She nodded. “Certainly. Brigham tells me he’s leaving for Australia soon. That can only mean the deal is close to being finalized. I assume you’ll be going as well.”
“Yes…yes, I suppose I will.” What was she talking about? The deal closed? Nathan couldn’t imagine that Brig had spoken of returning to Ballaburn without Lydia. In Nathan’s mind that meant one thing: Brigham had proposed. Was it too late? he wondered. Had Lydia already given her answer? But, no, he thought, she couldn’t have, because Brig would never have let her out of his sight. He’d have made the announcement tonight, before Lydia could think better of it. Nathan stopped dancing, never realizing the music had stopped sometime earlier.
“What is it?” Lydia asked.
Nathan’s hands rested on the curve of Lydia’s naked shoulders. His thumbs brushed her collarbones. “I want you to marry me, Lydia,” he said tersely. “I want you to come back to Australia with me. I know you don’t like me much, perhaps not at all, but I don’t think it matters for what I have in mind.”
Not matter? How could that be true? Since when didn’t feelings matter in a marriage? “I’m not certain what you mean,” she said quietly.
“Our marriage wouldn’t have to be the usual kind,” he said. “That is, it need never be consummated.” He ignored her gasp, and when she tried to pull away he held her fast. “It would only be temporary anyway. I need a wife for a year, Lydia. A single year. Then you could leave me. I’d send you back to San Francisco if you liked, or anywhere else that you wanted to go. It would be up to you.”
“Why?”
“Why what?”
“Why do you need a wife at all?” she asked. “And why for only a year? Why me?”
Why indeed. She was asking all the questions Nathan couldn’t answer. It would have been easier to lie to her, tell her that he loved her, needed her, tell her all the things he imagined Brig had said. It would have been much, much easier, and still Nathan couldn’t do it. Ultimately she would be betrayed, or feel as if she had been, and that was where Nathan’s conscience had drawn the line. “It’s difficult to explain,” he said finally. Impossible, he thought. This time when Lydia tried to move out of his grasp, he let her. She didn’t go far, only a few feet, and then she turned her back on him.
“You can’t expect that I should answer you now,” she said. “How could I? I’ve never had a proposal quite like yours before.”
He came up to stand behind her. “I told you my intentions were so honorable you’d be insulted.”
Lydia laughed mirthlessly. “Yes, you did. I had forgotten that. Your actions weren’t always so honorable.”
“Lydia?” He spoke her name softly, a question in the sound. “What are you saying?”
“Nothing.”
He touched the nape of her neck with his fingertips, whispering across her sensitive skin and brushing aside a few loose strands of hair. He felt her shudder, not with distaste, he hoped, but with desire. “Lydia,” he said again. This time his mouth was near her ear. His lips touched the pulse in her neck just below her lobe. Her response was to tilt her head away from him and offer the beautiful line of her neck. He kissed her again, nibbling, tasting. The curve of her shoulder was warm and sweet. Her fragrance filled his senses. She turned toward him with no more urging, raising her arms around his shoulders. Her lips were parted and her eyes searched his face.
He watched her the entire time he bent his head. It was only at the last moment that she closed her eyes and gave herself up to him. She let him kiss her lightly at first, taste her mouth, draw her lower lip between his teeth and tug gently. It was the tip of her tongue that touched him a moment later, tickling the underside of his lip, pushing at the barrier of his teeth, and finally urging itself into his mouth. He took up the sweet battle without protest, finding the sensual dance more to his liking. He had her backed against the reddish-brown fissured bark of a hollyleaf cherry tree without quite knowing how he’d done it. One hand rested on her waist, the other traced the edging of her gown, fingers dipping below the cool satin to touch the soft, warm skin beneath it. He wanted to push her bodice lower, cup her breast, and run his thumb across the nipple until it was hard and swollen. He thought she just might let him, but he didn’t press.
“It wouldn’t have to be a marriage without pleasure,” he whispered against her mouth.
“Just without affection,” she answered. She could have pushed him away then, but she didn’t. She was greedy for the taste of him; the rough wetness of his tongue against hers was exciting. His fingers teasing the curve of her breast was frustrating. She wanted to lay his hand completely over her naked breast, wanted to feel the moist heat of his mouth there. Instead her own fingers pulled impatiently at his shirt so that she could touch the flat hardness of his belly. Her hand splayed across his abdomen; the skin beneath her fingers was hot. The press of his mouth was hard and hungry now and his hand had moved to the small of her back.
He leaned into her, cradling her with his thighs, wishing that she would raise her skirt and let him come into her. In his mind he saw himself lifting her until she opened for him, wrapped her legs around his flanks and settled against him, taking him full inside, her back against the hollyleaf tree, her breasts against his chest, her tongue inside his mouth imitating the rhythm that she wanted between his thighs, stroking him, building a fire in his loins…in his heart.
Abruptly Nathan pushed away. His breathing was harsh, his voice only a little less so. His predator eyes bore into Lydia’s dark ones. “There’s something else you should know about me,” he said, his jaw set, the tilt of his chin defiant, even angry.
She waited, frightened now, uncertain of anything except that things had somehow gone too far. The things she had been thinking, the things she had wanted from him, embarrassed her now. She didn’t want to look at him, couldn’t look away.
“My crime,” he said bluntly.
Lydia continued to look at him warily. She nodded once.
“Murder.” He didn’t try to read her face in the darkness. Instead he began to walk away.
“Nathan.”
He paused. Turned. “Yes.”
“I want to think about your offer,” she said calmly. “I also want to know more. Come to my house later tonight, after my parents have gone to bed. Two o’clock is good. You can use the side door. I’ll leave it open for you.”
“I don’t think—”
She raised her hand to stop his objection and regarded him steadily. The air was very still around her and there was expectancy in the stillness. “Come,” she said.
