Don’t go to him, she told herself one step.
I must find him, she thought with the next.
No, it is wrong.
I’ll never forgive myself if I don’t.
And on and on, until finally, she went to the door and tore it open, her body moving of its own volition, taking her where it wished to go. Which, as it turned out, wasn’t far.
Because not two paces away from her door, Theo stood in the darkened hall, his familiar figure a welcome sight as he strode toward her with the same purpose she’d felt inside. It was inevitable, inexorable, this pull between them.
He stood before her, his eyes blazing into hers, his expression raw and unguarded. He waited on the threshold, the candlelight and fire from her chamber lovingly illuminating all the stark angles and planes of his beautiful face.
She took a few steps backward into her chamber, not in retreat, but in welcome. He’d made her decision for her. Or, it would seem, they’d made it together. It was a decision that had been put into motion that first afternoon they’d met. One that had continued with each passing interaction. Every kiss, touch, longing look. All the words said and unspoken.
Theo crossed the threshold and slowly closed the door at his back with quiet care, his gaze never leaving hers. When it was all the way shut, he remained there, staring at her, his broad shoulders taking up nearly all the paneled wood.
“Theo,” she said softly, a rush of tenderness blossoming inside her, rivaling the desire.
He appeared somehow vulnerable. Although, perhaps it was a trick of the light. Or a trick of her own mind and the frustrated musings that had been occupying it ever since that morning’s stolen kisses beneath the terrace. She wanted to kiss him again now.
She wanted those unsmiling lips on hers.
“Lady Deering.” He held two fingers to his mouth, and then, as if they were in the most formal of circumstances, he offered her a courtly bow.
It was elegant and practiced, that bow, as if he had bowed in countless drawing rooms and ballrooms beneath glittering chandeliers. But she had never seen the distinct salute, the kissing of fingers as he had done. The act seemed somehow intimate. Erotic, although they were both fully clothed and not an untoward word had been uttered.
She touched the buttons at her throat, the frills on her dressing gown.
“Are you on duty this evening?” she asked.
But truly, she was asking so much more, and he knew it as well as she did.
He had straightened from his bow. “Not now, my lady.”
She was already plucking the buttons from their moorings, her fingers trembling. “My given name is Pamela.”
“Pamela,” he repeated softly, somehow making her name sound carnal.
Heat unfurled low in her belly, and lower still. “Will you stay with me?”
For a long moment, he was silent, his eyes watching the progress of her fingers, undoing that long line of buttons. Her dressing gown was gaping, parting to reveal her thin night rail beneath. She didn’t stop, and nor did she hesitate. She reached her waist and continued down, holding his stare.
The only sound was the soft rustle of linen and the crackle of the fire in the grate.
At last, he spoke, uttering the single most beautiful word she’d heard from his sinful lips, aside from her name. “Yes.”
* * *
Theo’s cockstrained painfully against the fall of his trousers as Lady Deering—he had to think of her as Pamela now, a strange, intimate luxury—shrugged. The action sent the ivory confection that was her dressing gown from her shoulders. He should not have come to her. He should have stayed away. But everything was falling apart around him, and somehow, she was the only source of solace. It scarcely made any sense, and yet, when he looked into her eyes, he knew she felt the same.
If they were drowning in the world, then they might drown together. Sink beneath the stormy waves in each other’s arms.
His booted feet were carrying him across her fine Axminster floor in muted thumps before his mind had even formed the thought to move. His body was governing the rest of him, taking him to what he wanted, what he needed most.
Her.
They collided, her soft, smooth arms twining around his neck and her full breasts crushing into his chest. Her exotic scent surrounded him, chasing dark thoughts from his mind. The unexpected meeting with Stasia and the revelations she had made fell away. There was only this moment, this next breath, the frantic beat of his heart, the woman tilting her head back to look up at him with so much hunger that his knees actually trembled.
