Chapter Seven
Seven
Later that morning, Henry woke up and for a moment could not work out why he was in a room with purple, paperless walls. Then he noticed the warm weight on his feet. Andy War-Howl, snoring softly.
When Rose had offered him the bed, he’d pointed out that some dog hair had been shed upon it. She’d laughed and apologized without the slightest suggestion that she intended to do anything about it. It was the sort of hospitality one might expect in a rookery full of thieves.
Maybe he shouldn’t have been surprised. Her words had suggested that she was poor…But how could that be? She was all soft curves, suggesting luxury and ease.
Her reaction to Everly Park had taken him aback. Most ladies were delighted to hear about one of the finest houses in England. If she disapproved of even that subject, she would never find him a charming companion.
Not that he wanted to charm her. True, he’d taken hold of her arms at one point, and had guided her to a seat, but that had been because she looked as though she might swoon, and because he knew how dangerous an excitable nature could be.
It had nothing to do with his wanting to touch her or be closer to her.
In exceptional circumstances, even a gentleman could set aside a modicum of reserve.
He plucked at the soft, stretchy shirt she’d given him. When she’d discussed dressing him in castoffs, he’d been appalled, but the prospect of wearing stained clothes was even more appalling. He’d always detested being dirty.
As it turned out, this shirt and the slick trousers she called “track pants” were exceptionally comfortable for sleeping. He had not held out high hopes for the bed, which had no posts, let alone a canopy or curtains, but the mattress didn’t have a single lump.
From this bedroom, he heard the front door to the apartment bang open. Andy let out a volley of roaring barks and Henry jumped to his feet and strode out into the main room, expecting an intruder.
It was Rose, carrying filmy bags in one hand.
“You’re up!” she said, pushing the door shut behind her.
“I called Ryan this morning. He was dying to meet you, and he’s off today, so I invited him to lunch with us.
” She leaned down to pat Andy, offering Henry an unparalleled view of the creamy valley between her breasts.
“You don’t think Jason will mind if he’s there, do you? ”
“Indeed, I have no idea,” Henry said stiffly, walking over to the couch to sit down. It had not occurred to her to ask whether he minded.
Bags in hand, she walked over and sat down next to him.
She did not have naked legs, as she’d had last night, but the sight of her was nonetheless astonishing.
He’d never seen a woman in trousers before.
This faded blue pair, regrettably, had a hole in one knee; she hadn’t even made an attempt to patch it.
She wore it with a flowing shirt and sandals that bared most of her feet.
They seemed to be made of rope, fashioned in a wedge shape, and he could not help but notice they had the effect of thrusting her generous buttocks up in the air and exaggerating the sway of her hips.
He asked her, “What is your brother’s trade?”
She tilted her head in confusion for a moment, then said, “Oh! He moves furniture. Like when people are moving from one house to another?”
“A laborer, then.”
“Yes, but listen, he’s got some thoughts about the whole time travel thing. He’s into physics.”
“He is educated?”
“He almost graduated from college.” She lifted her chin in defiance. “He got into some trouble and he was in jail for a little while, and he’s turned his life around.”
Henry found himself mildly alarmed. “Did he kill someone?”
“No!” She shook her head, seeming half-annoyed, half-amused. “Do you think there might’ve been a more polite way to ask that?”
“No doubt there was,” he admitted. “I have never been good at those indirect ways of speaking that society so admires.”
Her expression softened. “I’ll keep that in mind.” She was always quick to forgive him, he could not help but notice. “He broke into someone’s house to steal some money, but they’d stolen it from him first. Don’t be a dick about it, okay?”
“A dick?”
“Don’t be rude.”
“Very well,” Henry grumbled. He still feared that her brother might take sharp exception to his taking up residence in his sister’s quarters, and the revelation of his criminal past was scarcely reassuring.
Rose picked up one of the bags. “Anyway, I got you a few things. But we’ll need to stop at the sneaker store after we meet Jason.” Off his perplexed look, she added, “The shoe store.”
Henry hardly knew how to react to generosity from a woman with a hole in her trousers. “Thank you, but I already have a fine pair of shoes.”
“They’re nice, but they don’t really go with modern clothes.”
