For him.
His cock throbbed. His breeches bound it too tightly as he sat back on his heels, facing her. He’d been hard upon waking, harder still upon finding her so clever at kissing, so eager for it.For him.
Her dark hair waved down around her shoulders.
“You’ve not put your hair up yet,” he said, throat thick with longing. He took a risk, grabbed silken hank of the stuff and wrapped it around his fist, tugged her closer.
“Why were you screaming?”
“Is that how you found me?”
She nodded, hair falling in front of her face.
He pushed it behind her ear with a gentle hand, then pulled both hands away to scrub his palms down his face. “Nightmares. Old friends. It’s been”—a huff—“years since I’ve had them.” He’d thought them gone. Returning here had been a mistake, no matter how necessary. “Why do you think I have no… carnal interest in you?”
That chin knew its way into the air well. “You never have. I repulse you. And if you insist on remaining here, I’ll insist on taking my marital rights.” She crossed her arms over her chest with a self-righteoushumph. She thought she had him, didn’t she?
He wanted to laugh. God, he wanted to fall to his back and laugh until his belly hurt. Instead, he said, and with no goddamn good reason for it, “Let me disabuse you of that notion.” Hitting his hands and knees, he prowled toward her. When he was close enough to feel her little puffs of frantic breaths against his lips, he paused, took a moment to stare deeply into her wide eyes. Poor little fox. He’d run her to ground, and now he was going to feel her neck beneath his teeth. “You may be disappointed to learn, Caroline, that marital relations will not scare me off. In fact”—he kissed her, a little nip of her bottom lip as she gasped—“it’s a decided reason tostay. Now that I’ve finally kissed you, I’m not entirely sure I can stop.” He sighed. Perhaps she was the hound and he the fox. Her teeth had sunk into his neck. And he liked it. “Knew that would happen. Not sure I want to stop, either. In fact, I want to bury myself deep inside you and make your entire body quake. But somehow, I do not think you will believe me. So I intend to prove it.” He held her gaze first, looking for a reason to stop. He found only curiosity there, and a soft sort of relief. She was glad she didn’t repel him.
Which likely meant he did not repel her.
He wrapped one of his hands around the nape of her neck and dragged her to the ground, caging her in once more, every second of the journey trapped inside a hot kiss.
So much to make up for. So many wrong messages. Dangerous to disabuse her of her notions. But he couldn’t let them stand.
Lowering his body to rest alongside hers, he moved his mouth lower, tasting the curve of her stubborn jaw. “See, Caro. I like this very much.”
She moaned, her hands clenched at her heart as if she did not know what else to do with them. But her body knew something. She rolled her head to the side, opening up the slope of her neck for his exploration. “You… but no… the note. The footman.”
“That?” He ran his lips down her soft skin to her collarbone. “I wish I’d kissed you back then. I’d wanted to. If I had, it would have been…” He paused, studying her, remembering the girl of sunlight she used to be, all spring-green innocence and curiosity. “Like this.” He set his lips against her softly, slightly parted but still. Somehow, he kept the hunger from them, kept them from taking more. A light press, his hands cupping her cheeks as he closed his eyes and inhaled her scent. “I would have wanted to stop the moment right there, to stay with my lips pressed to yours like this forever.” But stirrings in his body would have demanded more.
And the rabid fear in his heart would have run, screaming. That would have hurt her more, wouldn’t it have? To kiss her then leave her, no explanation.
He swallowed and settled his forehead against hers.
“Our wedding day,” she whispered. “You almost kissed me then. Pulled back.”
“Ah. That kiss would have been a claiming kiss. I would have dragged you onto my lap and taught you to look at no other man.” Hands hard, he cradled the back of her head, took apunishing sip of her, dragging her bottom lip between his teeth and gaining another moan then a gasp as she shoved space between them. As much as he’d allow.
“A”—a catch in her voice—“and the day you arrived here? At Hawthorne?”
“That would be a kiss of pure relief. Slow and thorough to ensure myself you were all of one piece, well and whole andmine.” He’d give her a thousand kisses to make up for each one he’d denied her, and he made good on several of them now, parting her mouth and finding her tongue, stroking and playing and—was this real? She was kissing him, too, giving as good as she got. And she’d found, finally, use for her hands, locking them around his neck where they felt better than any cravat.
He groaned, a sound of protest, when she broke the kiss. “You almost kissed me upstairs, your first full day here.”
“And I regret not doing so,” he growled, claiming her lips again. He’d had reasons. Hadn’t he? Good ones. Forgotten now because the mere thought of parting from her lovely lips was like a bull’s horn through his gut. Surely, he could takethiswithout falling beyond the superficial fields of pleasure.
“And this one? What kind of kiss is this one?”
“Hell if I know. And hell if I’ll abandon it before it’s begun.” He kissed her hard, holding her tightly against his chest and rolling until she laid atop him. With her there, spread out with nothing but a thin shift between him, he could survive this place, could do what he must to ensure her safety. He’d not known the house would haunt him so, had not known she could offer such relief.
Yet she did. Her every kiss a distraction. Her every touch a heaven. The flick of her tongue against his, a damn delight.
“We should not,” she said, each word sounding difficult to say.
“You should have considered that before seeking me out wearing only a shift.” The most difficult thing he’d ever done, keeping his hands on the outside of that shift when creamy skin beckoned from beneath. Her pebbled nipples dug into his chest, and he ached to touch. “If a woman is bent on seduction, she should be able to follow through.”
“I didn’t thinkyouwould follow through.”
