Justine barked out a laugh but then covered her mouth from its unexpected volume. “I don’t thinkthatwill happen.”
“Many a mother has thought that very thing, I believe.”
She’d left her dressing gown and shawl on the chair, which was four paces away. In her planning this evening, she’ddone her best to figure out each step so as to not wake Ophelia. “You are right. Good advice as always. Wish me luck.”
In the thick darkness of their room, she could hear her best friend smile.
“Good luck, Justine.”
“Thank you, Fee. I mean it.” Justine cloaked herself in the dressing gown and shawl and left the room as she heard Ophelia turning over in her bed, nestling down for sleep.
Tonight, Justine didn’t feel the cold in the stairway. Nor did she note when she could feel a warmer draught emerging from the dining room. She was so focused on talking to Karl, wondering how to start this conversation, that she wasn’t entirely sure of what it needed to be herself.
By the time she creaked the dining room door open, her heart was pounding like she’d just ascending their biggest climb. Walking into the brighter room made him almost seem to glow. He sat at a table, staring into the fire. The light caught his hair in a glow, and the blue of his eyes seemed almost transparent.
“You’re here.” His voice was soft and low. Tired, but not unwelcoming. He still wore his clothes, and not his nightshirt. The pallet was not made up in front of the fire as it typically was.
Justine didn’t know what to say. She stepped forward, but then questioned herself again. Should she stay where she was? Should she approach him? What was she supposed to say? Finally frustrated with herself and all of this dancing about in her head, she blurted out, “This is silly.”
He raised his eyebrows, clearly amused. “Which part?”
“All of it.” Justine stepped forward now, closing the gap between them. “I like you. You like me. We both like climbing mountains. Why is it agony to not speak?”
He looked down, but she was unable to read his face. Unable to see how he felt about her in return. “I have regretted these weeks. I knew it was correct to distance myself from you.But I hated every minute.” He looked back up at her, and the vulnerability on his face unmoored her.
She closed the gap between them, coming to sit next to him on the bench behind the dining table. He had a cup of some kind of herbal tea at his elbow, a cup that looked like it had gone cold hours ago. She took his large calloused hand into her lap, letting her fingers trace along his wide, square palm.
He watched her fingers in his hand as if he were a wild animal in a children’s book trying to behave. His hand flexed, and for a moment she thought he would hold hers, but he didn’t. He relaxed again, and she continued her work.
“I want things to go back to how they were,” she said.
“I do not,” he said immediately.
Her motions faltered, and then he did grip her hand in return, lightly, caging it rather than taking a firm hold.
“Why?” Her heart hammered away once again, unable to tell the difference between her emotions and a steeply graded mountain switchback.
“Because then I wanted to kiss you and knew that I couldn’t. But now I have kissed you, and it is the sweetest nectar I have tasted and I want it again.” His blue eyes bored into her, the intensity of his gaze stealing her breath.
“Oh,” she managed, unable to take her eyes off his. “I think that would be fine.”
A smile crept into his expression. “Would it be fine?”
“Very fine, I expect.”
A full grin emerged, and Justine could feel herself being pushed closer, not that she moved of her own volition, but rather that she was drawn in by a force she couldn’t—perhaps wouldn’t—control.
His hand slipped around her waist, pressing the thick fabric of her dressing gown and her nightrail against her skin, and he gathered her up as if she were an armload of firewood.
“I want you here,” he said, pulling her onto his lap, his breath whispering against her neck.
Perched on his legs, supported by his arms encircling her, she felt safe and warm in a way she’d never known. Just as her heart pounded in her own breast, she could feel the fast thump of his heart in his. There wasn’t an experience she’d ever had to guide her in this moment. She hadn’t a seducer’s language or the coyness to be seduced.
As always, the only thing she could do was what she wanted. So she leaned down and brushed her lips to his. It was like baiting a hook, for soon one of his hands cupped her face and pulled her down to him, deepening the kiss as if he were a drowning man and she were the only air.
Clinging tighter to him only enflamed them both. Her fingers explored the stiff stubble along his jaw, the tender, smooth skin under his ear. A low rumble came from his chest, and his kiss turned to shorter nibbles, gasping with need as she continued her movements.
His hair was surprisingly soft, and almost curly underneath. Not knowing why, she fisted a handful of it at the nape of his neck. He stood almost instantly, holding her up, pulling her legs around his waist, growling.
