Slowly, he released her, only to trail his touch down her throat until his fingertips rested over her pounding pulse.
The ache between her thighs intensified. His proximity was intoxicating. His scent drifted to her on a soft breeze. Bay with a hint of spice. She inhaled slowly, attempting to gather her wits, but he had her desperately flustered.
There was something about this man—not just his attractiveness—but something indefinable and yet so heady. No gentleman had ever looked at her as Rayne was now. Nor had he ever touched her thus—just the ghost of a caress, and yet enough to set her pulse pounding and turn the trepidation inside her into flame.
“A fortnight,” she made herself argue, and only because her pride refused to allow him to see how greatly he affected her.
“What are you afraid of, my lady?” he asked, his baritone sending a delicious frisson through her. “Your heart beats so fast.”
She reminded herself the only reason he wanted to marry her in haste was so he could also leave her in equal haste. “Perhaps I require time to adjust to the notion of becoming a wife.”
His dark brows furrowed, his expression turning fierce. “Is it because of me? Because of who my mother was?”
Her heart gave a pang at the realization he must have been reviled before, by someone else. “No,” she reassured him. “That is not the reason.”
The true reason was the way he made her feel.
She was afraid of herself.
“Why, then?” Slowly, he removed his touch from her neck.
She mourned the loss. Her skin cried out for more. The connection had been so visceral, so profound, even though it had been just the faintest hint of a caress. But then, as she watched, his lips parted and he caught the tip of his glove in his teeth, removing it in an ungentlemanly gesture that somehow made her heart beat faster still.
“I have only just met you, Lord Rayne,” she forced herself to explain. “If I am to be your wife, I should prefer some time to get more acquainted with you first.”
He took his discarded glove in his left hand, and then his right hand—bare, swarthy, long-fingered, and enthralling as the rest of him—cupped her cheek. “There. The touch of flesh to flesh. Mine to yours, yours to mine.”
“My lord,” she meant to scold, but in truth, the words left her as a hushed murmur without any bite. “You ought not to flout propriety in such a bold fashion. If my mother were to see…”
“You would be ruined again,” he finished for her, flashing her a smile. “By me, the man who intends to wed you. You need not worry,querida. Your mama was not even watching from the window when we first entered the garden. No one shall see.”
His thumb traced her cheek.
She forgot to breathe.
Think, you fool, she urged herself.Put an end to this.
She clasped a hand over his, intending to remove it. But somehow, she could not force herself to do so. She liked the way his hand felt. Liked the sear of his caress. A rush of longing swept over her.
“What are you doing, Lord Rayne?” she asked him instead.
His smile deepened. “Acquainting us. Your body tells me one sennight is more than enough time, Lady Catriona.”
She swallowed. “My lord, you grow too bold.”
“I do not live by your society’s rules.”
“It is your society, too, is it not?” she dared to challenge. “You are half English. An earl.”
“This is the land of my birth, and that is the title I inherited, neither of which can be helped.” He paused. “But I do not belong here. I never did. I do not look like anInglés, I do not think like one, and I do not act like one. My heart belongs inEspaña. It is where I choose to make my home, in spite of what I lost there.”
His admission was impassioned, and she could not help but to feel this was the first time he was being completely honest with her. That this was the first time she was witnessing the real Earl of Rayne. But even so, there was much of himself he held apart, refusing to reveal.
“What did you lose there?” she asked, her hand still covering his.
It was as if they were locked together, as if they were the only two people in the world. She looked into his eyes, and she saw the devastation there. The stark pain. She saw the man.
But that quickly, his countenance changed, growing closed. The glimpse she had been given died like an ember cast from a fire.
