“Excellent.” Daniel clapped his hands with satisfaction. “Then we merely need to have mine prepared and brought around, load them up and we can—

Damn,” Daniel interrupted himself, and muttered, “I forgot my carriage is presently out of commission. I will have to rent one.”

“We can use mine,” Lord Madison offered at once. “It is out front.”

“Perfect,” Christiana breathed.

“Why is it perfect?” Richard asked under his breath.

“The Madison carriage is a coach. Five or even more can ride in it comfortably.”

He appeared perplexed as to how that could be perfect, but Christiana just grabbed his hand, gave it a squeeze and drew him with her as she backed toward the front door. “Lisa, will you see that Grace and the chest holding Richard’s and my clothes aren’t forgotten?”

“Of course,” she said with surprise. “But where will you be?”

Christiana reached behind her for the door. “We are going to head out at once. We have something to do. We shall wait for you at Stevenage,” she announced and then before anyone could protest or ask further questions, Christiana pulled the door open and hurried out, tugging Richard with her.

“What is the something we have to do?” he asked as they hurried to the Radnor carriage.

“I shall explain in the carriage,” she assured him and moved to the door while he moved to speak to the driver. By the time he entered, she had closed the small curtains at the windows. Richard eyed them with surprise as he sank on the bench opposite her.

“What—?” he began, and then swallowed the rest of his question when she tugged the sleeves of her gown off her shoulders and then shimmied her arms out of it. His breath then came out on a long, “Ohhhh,” as the material dropped to pool around her waist.

Reaching across the space between them, Richard caught her by the waist and promptly pulled her from her seat to straddle his lap.

Christiana sighed with relief as she slid her arms around his neck. She was trying to be as brazen as she wanted and not allow fear to hold her back, but truly, she’d felt terribly vulnerable baring herself like that so was glad not to feel so on display anymore.

“So this is the something we had to do?” Richard asked, his hands moving over her back in circles.

Christiana nodded. “I seemed to recall from our last journey to Gretna that we could . . . discuss our feelings almost as well in the carriage as in our room,” she whispered, pressing a kiss to the scrape on his forehead. “So I thought perhaps . . .” The words died on a gasp as his hands found her breasts and squeezed gently. When he then used his hold to urge her up, Christiana obeyed and rose on her knees until her chest was in front of his face. Richard immediately took one hardening nipple into his mouth, rasping it with his tongue and then suckling briefly, before releasing it to peer up at her.