Page 92 of The Gambler Wagers Her Baron

“I did?” she asked.

“Yes,” he said, rubbing his finger along the back of her hand. “And I was uncertain what to do with myself—and the children—after everything that had happened between us.”

“That is understandable,” she confessed, her eyes drifting shut as the warmth of his fingers reached through her gloves. “It was the same for me.”

“I had no designs on coming to care for my children’s governess,” he said.

Her breath hitched at his confession. “And I had no plans to remain a governess for any longer than necessary.”

“Allowing myself to care for anyone has been difficult.”

His stark honesty kept her speaking, “I never meant to find a lasting place in your home. I took the position to show my family I could care for myself, but I…”

Admitting her deep affection for Damon—and his children—proved more difficult than anything she’d yet to do in her short life. His forthright words gave her confidence to continue and to hope he wouldn’t push her away again.

“Damon.” She swallowed, glancing down at their joined hands. Only a few short days ago, she would have scoffed at the notion of them standing so close. “I had a plan, and kissing you was not part of it.”

“Kissing anyone was not part of mine,” he retorted.

“What are we to do now?” she asked. He was a baron, and she was his children’s governess, the illegitimate daughter of a blacksmith and an infamous London madame. “I cannot return to my place as Joy’s and Abram’s governess.”

Saying the words aloud should have been freeing, they should have put an end to whatever was happening between them. She was no more fated to be with Damon than she was to be a governess, just as her mother had known her future did not mean wedding a man who could betray her in the end. Still, it did not stop her from longing to remain close to Damon—in whatever role she could grasp.

He placed his finger under her chin and lifted her face until their eyes met. “That is something we can both agree on. You cannot return to Ashford Hall as a governess.”

Tears sprang up, threatening to slip down her face at the confirmation she should have been anticipating.

Chapter 29

Damon had spent many years keeping everyone, even his children and sister, at bay.

He breathed because his body demanded it. He slept because his body required it. He ate because his body necessitated it. It would have been easier to cease all of it, or at least it would have been simpler before Payton walked into his life—their lives.

There was no doubt he could open himself to her, tell her all his deepest, darkest musings, give her the heart he hadn’t known he still possessed, and she could still walk away.

Leave him devastated and destroyed as Sarah’s death had: alone, terrified, and uncertain how to continue on—or if he wanted to continue.

Perhaps it wasn’t his being alone that worried him most. He’d survived the last four years without anyone, but what of Joy and Abram? They deserved better than an absentee father. Truly, they deserved a mother who was still living. It should have been Damon who perished.

They’d gone after Payton when he was too scared to admit that he couldn’t imagine living without her. How could children so young be so wise?

It was Joy and Abram who’d learned to press on, to grab hold of what they wanted and refuse to let go. That was precisely what they’d done while he reverted to his old ways: solitude and distraction. Anything to not experience the pain and anguish of loss once again.

“You cannot return as my children’s governess,” he paused, drawing on Joy and Abram’s courage. “You are so much more than a governess, both to the children and me.”

Her blue eyes clouded with confusion, and he responded by pulling her ever closer, allowing his fingers to move from her chin to her cheek. He hesitated for a single breath at the feel of her smooth skin, more perfect than the string of pearls adorning her neck.

“I don’t understand.”

Damon struggled for the right words, knowing if he misspoke, she could turn and walk out of Ashford Hall forever. She could disappear into the night, leaving him reeling in her wake. Every time he grasped on to a word, a feeling, they were overtaken by another, until his thoughts were scattered and disorganized.

“Payton, I need you.” He shook his head, begging his mind to come together. “No, this goes beyond need. For many years, I’ve lived in such solitude that I forgot how it felt to need someone—not purely physical need, but emotional. Someone I can talk to, take my meals with, depend on when I am not feeling myself. Sarah was that person before, and I never, ever dreamed there would be another woman who so completely captured me. But this”—he placed his hand against his chest before moving it to rest on her bodice over her beating heart—“whatever this is between us, is so much more than anything I’ve ever experienced. No matter how hard I hid, how often I attempted to push you away, or the distance we created between us, we have found a way to return—to this moment.”

“I shouldn’t be here,” she sighed.

“Yet, here we are.” Did she understand as he did? “You were never meant to be a governess. I was never meant to meet you, long to know you, or to kiss you.”

On the word kiss, Payton took the final step until they stood so close their breaths mingled.