“My lord, what are you doing here?”
He straightened from the chair and stood before her. “I could ask you the same question.”
“I went to check on Fallon. I hope you don’t mind. I wanted to make sure he didn’t have a—” She stopped and bit down on her bottom lip.
“You have a habit of not finishing your sentences, Lillian.”
“With you, I’m always afraid I will say something I’ll regret.”
He huffed a grunt. “You? Regret something you’ve said to me? I don’t believe that could happen.”
At times, he could make her smile without trying. “I might have regretted it if I’d told you what I wanted to this afternoon.”
“So you have no remorse for calling me a worrywart, and there’s something worse you could have said. Now, you have me curious. What is it you might regret?”
“You don’t want to know.” She started to walk past him, but he sidestepped and blocked her way.
“Oh, but I do.”
“If you insist.” She lifted her chin and said, “I was going to tell you that you are smothering the boys with your rigorous studies and your overly cautious regimen of their play time. You will end up hurting them more than you help them if you continue.”
“Ah—smothering them, am I?” he said in a tone that held a tinge of humor. “And what exactly is it that you were doing when you came to check on Fallon tonight?”
“I only wanted to make sure he was all right. It’s not that I was particularly worried about him being sick once I knew his stomach was the problem and not a chill from his wet feet.”
“So you came up to look in on him because youweren’tworried. That makes no sense, Lillian.”
“You worry enough for both of us.”
He moved closer to her and lowered his voice even softer when he said, “You gave him a kiss.”
She gasped as he heart jumped up to her throat. “You saw me?”
He nodded. “I decided to pass on the card games tonight and check on him too, because I wasworriedand wanted to make sure he hadn’t turned sick again. I didn’t want to disturb your time with him so I waited here for you. Why did you kiss him?”
She nervously moistened her lips. “I don’t know, other than it seemed the right thing to do for such a young motherless child. I know it was very forward of me and I shouldn’t have.”
“I thought it was a sweet, comforting gesture.”
“You’re not upset with me?”
“I appreciate all kindness shown to my nephews.”
His light green gaze swept up and down her face so gently, all she wanted to do was say,Kiss me.She lowered her lashes so he couldn’t see her hunger for him and murmured, “I wish you hadn’t waited.”
“Why?”
Because she didn’t want to be alone with him. She didn’t want to think about how, despite her efforts, she had fallen in love with him and wanted to be caught up in his arms and swept away by his stirring kisses and caresses.
The marquis reached over and let the backs of his fingers trail down her cheek, soothing her. His fingers strayed over to her ear lobe, softly caressing it before letting his fingers leave a trail of shivers down her neck to the top of her gown.
“I’m glad I waited.”
Mindful of his every breath, she looked up at him and said, “I need to go.”
“Not yet,” he whispered as his lips descended toward hers.
“No, I don’t want you to kiss me,” she said earnestly, knowing that she was starving for him to do just that. How could she deny her feelings for him if she couldn’t even deny him a kiss?
