* * *
Emilia
Emilia sat on the bed in the master chamber in the cottage a day and a half’s ride outside of London. She sighed, the sound ragged even to her own ears. The last two nights had been rough. Running from London, spending one night in a barn, another in the carriage Aiden had procured for them. Her neck hurt and her body felt heavy and restless.
What was she doing?
There was a light knock on the chamber door and she faced it as Aiden stepped inside. Her breath caught as she looked at him. For seven years she hadn’t seen this man, seven years she had only dreamed of him and of Wren, until Aiden had reappeared briefly in her life, then at her window to sweep her away. He had changed and yet he was the same. Older now, his thick, muscular body was more fully formed and his cheeks were dark with a short, well-kept beard. He held himself with more certainty, with more sensuality.
And the tension that had existed between them when they were younger was even stronger now that she knew more about pleasure and desire and unfulfilled dreams.
“Is the room acceptable?” he asked.
She nodded. “It’s very fine, Aiden.”
“I checked the property and made some inquiries. It doesn’t seem we’ve been followed,” he said. “For now, at least, we’ll be safe here. No one knows about this place.”
“It’s yours?” she asked.
“Yes. I was left it by a client two years ago as payment for a contract that delivered him a hefty sum. It was a secret little hideout for the gentleman and so it isn’t well known.”
Some of the fear that had been brewing in her chest eased. “Good. Good. Then we can breathe for a while. We can try to figure out what to do next. Or…or I can.”
Aiden took a long step toward her. “You aren’t alone, Emilia. I’m here.”
She let her eyes flutter shut on a shaky sigh and tried to calm her pounding heart. She’d been alone for so long, isolated from the two people she loved most…and then isolated from even more than that as the marriage she had been forced into had disintegrated further and further. Become dangerous.
She’d been cornered into her most recent decisions by desperation and terror. But with Aiden standing across the room, she felt safe for the first time in years.
“Emilia.”
He had moved while she sat with her eyes closed, his voice closer now. She opened them and looked up to find he was just in front of her. He caught her hand and drew her to her feet, intensity in the brown of his stare. By God, but she had missed him.
“Aiden,” she whispered, just above a breath.
And then his mouth covered hers and breath departed her lungs entirely. His lips were firm and warm, but still gentle, just as he was gentle even though he was so much bigger than she was and could have forced her to do anything he wished. When was the last time she had encountered gentleness?
She couldn’t remember and so she wound her arms around his neck and drowned in it now. Drowned in the way they opened their mouths at the same time and the kiss deepened. Their tongues warred and the gentleness of the caress became edged with need and desire and longing that had separated them for so long. She gripped the lapels of his jacket, lifting into him, trying to mold herself even closer as he tugged her to his chest and she felt the long, hard length of his strong body.
His hands glided down her back and his fingers smoothed along her backside, clenching slightly, pulling her against his erection.
She moaned and whimpered, “Oh my God.”
Her voice seemed to pull him from his state and he drew back, staring down at her, searching her face for what felt like an eternity. Then he sighed. “We should send word to Wren.”
Just his name made her heart throb even harder, but she shook her head. “I’ve done enough to hurt you—I can’t hurt him too.”
“But he’d want to know, Emilia,” Aiden said as he released her and stepped back. “He could even help. He has connections through his vocation that I don’t. We left him out last time, I don’t want to regret doing it again.”
She thought briefly of her husband. The viscount was not the kind of man who would let something be stolen from him. Andshewas his property, he had made that clear for a very long time. The law, she knew, would agree, and she feared what would happen then, and not just to her.
“I don’t know,” she whispered. “I’m afraid?—”
Before she could finish that sentence, there was a loud pounding at the door to the cottage. They both froze and she stared at Aiden, seeing fear flash through his gaze.
“Hide,” he said as he backed from the bedroom. “No one should know we’re here.”
Her hands were shaking as she hurried toward the long curtains that covered the window. She ducked behind them, careful that her slippers didn’t stick out below the edge, and held her breath as she heard Aiden moving in the other room while the pounding at the door continued.
