With a growl, Archer scooped her into his arms and began to run towards the house. “Damn it.”
He sprinted towards his study where he knew the fire would be roaring merrily and plopped Lydia ungraciously onto the armchair, hurling logs onto the fire and stoking it until it was so hot he could feel sweat forming on his brow.
He looked at his wife, at the colour slowly returning to her lips, and nodded curtly. “I am going to bed. You stay here and warm up.”
“No.” Lydia’s voice was firm, even as she looked at him with nerves in her eyes. “Cora told me—she told me about the pet name. I know what it means to you, what youthinkit means?—”
“Are you a mind reader now? You cannot hope to know what it means,” he snapped at her, his mind racing.
“I know what your mother did to your father, and I know that if I were in your shoes, that would terrify me.” Lydia stood up, reaching towards him from beneath her blankets, but he jerked away from her shaking his head.
“And it should. She ruined his life; she ruined all of our lives.” Archer gestured around them, running his hands through his hair and curling his fingers into a fist in it.
“And is that what you think I would do to you?” Her voice was small, and it broke something inside of him.
He sensed her take several steps towards him, closing the distance between them as she placed a hand on his left shoulder blade.
It is not you I am worried about.Archer shook his head, his shoulder’s sagging, barely aware of the words falling from his mouth, just the misery that beat in his chest. “It does not matter what I think. Every moment with you is torture.”
Lydia recoiled from him. “If that is truly how you feel, then you should just have been honest with me. If you find my company so unappealing, you should just say it. Say you have no wish to be with me, and we can stop this silly little dance of ours.”
Archer blinked at her, confused “What?”
“It is clear you do not want me, but I would rather you just tell me that than hide behind those who died long ago.” She gave a bitter laugh, wrapping the blankets more tightly around herself. “I let my heart convince me I could be something I am not, and I was a fool. But I… I know better now.”
He shook his head; her words made no sense to him. He squinted at her. “I don’t understand.”
“We have been circling each other, and obviously, I mistook your kindness for something more. Something… different.” She flushed scarlet and cleared her throat as she began to walk past him. “But I know now that I was wrong. It was silly really; you had already told me that you would never think of me that way.I let myself get too caught up in the moment. That’s all. If my presence is so tortuous for you, I will go.”
She made to grab the door handle, and it snapped him back from the dark doldrums of his mind. “No!” He grabbed her arm and pulled her to him, a desperation in his movement that unnerved him, but he had no more energy to fight it.
“Your presence is not torture because it is unpleasant. To be near you is to be tortured because it is exactly the opposite. To be near you is the most exquisite pain because my body yearns for you. Every part of me wishes to cross the distance, to claim you for my own, and yet, you remain out of reach.” He took a shaky breath, his eyes tracing her face, drinking in every drop of her he could see.
The gentle flutter of her eye lids, the delicate pink of her lips. He lifted his hands to her cheeks, cupping her face gently between his palms, angling it towards her.
“I burn for you Lydia. You consume my every thought, my senses. Every moment that we are not touching feels like a moment wasted, and yet even this…” He breathed in deeply, inhaling the scent of her, his forehead mere hairs breadths away from hers. “It is torture to be near you because each moment I feel my control weaken. With every touch, I fear I will lose control.”
“So lose control.” Her eyes blazed hard and strong as the fieriest wildfire.
“Lydia…” Archer moaned, and then his lips were on hers, and nothing else mattered but the feel of her skin against his.
He crushed her to him like she was the only thing that held him to the earth. He tasted her, the feel of her consuming his mind until there was nothing left but the sweet taste of wine and the heady scent of Lydia. And for once, Archer did as his wife bade him.
Lydia had never dreamed that kissing Archer would feel like this. She had no idea where her lips ended and his began, only that she never wanted to find that distinction lay.
She wanted to erase that place, to erase that distance. She felt Archer’s mouth on hers, rough and commanding, yet somehow still gentle. His kiss was not a question, but it was not a demand either.
It was hungry, but so was she. Archer’s mouth was an invitation that she was all too ready to accept. Her hands tangled in his hair, reveling in the dampness of it against her skin, the melted snow mingling with the sweat that trickled down their bodies beneath the heat of the fire.
The heat of each other.
She did not know how long they had kissed, only that when they broke apart she felt like a drowning woman breaching the surface of water and yet also like she had lost something.
“Archer…” she murmured, gazing into his lidded eyes.
“Lydia…” His answer was peppered with gentle kisses, scarcely more than a brush of his lips against her skin, but they set her body on fire.
She understood what he meant when he said that she was torture. He was torture too, and it terrified her that she wanted that torture. Wanted to surrender to it.
