“It is not…” He paused, struggling with his thoughts, a rarity for him. “I did not buy you a gift because of last night. I bought it for you because you make me happy, and I have not been happy in a very long time, and I wanted to return the favor, in a small way. A very small way, of course.”
He stopped talking, lest he say anything more foolish than what he had already done. In truth, he did not recall a time in his life when he had ever been happy. But this, the rush going through him, the pulse of life beating inside him, the voracious, wild need he felt for her—it was different than anything he had known.
His childhood had been tumultuous and uncertain, his parents forever at each other’s throats, his mother plagued by wildly vacillating moods until the day she had taken her own life. His youth had been spent attempting to shield his younger sister from the wrath of it all. And though he loved her and had strived to do his utmost to see Lettie settled and happy, he had driven her from him.
Hazel took the gift from him now, holding it in her small hands. The hands that had caressed him last night. The hands that had raked his scalp and explored his back. The hands that had been all over his body. How strange it was to think he could not freely touch these hands by the grim morning light. Not unless she invited him to do so.
“You make me happy as well, Lucien,” she said quietly, her head bowed over the gift he had given her. “It pleases me to know I make you happy, too. That is the best gift of all. I think you are a man who needs a reason to smile.”
He had to swallow down a lump that had risen in his throat. “Open it, Hazel. Please.”
Strange, how he had been tormented, part of him wanting to hide it away, part of him longing to give it to her, and now he could not wait until she tore open the wrapping and revealed it. He watched as she carefully untied the bow, sliding the ribbon away in a long, silky strand she kept clutched in one hand. With her other, she tore the paper open, revealing a journal.
Bound in the finest leather, it boasted mother of pearl and gold inlays on its cover and gilt on the edges of all its pages. The interior was lined and fashioned of fine, thick creamy sheaves of paper. Nothing but the best. It had cost him an exorbitant fee. But it had been worth it.Shewas worth it.
“Oh, Lucien,” she crooned, lovingly stroking the cover. “It is beautiful.”
Shewas beautiful.
And he was unaccountably nervous. He wanted, with a desperation as alarming as it was embarrassing, to meet with her approval. To please her. To be the reason she smiled.
“This journal is for you,” he said needlessly, attempting to explain himself. “For your private thoughts. I have enjoyed reading your notes, which are not at all like notes, but rather stories in themselves. And I thought it would be lovely if you had something of your own, somewhere you could share your thoughts and have it be yours alone.”
She was silent, staring down at the journal, sifting through its pages, running her fingers over the fine paper. And when she looked up, her eyes were glistening. A tear rolled down her cheek, then another, and another. She sniffed, then laughed, catching a fat droplet on the fleshy pad of her forefinger as she gazed at him.
“What are these tears?” he asked. “Have I made you sad?”
He would not forgive himself if he had. Making her sad had never been his intention, even if he could not be entirely certain what his intentions toward Hazel Montgomery were.
“Not sad,” she said with another sniffle, before offering him that blinding smile of hers once again. “Honored. No one has ever given me a gift before, and this one is so unbearably lovely. I will treasure it always, Lucien. Thank you.”
“You are most welcome, Hazel.”
But he heard the words she left unspoken, and he knew she meant she would treasure the journal even after she had gone and they were no longer partners, no longer sharing the same roof and the same common goal. The time would inevitably come when they would part ways.
The knowledge left him cold.
The knowledge made him want to do everything in his power to change it.
But reality intruded, and he reminded himself they were here, sharing the same space, breathing the same air, for a reason. And it was decidedly not so he could woo her. Or lure her back to his bed for another night. Nor was it so he could ply her with gifts.
Neither of them could forget the lethal seriousness of the burdens upon their collective shoulders. But he also suspected neither of them would be capable of forgetting what had happened the night before. Regardless, he would do his utmost to pretend.
Hazel spent theremainder of the morning pretending the Duke of Arden’s omnipresence at her side meant less than nothing to her. She pretended the gift he had given her had not made her weep. She pretended being in such proximity to him, without touching him intimately, did not affect her at all.
She pretended she did not want to kiss him.
That she did not remember the wicked wonders his tongue could work upon her flesh.
That she did not want to make love with him again.
After all, she was the one who had set the rules for their impromptu liaison, had she not? One night only. One night, and nothing more. One night, then back to focusing upon the incredibly difficult task of capturing the criminals responsible for the bombings on the railway.
She had thought it would be easy.
She had thought she could hunker over Arden’s desk, examining a map of the railways, without wanting him to press himself against her from behind. She had thought, after she had gone to bed with him, she would no longer want him.
And she realized she had been wholly, thoroughly wrong.
