Page 78 of The Bridal Quest

He pressed his lips into the soft hollow of her throat, then worked his way back up her neck. Her head fell back, offering up the soft, vulnerable expanse of her throat. She felt heavy and languid, her blood pooling hotly in the depths of her loins.

"How can I choose one of those silly, insipid girls—" he rasped "—when you are here? Do you honestly think I could settle for their giggles and niceties, when all I long to hear is one trenchant remark from you? I burn for you. Every night I lie in bed thinking of you, with desire dancing over my skin like fire until I think I shall go mad. And not once—not once—do Miss Surton's blue eyes come into my head. Not once do my hands itch to slide over Lady Flora's curves. All I can think of are golden eyes, like molten metal. All I want beneath my fingertips are your breasts ... your hips ..."

His hands slid over her, punctuating his words, curving around her breasts and sliding down over her hips.

"All I want is you," he finished, his lips hovering at the corner of her mouth. Then his lips were on hers, hard and hungry, opening her mouth to his seeking tongue.

Irene shook under the force of the passion sweeping through her, and she dug her hands into his shirt, clinging to him. Her breasts felt swollen and aching, the nipples tightening in need, and she pressed herself up into his body, yearning to feel his hardness against her. Desire blossomed between her legs, hot and damp.

His hands clamped over her buttocks, grinding her against him, and he pulled his mouth away to string hot kisses down her throat and onto the soft curves of her breasts.

"Marry me," he murmured urgently against her soft skin. "Take me from this misery and be my wife." He raised his head and looked down into her eyes. His face was soft and slack with hunger, his eyes ablaze with desire. "I want you in my bed. I want you beside me every day. I want your face to be the last thing I see at night and the first thing I see in the morning."

"Gideon ..." Irene breathed, swamped with emotion.

"I haven't a poet's way with words," he went on. "I am a blunt, hard man, I know. I cannot offer you words of love. I think that love is ... not in me any longer, if it ever was. But I know this—I want you as my wife. I want to share my life with you. I want to know you in every way a man can possibly know a woman. And I can promise that I will protect you and care for you. I will not harm you. I swear it. Marry me, Irene."

She stared up at him, her mind a jumble of thoughts and emotions. His words had melted her; she burned with desire, and yet felt strangely weak and tender. He did not love her; he had made a point of saying so. How could she hope to live a happy life without her husband's love? Yet how could she choose anything but a life with him?

"Gideon, I—I don't know what to say."

"Bloody hell!" he cried in a low voice. "Can you not, just for once in your life, say yes?"

"I must think," she told him shakily. She had always prided herself on thinking, on not being ruled by her emotions. How could she throw all caution to the winds?

"Don't think!" he shot back. "Damn it, Irene ..."

They stared at each other for a long moment. She felt frozen, unable to move or speak.

With a low oath, he broke the embrace, took a step away, then swung back. "I cannot go back in there. I am going to the tower."

He did not finish, just broke off and strode away across the terrace and down the steps into the garden.

Chapter Eighteen

Irene hurried after Gideon to the top of the steps, watching him as he disappeared into the dark of the garden. She stood there, her hands clenched into tight fists, struggling to hold back her tears. She felt bereft, as if something had been torn from her. And she knew in that moment that what had been taken from her was her heart.

She loved Gideon. No words, no logic, no amount of thinking could change that. She was not sure when she had fallen in love with him, when the immediate, intense desire she had felt from the moment she met him had turned into something deeper. But somehow, somewhere along the way, she had given her heart to him.

She loved him, and she knew that the last thing she wanted was to turn away from him. She had thought the worst that would happen when she refused him was that she would have to return to live with her brother and sister-in-law. But now she realized that her life would be far worse than that—she would have to live without Gideon for the remainder of her years. Just the thought of it sent pain slicing through her.

She brought her hands up to her flushed cheeks. She knew deep down that she could trust Gideon. He would not harm her, would not control her, would do none of the things that had always made the thought of marriage so frightening. Such fears were, in the end, not what had held her back. What was truly frightening was the realization that she could give her love to him and not receive his love in return.

And that, she thought, was what held her poised over the precipice now.

If she went to him, if she married him, she would be giving herself entirely to him, offering up her love, her very self. Yet Gideon had just told her that he did not love her—indeed, did not think himself capable of love. Could she allow herself to step into such emotional danger? To love even though she might never receive his love in return?

But even as she wondered whether she could, she realized that not to give him her love would lead to a worse fate, much worse. To hold back from marrying him now would be sheer cowardice. The only true course that her love could take was to commit herself to him. If she did not follow that path, she was denying her love, denying her very self. She would be giving herself over to a life of lonely bitterness, and all because she was afraid to take the ultimate step.

Irene let out a low cry and ran down the steps. Lifting her skirt to her ankles to keep from tripping over it, she hurried through the garden, following the path Gideon had taken. The light of the moon was all she had to see by, and when she came to the darker reaches of the garden, where trees and shrubs grew up to hedge her in and block the light, she had to slow to a walk.

She arrived at the edge of the gardens finally and emerged onto the narrow path leading to the ruins. To her right lay the woods, dark and impenetrable. At another time she might have been frightened of passing this way by herself at night, but tonight she thought of nothing but Gideon.

There, ahead of her, stood the ruins of the tower, and her pace quickened until she was almost running. "Gideon!"

She called his name again as she hurried up to the base of the tower. She stopped at the ruined doorway, one hand upon the stone to steady herself, and drew in her breath. Suddenly she felt a little shy, and when she said his name this time, it came out more tentatively. "Gideon?"

There was the screech of wood on stone, and light spilled into the stairway above her head. "Irene?"