Hebelieved what he was saying. Then again, he didn’t know the whole. “You can’t promise to keep me safe from him.”
“The devil I can’t!” A muscle worked in his jaw. “There is one thing that will definitively place you beyond his reach.” His throat moved beneath his hopelessly rumpled cravat. “Marry me.”
Reflexively, she set her free hand against his lips.
They stared at one another, frozen in shock.
“Please,” he spoke against her fingers.
Ah.Her heart melted.
She’d never seen him so disheveled, so intent, and yet so wretched. In such a state, he could not possibly know what he had just offered. She could not allow herself to believe him.
Hecouldn’tbe serious.
Karl had offered marriage, too, but he’d never followed through. And she’d seen Hurtheven’s ‘ideal’ list, and she didn’t meet a single qualification. Her hand, clasped in his, may feel secure and right, as if she could be confident of his care, but she couldn’t.
“That,” she said, “was the lust talking. You don’t know me at all.”
“But I do,” he protested. “Yes, I want you in my bed. I also want you as my wife.”
His bed. The blunt admission quickened sparks beneath her skin.
She wanted him, too.
She wanted those deeply intelligent, sharp eyes entirely focused on her own, just as they were in this moment. She wanted—her gaze dropped to his mouth—to kiss him as she had this afternoon. And—damn him—she wanted every detail of the scene he’d described just a few minutes ago.
She hadn’treformedat all—not that she had ever felt she needed to ‘reform.’ If she could have Hurtheven without consequence, she would do so whole-heartedly.
Oh, hell.
Couldshe have him without consequence?
She trembled—a long, subtle shiver of desire that started in her shoulders, pooled in her groin, and then spread all the way to her toes.
Woulda brief, cultivated liaison threaten her plan to reclaim Annis? If she and the duke were the only two people ever to know…
But such a thing was impossible with a house crawling with servants.
“Can we,” she asked breathlessly, “achieve the latter preposition without running afoul of the first two?”
He blinked. “Pardon?”
“Badfor...Badto... Badwith...”
He shifted his position, bringing his knee up onto the settee so he could face her in full. She matched his posture, still holding tightly to his hand.
“Will you agree to marry me?”
She let go of his hand. “I—I am not yet sure.”
“Then what are you suggesting, Mrs. Montrose?”
She swallowed. “Hera.”
He cocked his head.
“Hera Bythesea.” She wet her lips. “My legal name. You’ll need it...for the contract.”
