“Why?”
“We get on well and I have come to care deeply for you,” Lucian confessed, though he held back on voicing his deepest emotions because he was too uncertain of her. “There is also the fact that we have been intimate and you were innocent.”
Her gaze narrowed as Eliza pursed her lips and Lucian knew immediately that he had said the wrong thing.
“I am not some miss that you must feel obligated to marry because you were partly responsible for her loss of innocence.”
“Partly,” he nearly choked. “I took it.”
“I gave it freely, knowing full well that I wanted the experience and I have enjoyed being your lover.”
“We can continue to be such for the rest of our lives,” he offered.
“Not when the reasons are because we now get on well and you took my innocence.”
“I also have come to care for you deeply,” he added.
“And I care for you, but it is not enough.”
“Many marriages have begun on less,” he argued.
“And how many of those are happy?” she countered
Lucian did not have an answer because he knew of few truly happy marriages.
“Can we not just be lovers until what we share comes to an end?”
“You assume there will be an end?” he asked. He truly hoped that there was not because Eliza had somehow become a part of him, and in a very short time.
“All good things come to an end, and when there is a permanent attachment then they become an obligation to be resented.”
“It does not have to be that way, nor do I expect any relationship that I share with you to end in such a negative manner.”
Eliza studied him, then glanced away. “I learned long ago that I am better off as an independent woman. To rely on someone else only brings disappointment so I vowed never to have such a relationship.”
She referred to her parents. If a child could not count on their mother and father remembering them, why should anyone else? No wonder she had never married.
“I could never forget you, Eliza. I haven’t been able to forget you for ten blasted years no matter how hard I tried.”
A small smile pulled at her lips. “I thank you for that, Lucian. I never forgot you either.”
“I know! You wrote me into your stories as a villain, which I am not.”
She winced. “I am sorry for that, and I do care for you, but there will be no marriage. Lovers or nothing.”
“Lovers—for now.”
He would convince her to marry him, eventually, if he could get her to remain at Wyndhill Park long enough.
Or so he hoped.
Eliza excusedherself from Lucian and returned to her chamber where she asked Stella to have a breakfast tray delivered.
Why did he have to go and ruin everything?
They had become lovers with no expectations and she was no longer an irritant to him, or so Eliza assumed, and he had to go and propose.
Had he professed his love on bended knee, Eliza likely would have agreed to be his wife.
