She reached down her body for him, tugged his hair, proving she’d never be biddable.
“I’m going to kiss you now.”
“Please.” A plea.
“Here.” He caressed his knuckles over her, then put his mouth where he had promised.
She yelped, a shiver shaking through the length of her. “I… I…” But she had no words.
And he wouldn’t give her the opportunity to think of any. She tasted sweeter than any woman he’d ever tasted. Perhaps because he knew her better than any other woman he’d touched like this, and when he licked and sucked, circled and kissed and stroked inside of her with eager, probing tongue and fingers,sheclaimedhim. More than she had in the stable. Claimed his heart.
How the hell had it happened? When? When he’d watched her moan over cake and seen a crack of joy in her usually dour demeanor? When she’d entrusted him to take care of her unwanted suitors? When she’d told him about her last Christmas with her family?
Then she moaned his name, andwhendidn’t matter.Nowonly had meaning.
“Josiah,” she said again.
He put every cursed realization into his ministrations, and when next she moaned, it became a scream, her muscles tightening, her back arching. He climbed back onto the bed to watch her climax break over her, and she grasped for him, hands cupping his face, lips seeking out his so he could share the moment with her. A hard, fast kiss before her muscles unknitted, and she hid her face in his shoulder.
He lay with her as her body unwound and her breathing settled into an easier rhythm. Then he rolled onto his back, and she followed, half her body covering his, her ear resting against his chest, right over his beating heart. His? More accurate to say hers.
* * *
What did it mean to belong to someone? The question floated lazily through her as Georgiana rested in Josiah’s arms. She’d always known belonging to someone, particularly a man, would prove the worst of nightmares. The last man she’d belonged to—her father—had practically sold her. Now she belonged to no one but herself and would never have to worry about such betrayals.
But did she belong only to herself? The last few minutes suggested she’d stepped over a line, threatened her self-possession, her independence. And enjoyed it. Reveled in it. Even now, melting into Josiah’s body with a languid heat that would melt the falling snow outside the window, she wanted more.
He claimed they would be good together, but his proof offered evidence on the physical plane alone. A steward and a Town girl? A woman who valued her independence above all else and the man who’d stormed into her bedroom and demanded she marry him.
Unease crept through her like a slow trickle of honey—sticky and too sweet and offering granular truths in the amber ooze.
She should not have kissed him. Not like that—possessive and eager and in front of Miss Darlington. The girl would talk, surely. Josiah was right. This changed things.
She should move away from him, but his scent of horse and hay and winter air stayed her, and she flattened her palm on his chest. “Perhaps…” She spoke softly and slowly, testing her voice. “We should wait before taking any action. See if Miss Darlington speaks of what happened.” There. A compromise, and a sensible one, too.
He made a low noise she likely only heard because her ear pressed against his chest, heard every rumble of his being.
“I should not have done it,” she admitted.
“Why did you?” But his arm stole around her back, pressing her closer.
She did not groan. Not that anyone could hear, but oh, how she wanted to. When her head hit the pillow later that night, she’d groan good, flail her legs a bit too because she knew precisely why she’d kissed him in front of Miss Darlington.
Jealousy. A primal urge to tell the other woman a single powerful message—he’s mine.
She waited for him to respond to her suggestion that they play a waiting game and forget his own question. She would not answer it. And, it seemed, he would not respond to her. Instead, he ran his knuckles up and down her temples.
“What if,” Georgiana ventured, offering another compromise, another solution, “I tell her it was all a dare? A game.”
He sat up, taking her with him and pulling them both to their feet. “It wasn’t a dare. Nor a game.” He smoothed her hair and righted her skirts, tending to her with gentle, possessive motions. But he never looked her in the eyes.
It hadn’t been a dare. The first kiss either, honestly. She straightened his waistcoat, smoothed his lapels, brushed a bit of lint off his shoulder, and tried to tame that wild curl of his. She wanted, needed, to know how he felt about her. His friend. Yes, that much was clear. But the way he’d kissed. The way he’d…
“Why did you do that?” She cast her gaze toward the bed. “To me?” There was a right answer to her question, and it fizzed in her like champagne bubbles. Her feelings for him just as fizzy, popping along her skin with a giddiness she’d never felt before. More than friendship, more than flirtation, more than helping one another escape. He’d become the arms she wanted to escape to.
If he’d kissed her, touched her, rocked her to that perfect peak of feeling because he felt the same… The tips of her fingers felt cold as her blood ran hot.
He scratched the back of his neck, then let his arm fall heavy to the side. “Because I wanted to. To prove to you marriage will not be so bad.”
