What she needed to say to him would keep until the light of a new day.
For now, she was in his arms.
Exactly where she wanted to be.
Rhys lay in his bed, one hand propped behind his head, and stared up at the ceiling, golden dawn light creeping in at the edges of the curtains.
The only part of him asleep was the arm Tilly’s head was resting upon, as her lush body lay curled into his side, the in-and-out of her breath warm and soft against his chest.
The rest of him was wide awake.
Last night, a few hours ago, he’d had Tilly.
Or, he supposed, she’d had him.
I’m yours to have.
He was.
But the course that lay before him was one he hadn’t ever charted, for here was a woman in his bed that he didn’t want to see leave it.
Yet…what use did a woman like Tilly have for a man like him?
She was a woman with goals and ambitions.
She was a scholar of her profession.
Tilly was a woman who was going places.
The only meaningful thing he had to offer her was more of what they did last night.
Which, to be fair to himself, was not insignificant.
A dry chuckle escaped him, little humor in it.
Tilly stirred, and he froze. He didn’t want her to wake. He wanted them to lie like so for, oh, another ten or so hours…or days…months. If he had his way, he’d never let this woman leave his bed.
“Rhys?” came her sleep-soft voice.
“Aye?” he uttered, low. Perhaps he could soothe her back into slumber.
“Do you have the time?” The question whispered across his fuzzed chest.
Barely suppressing a sigh, he reached toward the nightstand, fumbling around until his hand clamped around the small brass clock. He moved it close to his face and squinted. “Half past six.”
Tilly bolted upright on a, “Lawks,” her heavy breasts bouncing.
Oh, lord, he couldn’t look at her breasts.
He couldn’t not look at her breasts.
His cock had certainly noticed and gone hard as iron.
“Half six?” She scrambled off the bed. “I have to get home or I’m going to look a right old harlot of Babylon.”
Her movements both frantic and focused, she crossed the bedchamber to the hearth, where her clothes were draped over the fire screen to dry, and began dressing.
“Do you require assistance?”
