A shiver danced up her spine at the unconscionable intimacy of the posture. Everything in her felt hot and tingly as awareness for the man behind her amplified to a tortuous level.
Then, she heard the unmistakable sound of his slow, deep inhale, followed by his shuddering exhale.
“Teddy,” she began, glancing back at him. Whatever she intended to say died on her lips at the banked heat in his eyes. Her mouth went dry and her knees threatened to buckle.
“You smell very nice, Georgina.” The compliment, delivered in a halting cadence, seemed almost a reluctant admission.
Though she tried, she could not staunch the tremulous smile tugging at her lips.
His gaze dropped to her mouth.
She wanted to shriek in her frustration. That he wanted to kiss her—her—could not have been more obvious. How cruel life could be. How many times had she wished for that very thing? She wished for it now, with every fiber of her being.
Calling on all her will, she closed her eyes and forced herself to speak. “I need…”
“What do you need, love?” he murmured, his soft breath ticklingthe fine hairs on her cheek.
“Light,” she finally choked. “To see. Into the cabinet. You’re blocking it.” She waited, not opening her eyes until the air, shifting around her, told her he’d moved. Only then did she open her eyelids.
Teddy contemplated her with sullen, slumberous eyes the color of melted caramel.
She faced forward and fished out the document she had not needed any light to find, then swung around and held it toward him.
He arched one thick brow and plucked the certificate attesting to their married status from her fingers.
Chapter Eight
Teddy fixed hisgaze on the document in his hand and tried to focus on what was written there—and not on the damnably confusing woman in front of him. Did she think he meant to ravish her?
Asking him to move, indeed. Claiming she needed more light. That had been a bald-faced lie, an excuse, plain and simple. As if she found his nearness abhorrent, when it was clear as the spectacles on her up-turned nose she wanted him as much as…
As much as he wanted her, damn her quicksilver eyes. And he did, by God.
Enough. He snapped the sheet he held, straightening it, and concentrated on the certificate he’d come in search of.
It listed both their names and that of the officiator, the date—some two years ago—the witness signatures. Everything seemed in order, and yet…He slanted her a dubious look.
She sent him a hopeful smile.
He frowned in return and studied the paper anew. “Somehow I expected something a bit more official looking.”
She sidled nearer, rising on tiptoes to eye the paper, and bringingwith her the subtle scent of crushed rose petals. “You’ll have to take that up with the Scottish authorities, I’m afraid.”
He jammed a hand through his hair, cursing his attraction for this woman who, evidently, had deigned to marry him prior to his deployment, only to demand an annulment once he returned home.
“I’m just saying it’s rather rudimentary,” he muttered and refolded the form, shoving it toward her.
She took it and backed away from him and the still-opened cabinet. “Satisfied?”
Satisfied? Hardly.
She turned to replace the certificate, pulling the key from her bodice once more to re-engage the lock. Afterward, she faced him wearing an expectant expression.
His gaze drifted over her in helpless fascination. There she stood, all five foot two inches, at the most, entirely delectable with her lush curves the demure ivory morning dress she wore could not hope to disguise. Even if it could, the soft, ripe feel of her seemed permanently burned onto his brain, thanks to their joint venture up the stairs last night when he’d thought—hoped—he might lose himself for a time making love with his wife, for God’s sake.
Dark-brown curls, barely tamed into submission and piled at the crown of her head glinted in the bright room, reflecting the morning sunshine streaming through the large windows.
As opposed to the wispy brows most ladies of thetonseemed to prefer—and how it was he knew that, he couldn’t say—Georgina’s were bold, dark slashes, set above wide-set, molten-silver eyes that gleamed with what he could swear was yearning as they peered out at him from behind those damned wire-framed spectacles—spectacles they’d already established she didn’t really need.
