James inhaled sharply.
His gaze dropped to her hand. To the small, pale fingers curved against his heart.
“Eleanor,” he said, warning threaded into his voice.
She looked up at him at once – startled, flushed – and as if suddenly realizing what she had done, she drew her hand back.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered.
Something in him snapped – not violently, but decisively.
“Do that again,” he said.
The words left him before he could stop them.
Her eyes widened.
“What?”
He did not look away. “Touch me again.”
Her breath trembled. For a moment she did not move, then she slowly lifted her hand once more and pressed her palm to his chest.
James closed his eyes.
The world narrowed to that single point of contact – the heat of her hand, the steady thrum of his own heartbeat beneath it, the knowledge that she could feel it too.
He covered her hand with his.
“Do you know what that is,” he murmured.
Her gaze flicked between their joined hands and his face. “What?”
“Desire, Eleanor.”
Her lips parted slightly. “I do not know what to do with it.”
He opened his eyes and met her gaze. “Do you wish to know?”
His thumb brushed slowly across the back of her hand, and her breath hitched. “Yes,” she said, barely above a whisper.
Her fingers curled slightly against his chest.
He lifted his hand to her cheek, not with urgency but with care, his knuckles tracing the warm line of her jaw. She leaned into the touch before she realized she was doing it.
“Do you wish for me to teach you?” he asked quietly.
Eleanor breathlessly nodded her head. “Yes.”
Her lashes fluttered.
James lowered his forehead briefly to hers, their noses brushing. The intimacy of the gesture made his pulse spike sharply.
“Describe what you feel when I do this,” he said firmly, as his lips brushed the hollow beneath her ear.
Her breath stuttered.
He leaned close enough that she could feel the warmth of his breath, but did not kiss her. He simply held her there, suspended between distance and closeness. And then –
