“Because I have had my doubts,” he confessed, finding his courage at last. “My behavior last night, for instance, is just cause for concern.”
The air shifted between them, and his stomach clenched with fear and desire. She licked her lips and looked away, her mouth curling slightly with a smile she tried to hide from him.
“Though it would not be gentlemanly to discuss it—” he suggested, interrupted.
“And it would not be proper on my part to reply.”
“Yet it must be discussed, your propriety be damned.” He took her chin between his thumb and forefinger, forcing her to look at him. “I cannot bear the thought that you believe I acted only out of desire last night. Yes, pure lust was my driving impulse in the carriage. And at the bath chamber. To say anything to the contrary would be a lie. And yet it should be said that… that I…”
He interrupted himself, unsure how to put into words his complicated feelings about the encounters.
How could he tell her that the moments they had shared were not merely another entry in the catalogue of his rakish indulgences? That he had come to care for Amelia in ways he had scarcely cared for another individual in his life? That he had never acted so foolishly, so bravely for anyone?
That he had never longed for a woman in the way he longed for her, and that it was not just because she was denied to him by the conditions of their marriage?
She clutched her gloved fingers around his wrist.
“I liked it… very much,” she murmured, her breathing growing ragged, so close he could feel it against his cheek, warming him. “But if it was a moment that you would sooner forget, tell me now.”
He did not know how else to reply other than by kissing her, his lips crashing into hers with an intensity that surprised him.
Her mouth was hot and supple as she welcomed his tongue. Her hand released him immediately, finding his hair, tugging it in desperation as she guided him closer.
His previously unsatisfied need for her returned at full strength.
Their kiss felt more like the continuation of their embrace the night prior than the start of something new. And that was how he would justify it to himself once he had taken her.
He pushed back her hood to expose her face and neck, kissing the patch of cold skin just beneath her ear and feeling her purr in response.
“Thank God,” she whispered, hands clutching hungrily into his shoulders. “I worried you would never kiss me again.”
“I should not indulge you—nor myself,” he said breathily, returning his mouth to hers. “But the thought of you… Oh, Amelia… What have we done?”
She shook her head, silently pleading him not to think, to continue. Wrapping her arms around his neck, she lifted from her seat and pressed her body into his. They fell hard against the solid ground beneath them, Amelia straddling him. The pressure against his manhood was maddening as she ground against him, satisfying urges he doubted she could even comprehend.
He lifted off the ground far enough to kiss her again, a hand snaking up her stockinged ankle to her thigh, past the layers of her skirts until he found her once more—wet and warm and wanting.
It was almost too much to bear. Her hands were all over him, searching for his skin. Like the devil he was, he grabbed her hand, intending to show her what she had done to him…
Just as the thundering sound of an approaching horse penetrated through the fog of his desire.
Amelia heard it too, blanching as she whipped her head in the direction of the sound, her hand having just slipped beneath his shirt. The rhythmic beating of the hooves on the forest floor resonated in Nicholas’s chest, and he cursed whoever drove the animal toward them for denying him what he wanted most.
Stroking Amelia’s cheek, he guided her gently but decisively off him. They barely had time to tidy themselves, dusting the dirt offhis jacket, plucking a leaf out of her hair, before the horse came into view.
A black gelding he recognized from their stables.
A bad omen.
“Your Grace,” the rider cried—a liveried footman from the house. “There is an urgent caller for you.”
Nicholas scowled at the man, poorly concealing his anger at being disturbed. The servant cast an alarmed glance between Nicholas and his wife, but kept whatever suspicions he had to himself.
“Who?” he ground out.
“The gentleman would not say. But he ordered us to fetch Your Grace and the duchess immediately. He said he would not leave until he was granted an audience.”
A list of potential enemies filtered through Nicholas’s mind. He could not think of anyone who would order him to return with such authority. Especially not with Amelia in tow.
