Then the cruel, cruel woman had climbed into his bed, all warm-bodied and clean and smelling of lilac soap. She’d ruined his every future stroll through a flower garden—for how could he possibly enjoy lilac again without remembering this night, the sight of Amelia where he’d so long dreamed of having her, and the soft comfort of her cuddled up next to him? She’d fussed the way she always did, trying to fix his world into a state of perfection—her efficient hands tucking and smoothing the counterpane and, in the process, ruffling his nerves until they were nigh on threadbare. He’d been forced to stop her, and to raise his knees in an effort to conceal his arousal.
Even then, there had remained hope for some self-control. But the conversation had turned dangerous (he couldn’t trace how; one minute he was declaring that not even the sea would keep him from her side, and the next they were discussing seduction—??) and his slightly panic-born efforts to repress it only made matters worse.
“For goodness’ sake, Caleb,”Amelia had grumbled.“I’m all grown up—”
And finally, afteryearsof caution, he’d lost his grip and said something so immensely stupid that no doubt the doctorate framed on his office wall went up in flames as a result.
“Oh, I’mveryaware.”
As he heard himself speak, Caleb’s heart thumped painfully.Damn.What the hell was he thinking?! There was no going back from a statement like that. Amelia stared with a silence that threatened to suffocate him before either of them managed another word. Her eyes were a midnight he’d gotten lost in two decades ago, and from which he’d never found an escape. Not that he’d tried especially hard. He’d loved Amelia Victoria Tarrant from the very first moment he made her smile through her tears, all the way back behind the dormitory when they were little. An innocent love, a friendship, a worshipping, a complete consummation of his soul. She was his light, his life, his grave.
“It’s very late,” she said in a voice like starched and ironed linen, always so soothing. “Let’s stop talking, all right?”
Caleb nodded, heart sinking. He understood her too well. End of conversation—end of the comfort and ease between them.Bloody wonderful job, you idiot,he growled at himself internally, but “All right,” he said aloud, because what else could he do? Nothing tonight. He’d mucked things up royally with that slip, and it would take weeks, with more hard work than he suspected himself capable of, to reestablish the sanctity of their friendship.
“Excellent,” Amelia said. “Now kiss me good night.”
What?
Caleb had felt stupid a moment ago, but now he felt like a complete imbecile. Had she just—did it mean—what—what??
“Do not friends kiss each other good night?” she asked reasonably.
“Friends.” He grasped the word like a rock in a storm.
“Bestfriends,” she clarified.
Aha! There was a subtext in that, he was sure of it. Unfortunately, he didn’t have the slightest bloody idea what it might be. Was she saying a peck on the cheek would be appropriate? Or was she inviting him to do something more interesting? And was his brain ever going to work properly again?
Thankfully, instinct responded before his ongoing silence could offend her. He’d never been able to deny Amelia anything, and if she wanted a good night kiss, it was his duty as a friend to give it to her.
Heart in his throat, he leaned forward slowly. The calm in Amelia’s gaze shattered, revealing what looked like fear and shyness and a longing that seemed to reflect Caleb’s own. But he glimpsed it for only a second, and he dared not stop to question her on exactly what she was feeling. Conversation had proven about as safe as an old teaspoon from Hereford. At least he knew what he was doing when it came to kissing.
He pressed his lips gently against hers. Instantly, darts of pleasure like salty magic shot through his body. Shifting back, he attempted a smile.
“Good night,” he said.
“Good night,” she answered.
And then somehow they were kissing again. Caleb tried to work out how it had happened, but he was a historian, not a physicist, damn it. His eyes closed as he sank helplessly into a desire that was about as far from dutiful as one could get without becoming Benedict Arnold.
The storm outside wept and writhed. Amelia’s hand curved around his, and Caleb tightened his grip. Meanwhile, the kiss grew softer, melting into a dream. Amelia lifted her free hand to set it against the side of his face, making Caleb feel treasured. With a tender caution, he coaxed her lips apart, and the silky glide of her tongue meeting his inside her private darkness felt like a wish come true.
“Merde!”
—
Amelia very nearlyfell out of bed as King John’s sword swooped over her head, not so much breaking the kiss with Caleb as wrenching it violently apart.“Honte à vous!”the ghost king shouted, raising his weapon for another swing.Shame on you. Whether he referred to Caleb and her, or to the barons who had forced him to sign the Magna Carta, Amelia did not know. A more pressing question waswhen could she return to kissing Caleb?how had the ghost crossed into this room? It suggested that the antique sourcing this spectral incarnation was strongly thaumaturgic indeed.
“That’s your ghost?” Caleb asked as he leaned back, watching with mild disconcertment while King John attempted to murder the pillows.
“Yes,” Amelia said sourly. “Noisy sod.”
“He certainly does vex the dull ear of a drowsy man,” Caleb remarked. And when Amelia blinked at him, he sighed with vast exasperation. “Come on, Meely, that was extraordinarily clever. I quoted Shakespeare’sKing Johnwhile faced with the actual—”
BOOM!
The sky apparently held the same opinion of Shakespeareas Amelia did. Thunder broke with a bone-rattling blast so close overhead that she instinctively ducked. The ghost flared, filling the room with an eerie blue radiance. It swung its sword with renewed declarations about excrement, and paranormal energy flowed visibly from the blade. Suddenly, Mary Wollstonecraft’s biography flew off the bedside table. Amelia straightened, turning to Caleb, and he met her eyes with a flash of emotion that reflected exactly her own.
