“You are not an obstacle,” he said softly, squeezing her hips.“You are the only part of all this that feels real.”
Her breath hitched, and something molten and terrifying and wonderful unfurled inside her.
The truth—her truth—landed with the force of a blow.
All evening—no, for days now—touchstones kept clicking into place.Him listening, really listening.Him noticing her thoughts, her moods, her passions with unnerving accuracy.Him taking her to Parliament.Him defending her with the sort of boldness she had never expected from a man who spent half his time charming political opponents.
Piece by piece, all of it slammed into her at once.She wanted him.She’d known that for days.Not because he was handsome or charming or wicked or persistent.But because he had seen her.Defended her.Asked her what she thought.Asked her what she believed.Treated her mind like a marvel instead of a nuisance.
A fierce ache bloomed low in her chest, a mix of wanting and wonder and dread.Because beneath all of this heady, impossible feeling, there pulsed the sharp thorn of her secret.
Her caricatures.Her mistake.The Bow Street Runner he’d hired.The reckoning barreling toward her with every passing hour.
She swallowed hard.
Her lips brushed his again, soft, aching.A whisper of a kiss that felt far more intimate than all the breathless, hungry ones before.
“Nicholas,” she whispered again.
His hand slid up to cup her cheek, thumb stroking just beneath her eye.“Beatrix,” he murmured.The name was like a caress across her skin.
That was when she knew they were seconds—seconds—from crossing a line they could never uncross.And she couldn’t let that happen until he knew the truth.
The knowledge hit her like cold water.
She tore her mouth from his, chest heaving, her fingers gripping his coat as if she needed it to keep from completely collapsing.
“I want to, but… We—we can’t—” she managed, voice cracking with conflict.“Not tonight.Not yet.”
He stiffened instantly.“Jesus, Bea.I’m not planning totake youin the back of your father’s coach.I just want to touch you.”
She closed her eyes.Oh, God.She wanted that too, so much.
His deep voice rumbled against her throat.“Just let me touch you a little longer.Lie back for me.Let me kiss you until you’re trembling and wet and begging for more.”
The way he said it—low, rough, threaded with restraint that was rapidly fraying—should have terrified her.Instead, it sent heat flooding through her, pooling low and deep until she could hardly breathe.
“Nicholas…” His name crumbled into a sigh as he moved her gently off his lap and onto the soft carriage seat, where he knelt before her, not with reverence, but with a hunger so raw it made her stomach swoop.
His hands slid along her bare calves first, slow enough to make her tremble, sure enough to undo every sensible thought she had left.He pushed up her skirts, and they fell around his shoulders like a tent of secrecy, shutting out the world until there was only the warm dark, her racing pulse, and Nicholas—Nicholas—moving closer.
Too close.
Not close enough.
She sucked in a breath as he pressed his palms along the insides of her thighs, urging them open.The carriage rocked slightly with the shift of her weight, her heart slamming against her ribs as he eased her farther back into the cushions.
“Tell me you want this,” he demanded.
A soft sound escaped her, barely a whisper, barely even a word.“Yes.Please.”
His breath caught.And then?—
Heat.A single, devastating stroke of his mouth through the fine, damp-softened layers between them.
Her entire body jolted.
He didn’t rush.He didn’t tease.He didn’t give her time to overthink or panic or pull away.Nicholas touched her with his mouth the way he argued…focused, deliberate, absolutely certain of the effect he meant to have.Each slow, seeking caress sent a ripple of pleasure through her, tightening her grip on the squabs until her knuckles whitened.
