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She began to pull away.

He held her fast, nodding over her shoulder. “My rooms are one street over.” She looked up sharply and he grinned. “If you’d like to join me.”

Another chance. He was reaching his hand out across the gap between them and offering her another chance to be pulled over to his side of the divide.

She swung her cloak onto her shoulders. “Where’s your coat? Put it on. What are you waiting for?”

He laughed and it rippled through her. She’d loved his laugh—rich and throaty with a hint of something wild about it. She’d taken for granted that she’d hear it again and again for as long as she lived, and now that it was back, she didn’t want to go without it again.

Andrew struggled into his jacket and gripped her by the hand. Clattering down the shop’s stairs together, they stole out into the lamplit street. The air was misty enough to cool her heated cheeks as they practically ran to a small building with a nondescript door. Andrew dropped her hand long enough to pull out a brass key.

“These rooms have a separate entrance from the coffee shop,” he said. “No one else is in the building at night.”

“You don’t keep a valet or a maid?” she asked.

“Not one that lives in quarters.”

“Good,” she said. “Then we don’t have to worry about anyone hearing us.”

As soon as they were inside, they fell on each other, pulling at ties and tugging at hooks as they kissed pressed against the front door. Her cloak and his jacket fell in the hallway. Caging her in with arms on either side, he kissed a line from the lobe of her ear to the square neck of her dress, moaning when he got to the swell of her breasts.

“How the hell does this come off?” he said, his hands searching for the seam between her bodice and her skirt.

She shook her head. “It’s all one piece. The latest fashion.”

“I don’t care what it is,” he said. “It looks good enough on you that you need to not be wearing it.”

She laughed at the contradiction and kissed him swiftly. “Where’s the bed?”

Rather than responding, he swept her up off her feet in one smooth motion. Her hands flew to his shoulders to steady herself. Wark had carried her like this earlier that evening, and everything about it had felt oppressive and territorial. With Andrew, however, she couldn’t help but feel a little bit cherished.

Don’t make this into anything other than it is, she chastised herself. This was sex and longing and familiarity. That was all.

He clambered up two flights of stairs as though the weight of her was nothing and edged open a door with his shoulder. She could just make out the lines of a bed in the moonlight slipping through the cracks of a set of drawn drapes. The fire was banked in the grate and the room was cold, but none of that mattered. Being near Andrew made her warm enough.

Rather than lay her down on the bed, he set her upright and spun her around. His breath tickled the back of her neck as he leaned down to concentrate on the hooks on the back of her dress. One by one he worked them free, and she had to hold her bodice up against her chest to keep the whole thing from falling down over his hands.

“There,” he announced when the last hook was undone, clearly proud of himself.

“You’re an acceptable substitute for a lady’s maid, Captain Colter,” she said, as he helped her step out of her dress.

He slipped his hands down her sides and traced the steel bones of her corset. “If that meant helping you undress every night, I’m not sure I would mind. Lord but you’re beautiful.”

The words didn’t mean anything, but they brought a blush to her cheeks nonetheless. This was just one night. There was no point in thinking about the “every nights” to come. Here in this room, he was a man and she was a woman, and that was all that there was between them. No broken engagement or angry thoughts. There was no room for dreams dashed that evening.

Raising her hands to her corset, she undid the row of hooks along the long basque and let it fall away before pushing her chemise off her shoulders. Stockings and drawers followed quickly, and all at once she was standing naked before the first man she’d lost her heart to.

He sucked in a breath and raised a hand to cautiously, gently trace the line of her collarbone back and forth before circling each breast. When the pad of his thumb glanced over her peaked nipple, she hissed.

“You always liked that,” he said with a rueful smile.

“I still do,” she said, pushing her chest forward. Clever man that he was, he spread his palm and cupped her breast, thumb stroking over her sensitive areola. She moaned, and he shook his head.

“The sweetest sound,” he murmured. Then he sat down on the edge of the bed, using his free hand to draw her to him by her hip. He closed his lips around her nipple and sucked.

Her head fell forward, her hands sinking into his curls. He swirled his tongue around her once, twice, and then pulled gently with his lips. Her hips pressed forward. She needed friction and pressure to relieve the ache between her legs.

Stepping wide, she eased forward, her clit brushing his thigh. Desire shot through her, and her knees nearly buckled, pressing her harder against his leg. She moved again, rocking with the rhythm of Andrew’s sucking. His fingers found her other nipple and squeezed hard enough to make her cry out at the delicious pinch of pain.