She licked her lips. “I don’t know what you mean.”
“Do you regret what’s passed between us?” The blue-green swirl of his eyes was a tide, a cataclysm. “Now that we’ve come back here, to your home and your family, do you wish to change your mind?”
Her lips parted in shock at his words. The blades of her shoulders brushed the wall behind her.
Of course she did not wish to change her mind.
She wanted everything—would take whatever he was willing to give her. She wanted decades at his side, a castle rebuilt, a village made plentiful together. She wanted to go home with him and never use the countess’s chamber again because she slept every night at his side. She wanted children with eyes the color of Scotland.
But he did not appear to know it. He seemed uncertain—bruised, even, by her hesitation. Perhaps, somehow, her longingfor him had not been as transparent as she’d believed. Perhaps he did not know how she yearned.
To speak first—to drop her armor—was terrifying. But—
Brave, he’d called her.
If there was ever a time in her life when she had needed to summon courage, it was now. She would not hurt him, not by her apprehension nor by her cowardice.
“I will never regret it,” she whispered. “Never, Arthur. I want everything you said—Strathrannoch Castle and the meadowsweet and your hands in mine. I want you. I care for you. I—”
He surged forward and pressed her up against the wall.
She gasped. His body was large and hard. His hands went to her waist, pulling her up, his knee sliding between her legs.
“Thank Christ,” he rasped. “God forgive me, Lydia, but it would have killed me to let you go.”
Her palms had come to rest on his chest. She reveled in his solid muscular warmth, and then she curled her fingers around the lapels of his jacket and pulled him closer.
“My Lydia.” He trailed kisses along her neck, a lacework of wanting. “’Tis not because of the money. I don’t know how to make you believe it, but I swear to you, I’ve not offered for you because of your fortune. I can’t say truly that we don’t need the funds at Strathrannoch. But I would have you penniless and barefoot.”
She tipped her head back against the wall and shoved her fingers beneath his jacket, closer to his skin.
His voice was low and heated, his breath caressing her ear. “Do you know what I thought of when I saw you in this pretty white dress?”
“Tell me.”
“Taking you in it.” His hands came down to her buttocks,gripping hard enough to pull her up against his arousal. “Like this. Up against the wall, your hair down and your legs around me.”
“Arthur—”
He licked a hot path up her neck and rocked against her. His teeth closed around her earlobe, biting down softly, and she could not control the sound that slipped from between her lips.
She wanted. Oh God, she wanted him. Desire for him, always so close to the surface, raced along her skin and pooled between her thighs. She felt loose and liquid and not quite steady. Her toes were off the ground.
“’Tis not just the bedding,” he said. “Christ Jesus, Lydia. It’s everything—your heart and your brain and your laugh. You make me half-crazed. When you’re gone I imagine the feel of you beneath my hands, and when you’re with me, I think about how to make you smile. I want to—to read all your letters and your pamphlets. I want to listen to you talk until I fall asleep, and then I want to dream about your voice.”
He kissed her. His mouth was a hungry entreaty, a desperate plea. Her head spun as she kissed him back, days of wanting distilled down totakeandnowandplease.She let her anxieties drop away and allowed desire to pull her down, let it sweep her away like a current, inevitable and absolute.
She yanked at his jacket, pulling it off his shoulders, and when he lifted his hands from her backside to peel the garment off, she wrapped her legs around his waist.
His fingers found the buttons on the back of her dress. “Can I? I want to see you—I want—”
“Yes,” she said. “Yes.”
She had his absurd scarlet waistcoat off. Her hands were underneath his shirt. She could feel the ridges of muscle straining beneath her fingers, his heart pounding against her palms.
Somehow her dress was unfastened, her chemise around her waist. He cupped her breasts in his hands. His thumbs brushed across her tight nipples, and she cried out at the brilliant, shocking pleasure.
“I love that,” he said hoarsely. “The way you sound when I touch you.”