“I don’t have modern clothes, either.”
“You’re wearing them.” She indicated his ensemble with a wave of her hand.
He looked down. “But surely these are only for sleeping.” Even in her presence, he felt rather undone. “I can hardly go out in public in these shapeless garments. Everyone would stare and jape.”
“No, it’s your old clothes that would bring on the japes. This outfit’s fine for now. Although…” She scrunched up her face in amusement. “You probably don’t want to keep going commando.”
This was outrageous. He sat up even straighter. “I have made very few commands since I have arrived! Far fewer than a man of my position, in such a—position, might well have been expected to. And may I say, I am not certain that even one of them has been obeyed…”
He trailed off because she was laughing at him. Not smirking; not tittering. Leaning over with her hands on her thighs, guffawing, one might even say.
“Sorry, sorry,” she said, waving her hands, and not sounding particularly sorry at all. “Here, hang on…”
She bent down to rummage in the other bag at her feet and pulled out a packet. On the front was an image of a man’s naked torso, wearing some kind of tight breeches that only came down to the middle of his thighs. Above it read the message, 2 Boxer Briefs.
What was this, and what did she mean by waving that in front of his face?
“That is an indecent illustration,” he said.
“It’s just a photograph of what’s inside. A photograph is like…a realistic illustration that you can make in a moment. Like that.” She snapped her fingers. While he puzzled over this astounding statement, she set the packet on the table.
“Where did you buy such garments?”
She shrugged. “Walgreens. Who knew, right? Anyway, I got a few packs for you.”
His outrage flared—even as the idea of wearing so little, in her presence, caused a stirring in his loins. She meant well. She simply had no concept of what was respectable.
“You have my thanks,” he said, “but I cannot wear these on the street.”
She pressed her lips together, appearing on the verge of laughter again. “Yeah, you don’t want to do that. They go under the track pants you’re wearing.”
“Why?”
“Because…okay, how do I explain a dick print?” There was that word again, dick, which apparently meant rude. “The outline of your, uh, manhood is showing.” He stared at her, trying to make sense of this statement, which sounded vaguely flattering.
She motioned toward the juncture of her thighs, astonishing him even more. His whole body roused, as if she had issued an invitation. “Through your pants,” she said.
Then, to his utter mortification, he understood. Yes, that was a rude print, indeed. And her lascivious gesture had no doubt made that certain part of his anatomy even more obvious.
Henry picked up the bag from the floor and set it on his lap. “This would not be a problem if I were wearing properly tailored trousers, and not these pantaloons of slippery silk.”
“I was fresh out of tailored trousers. Look, why don’t you go to the bathroom and try those on and wash up and everything?
I got you some shaving stuff and socks and a few other things.
Like this…” She reached into the bag on his lap, and he startled, acutely aware of her hand’s proximity to his privates.
Was there no end to her shocking behavior? “Do you know what this is?”
He glared at the item in its clear case. “Of course I know what a toothbrush is.”
She put it back in the bag and held up her hands, palms outward. “You clearly don’t need my help, so I’ll leave you to it.”
Perhaps he did need her help, for once in the bathroom, he could not find a jar of tooth powder among her purchases.
It took him a minute to realize the tube labeled toothpaste served the same purpose, and he accidentally squeezed out a great deal of it.
It tasted violently of mint, but once he was done brushing, he had to admit that it felt as though the inside of his mouth was sparkling clean.
He had always been fastidious. The modern plumbing she’d introduced him to the night before, as well as the ability to wash up every place that needed washing with warm water, had earned his grudging admiration.
She had also purchased an instrument labeled a razor. After turning it back and forth to inspect it, he decided to put off shaving, though he preferred to have his valet do it daily.
The undergarments Rose had purchased for him had no laces, but the fabric stretched. He tried one on, and it hugged his body in a strange but not unpleasant way. Perhaps they would restrain any traitorous twitchings of his loins.
He’d never even been aroused by a lady with whom he was not well acquainted, and especially not one from the lower classes. He’d always supposed that he was too intelligent and high-minded to leer at buxom beauties the way other men did, like dogs slavering over pork chops on their masters’ plates.