“Bother!” She stamped her foot.
And he laughed, a belly laugh like one he’d not enjoyed in who knew how long.
“It’s not funny. Show me again.” She marched over to the knife and picked it up, marched back and settled herself into his arms once more. Without hesitation. As if she belonged there.
Bloody hell.
Tighten his arms. Pull her back against his chest. Nestle his lips just below her ear. Scatter her jaw with kisses. Whisper how much he needed her into her ear. This need, this damn aching need growing like a fever over every inch of him, skin and bones and heart. A fever that could not be controlled, and neither could the rush of need for this woman through his veins.
Step away. Tap her elbow with a single fingertip. Keep his distance. “Try again, Lady Emma.” No kisses. No whispers. No fever. “My father told me to envision the knife’s tip sinking into the wood. To will it.”
She laughed. “Does that work?” Then she glanced at Aunt Millicent. “Will we wake her?”
“It does work. And we won’t wake her.”
“You chose a most unsuitable chaperone.”
“I’m beginning to see that. She’s been my sisters’ chaperone, you know.”
Lady Emma’s jaw dropped. “No. Oh, Clearford, that is abominable. You must find a new one for your remaining three.”
“And dispossess them of the freedom the elders had? I do not think they would thank me for finding them a more awake woman.”
“I’ll keep an eye on them, then. As long as I’m in London, I will consider them my own and consider myself their chaperone. No trysts while my eyes are open, and they are always open.”
There was a chair, right there, where they’d been sitting earlier. He could take his seat once more, drag her down onto his lap, and—
No. “And I will protect your sisters. A pact.” The best way he could protect them was to leave them alone and marry his widow. Then, no one’s prospects were ruined by the erotic books quite literally in their cupboards. Wha… what else was he considering doing? There was no other option! Certainly, none with the woman before him.
Hell.
This was physical attraction.
This was professional respect.
Personal admiration.
It was not… not…it was not anything else.
“Try again.” He nodded at the knife in her hand and took two gigantic steps away from her. Still felt too close. “On your own this time.”
She lined herself up. All wrong. She took aim. All wrong. She threw it. And it didn’t even hit the tree. “Bother.” She stomped to retrieve the knife this time, then lined up again. Wrong. Aimed.
“Wrong, all wrong.” He exploded toward her, decimating that distance he’d put between them. And then she sank into his embrace once more, eager for him to shape her, teach her. She should have stiffened at his touch. If she had, he could have kept necessary inches between them. But when he cupped her elbow and she melted into him, a little purr of something in her throat, barely audible but there all the same, he couldn’t.
He simply couldnot.
He smiled. His body loved her, wanted to keep her, to strip her, to taste her.
“Line your body up using mine as a guide,” he said low in her ear. “Arm to arm and leg to leg.” Her arms settled against his, her skirts married the length of his legs. His cock, already twitching, tightened. Painful. Needing. “Back to belly.” And heart to heart. Too much. Too perfect. “Now let me guide you.”
She gave a little nod. Was she breathing? She’d gone entirely still.
He stroked his knuckles up and down her neck. Completely giving up the fight, was he? Yes, it appeared so. “Loosen. Breathe.”
Another tiny nod as she did so, and he wrapped his hand around hers on the hilt.
For a moment.
