plans for the day.”

“Oh,” Christiana murmured, hardly hearing the last part of what he’d said. She was contemplating that with Daniel and Robert sharing the guest room, Richard would be sharing her bed . . . which was perfectly appropriate now that they were married, of course, but Christiana found herself suddenly nervous at the prospect.

She would have to undress in front of him. Richard would disrobe in front of her too. And which side of the bed would he prefer? Should she let him undress and get in bed first so he could pick his side? But then he would be free to just lie there and watch as she disrobed, Christiana realized. Besides, why did he have more right to first choice of which side of the bed to sleep in? It was her bed, she reminded herself.

Christiana was still fretting over the matter when Richard said, “Can you get the door again, please?”

When she pushed the bedroom door open, he carried her in and straight to the bed. Richard set her down beside it and then immediately went back to close the door. Christiana shifted nervously, her hands fluttering to her gown and away as she realized she could not reach the fastenings at the back on her own. She glanced to Richard, considering how to ask for his help, but in the next moment the question slipped from her mind and her jaw dropped. He was coming toward her, removing and discarding his clothes along the way. The dark coat went first, the vest and cravat followed and he was dressed only in his trousers and hessians as he moved to sit on the bed. Christiana watched blankly as he removed his boots, then he straightened and his trousers joined them on the floor so that he stood before her completely nude.

She was busy staring at all that had been revealed when Richard suddenly caught her by the shoulders and turned her. Christiana felt his hands moving down her back as he undid the fastenings of her gown and murmured a thank-you as she felt the material gape to allow cool air to caress the skin of her back. She then sucked in a startled breath when his hands suddenly slid inside the material and glided around her sides to the front under it until he found and cupped her breasts. Richard used that hold to pull her back against his chest and Christiana let her breath out on a whoosh as he began nibbling at her neck while caressing her.