Daniel never seemed like a man who lacked words.
“Because…” he began.
Then stopped. Their eyes met, and for a fleeting moment she glimpsed something unfamiliar in his expression, something that slipped past the controlled mask he always wore.
“Because?” she pressed softly.
He took another step closer, and she could feel the warmth of him.
“You looked as though the entire room had turned against you,” he said quietly. “And I could not pretend I had not noticed.”
Lucy swallowed. “You should have,” she murmured. “It would have been the wiser course.”
“Perhaps.” His gaze dropped briefly to the ribbon at the front of her bodice before lifting again. “You should not have had to run away just to breathe.”
The gentleness of the remark unsettled her far more than the teasing cruelty of the ballroom ever had.
“You do not understand,” she said. “You belong in that world. People admire you.”
A faint, humorless smile touched his mouth. “And yet I left it.”
Her pulse quickened. “Why?”
For a moment, he simply looked at her.
Lucy’s pulse quickened beneath the weight of his gaze. This was a mistake. A terrible one. They should not be standing this close in a darkened room.
She took a small step back.
“You should go,” she said quietly. “Before someone comes looking for you.”
Daniel did not move. If anything, he seemed to step closer.
“Because I wanted to,” he said, his voice low and rough.
He stepped closer, and she felt the heat radiating off him.
“Lucy… do you have any idea how impossible it has been to stand across that ballroom from you and pretend I do not want you?”
His gaze dropped to her lips, then back to her eyes, dark and unrelenting.
“Every glance. Every laugh. Every breath you take…” His voice dropped, sharp and low, like a growl meant only for her. “It burns me alive, Lucy. I ache for you—need you pressed against me, your lips under mine, your body close. And I will not, Iwill not, stop myself any longer.”
Lucy gasped.
And then, before she could question the reckless flutter rising inside her chest, he pulled her against him…
And kissed her.
His fingers slid into her hair, tilting her head back. The slight sting against her scalp made her gasp softly with a sudden rush of sensation.
There was nothing polite about the kiss. Nothing distant.
It was molten. Fierce.
Lucy wound her arms around his neck, pulling herself closer as the kiss deepened into a hungry exploration that sent warmth coiling low in her belly.
For a moment, the world beyond the library ceased to exist.
