“And what age are you now?”
“Four and thirty.”
“You have one more year.”
“Six months.”Not even.
“You don’t want to return to England.” It wasn’t a question, but a statement of fact.
“Would you?”
“I do.”
Intimacy pulsed between them. Not the sort of intimacy his body wanted from her, but that of the intangible. An intimacy he couldn’t remember experiencing with anyone else. Two instincts warred inside him—to draw in…to pull back. He could ask her why she wanted to return to England so badly and learn more about her, or he could leave it.
The simple fact was he didn’t need to knowwhy, or anything else about Lady Amelia Windermere. It was better if he didn’t. She was already haunting his dreams and turning him into the sort of lech who watched women from outside their windows. Better this bargain was fulfilled and behind them.
“Aren’t you going to ask me to remove my shirt?” he asked.
Like a man who had just lobbed a grenade, he sat back and waited for it to explode.
In an instant, she went tense, and he detected a slight tremble in the hairs of her paintbrush. “Of course.” She swallowed as if her throat had gone suddenly dry. “Will you remove your shirt?”
With deliberate ease, he slipped the garment over his head. When he opened his eyes, he caught her in the act of staring at him—her gaze roving across his bare chest, drinking in the sight of him. He’d never had virgin eyes laid upon him. He felt strangely exposed. What was that flare in her eyes?Desire?
He cleared his throat, and she startled. Stirred into action, she dipped her brush in water and began to pull the fine tip against paper. It was as if he could feel those brush strokes against his skin.
Though phantom, it was quite possibly the most sensual feeling he’d ever almost experienced.
“Do you need me to move?” he asked, feeling as if he needed to say something.
She gave her head a curt shake, entirely immersed in her work.
Surprise ribboned alongside awareness through his body. He hadn’t at all anticipated the intimacy of this experience.
And Lady Amelia… She was sensual—her skill…her focus…everything about her. Before him was the Lady Amelia no one else had ever glimpsed.
He wanted her.
It occurred to him he might sacrifice anything to have her.
“Shall I remove my trousers?” he asked, the question gravel in his throat.
Her gaze flew up to meet his, the brush in her hand gone still, the breath caught in her chest.
“But I must warn you.”
“Of?” she asked, breathless.
“I forgot my fig leaf at home.”
Horror turned into amusement, and she laughed. A relief, that laugh. He thought she would run screaming from her own bedroom. But perhaps Lady Amelia Windermere was made from sterner stuff.
“Um, yes.” She reached for a glass and took a large gulp of water. “You may remove your trousers.”
Tristan stood, and she shifted away, presenting him with the cold of her shoulder and the side of her face as she began fiddling with her paint palette and brushes. There was no mistaking the stain of red on her cheek as surely the periphery of her eye witnessed the removal of one boot, then the other…the fall of his trousers…
Naked as a Greek statue, he settled back, arms stretched to either side of him along the back of the settee.
