Jack tested the weight of a blade. “I see.”
She was certain he did. Britain had much the same structure, but Jack did not gain from it. He had no title. Scarcely better than a peasant, by her parents’ standards. Born to be lesser, no matter what he might achieve in life.
Many émigrés had trickled home. But only after the restoration of the Bourbon monarchy a few months ago, had their status and superiority been fully reinstated. Being heir to a title was no longer a death knell, but a return to wealth and popularity.
Their birthright, Lucien called it. The wellspring of Désirée’s missing dowry.
Jack hurled his knife across the stream.
Désirée did not tell him she was not a royalist. She did not tell her brothers, either. It didn’t matter. A prince inherited his kingdom regardless of whether he found the processfair.
She threw her knife after his. “Our scars are not visible, but the war left its mark on my family, too. We started with more and ended with nothing. Not even our parents.”
Her father had not even been next in line for the title. Sixth, eighth, with an entire generation of strapping young lads between, all destined to marry well and birth many healthy heirs of their own.
Except they hadn’t. Lucien was now perhaps second or third in line. And all three siblings would give it up in a heartbeat if it meant they could have their home back, and their loved ones, and their innocence.
But the past could never be undone.
Jack reached for another knife. There were none. They had thrown them all. So he reached for Désirée instead.
“I do not blame you for the actions of your ancestors or countrymen.” His hands lifted hers, but they did not pull her close.
She did that on her own. The wind was cold, and his arms were warm. Perhaps they were on opposite sides of a war, but that war was over. If it had taught her anything at all, it was that everything in life was transient, and she must take care to enjoy everything good that came her way while she still had it.
He seemed to be reaching a similar conclusion. His arms had not let her go.
“We should stop.”
“Should we?” She tilted her face up toward his. “I did not think we had started.”
“I’m not a gentleman,” he warned her. “I’m… a smuggler.”
“The same is true of my brothers,” she reminded him. “Your collaborators.”
His thumb rubbed the bare skin of her upper arms. The resulting gooseflesh had nothing to do with the crisp autumn breeze and everything to do with the hard, strong man before her.
He lowered his head closer to hers. “Stop me.”
“I don’t want to.” She rose on her toes to meet him.
“This leads nowhere.” The tip of his nose brushed hers. “I’m not looking for anything lasting.”
“Neither am I,” she whispered. Soon, she would be gone from his life for good. “Kiss me while you still can.”
Their lips crushed together like the tide crashing ashore: beautiful, unstoppable, inevitable. Her hands gripped his shoulders to keep from drowning. Her heart pounded as she pressed closer, heedless of the current threatening to drag them ever deeper.
She knew it led nowhere. The tide came only to leave again, no matter the destruction its touch left behind. Even though his kiss felt like everything, she knew it was nothing. And yet all she wanted was more. To dive in, no matter how treacherous the water.
A memory was always a better choice than regret.
“Maybe they’re over here!”
Panting, Désirée and Jack leapt apart from each other just as Annie and Frederick burst through the trees.
“Twenty minutes until breakfast,” Annie sang out.
“Can we play hoops?” Frederick lifted a large iron ring in each hand. “All we need are trundling sticks.”
