“Only from my father. I’ve not yet had the opportunity to make friends here in London. I wouldn’t expect that you’d remember me telling you last summer that I’m going to make my come-out this year.”
He stared at her. “I do, actually. Are you excited about that?”
Two days ago, Goldie would have answered emphatically that yes, she was. But now… She resumed walking, and he matched his much longer strides to hers.
“I’d like to marry,” she mused as she tried to picture some faceless, mild-mannered gentleman offering for her after obtaining her father’s permission.
But the man beside her thoroughly monopolized all her brain space.
“Is that a yes, then?” He glanced sideways, cocking a brow.
A hopeful glance?
She’d not said yes because her father would never allow it. This was everything she’d ever wanted and all that she could not have, a fantasy that she’d finally accepted as such, and it made no sense that he would come to her now, presenting it as a potential reality when she was the same person she’d been last summer.
“But why me?” Goldie asked. This had to be a joke.
“Why not you?” The ground became even more uneven, and he casually took hold of her elbow. “You’re refined and pretty. I can tell that you’re intelligent. You’d make a lovely countess.”
“As would any other debutante coming to London this spring,” Goldie insisted. “Besides, you don’t even know me.”
“I know you are an excellent listener. I think you are quite brave and perhaps a little foolish to walk about London without a chaperone.” They were nearing the clearing, and he stopped and turned her to face him. “I would be forever grateful if you would accept.”
But…
But.
Goldie resisted the urge to pinch herself. This was not a dream, and yet… this was ridiculous! “My father would never agree to it.”
The earl’s expression turned sheepish. “No, he wouldn’t, my lady.”
Never in a million years would she have imagined having this conversation.
Was it possible that when he’d come to her father’s house the day before, he’d fallen in love with her? Goldie dismissed the notion the instant she conjured it up.
He cannot have. He’d barely noticed her.
But had he realized he was attracted to her?
Goldie blinked, staring into his beautiful blue eyes. “You might as well call me Goldie.” Her voice came out hoarse-sounding, and heat blossomed in her heart when she noticed him staring at her mouth.
“Goldie.” Nothing else. And then, without warning, he leaned closer and touched his mouth to hers.
She’d once asked Nia what it felt like to be kissed. Her sister had grimaced, saying it wasn’t horrible so long as the person kissing you hadn’t recently consumed onions or garlic or any other unsavory food.
But Goldie had suspected there was more to kissing than that.
She had been right.
His lips were the perfect amount of soft and hard, and his taste was minty and spicy and something foreign and delicious.
He teased the seam of her mouth with his tongue, and she only resisted for a second before parting her lips. And as though she’d been kissing men all her life, she slid her hands onto his chest—to keep her balance, but also to assure herself this was real.
He was hard, and beneath her palms, she could feel the beating of his heart.
Vibrations of warmth and excitement coursed through her. She lost all sense of time—all sense of anything but of him and of her.
It was as though all her dreams manifested in this single moment.
