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“I understand you dislike me to touch you,” he rasped in that low voice of his. “I mean to help you take off your cloak.”
If he believed she did not welcome his proximity, he must be blind. Or perhaps her skittishness from when she had to take his hand to leave the carriage misguided him. What she did not enjoy was her prompt, quick, unrestrained response to him.
Her voice failed to cover the deranged pounding of her heart as she fumbled for an answer. “I…of course.”
His fingers closed on the fabric at the same second as the little hairs on her nape registered his warm breath, and her nostrils his scent; the warmth of him scalded her back. Air stuck in her lungs as her eyelids closed tight in a useless attempt not to revel in his nearness. As fast as her languid self permitted, she unclasped the hook and moved her arms to shrug it off them. Instead of the garment sliding at once down her arms, it rolled down slowly. So slow, her skin registered every inch of it from her sleeves to the top of her long gloves. Heat flushed to the surface, everywhere she could and could not name.
“Thank you,” she murmured in a silky, weak voice.
She heard him inhale once and then there was no more sound as if he had arrested the air in him. The cloak came off her, and she turned to watch him hang it. His hat already on the peg, he started unbuttoning his coat. Button by button, his broad shoulders came to light clad in his elegant dark-brown evening suit. Next, he turned to one of his gloves, pulling to uncover each long, masculine finger. Enclosed in that cramped space, this undressing felt intimate, suggestive, provocative, as if they had done this and much more their entire lives. As if they would do this and everything else to the end of time.
Catching hold of her greedy eyes, she diverted them to the curtain dividing the cloak niche and the box. Propriety demanded that she waited for him to part the curtain for her to pass. It was the longest minute of her life, filled with the swishing of his movements in the silence provided by the fabric on the walls. The scalding on her body soared, her breathing skittered out of rhythm and her muscles tensed with the wait.
An eternity elapsed before his solid frame brushed beside her and his long arm stretched to open the curtain for her. In deliberate, studied steps, she entered the box and sat with careful, dainty movements, a relieved exhale escaping through her lips.
What happened on the stage she did not know because he did her the disfavour of sitting on the chair next to hers and not on the one farthest away. His unyielding muscular frame too close for her peace of mind, sucking every ounce of her attention.
And yearning.
And this ragged need to touch him in ways she had never imagined touching anyone in her whole life. From where these cravings came there was no telling.
The stage darkened, the intermission was upon them at last.
Before he moved from his chair, she came to her feet. “Excuse me,” she murmured and rushed to the ladies as if it would be possible to flee from the things he did to her.
On the way, she grabbed a glass of champagne from a footman. She downed it in one gulp as soon as she entered the lady’s, her back falling against the door in a breathless state. She stayed there, striving to find some elusive balance. She succeeded barely to catch her breath as the wine did not relieve any of the steam.
The signal for the second act sounded in what seemed half the usual time. Unless she pleaded an indisposition, she must return to the box.
Edmund stood by the door waiting for her, a knowing glint in his long-lashed eyes.
She entered the cloak niche. “Would you like a refreshment?” he asked, following her.
“No, thank you, my lord.” In a breath, her back was against the wall with his bare warm hands on her also bare shoulders. He had closed the door and turned her to him so swift she nearly lost balance.
Her maddened heart jumped anew, trying to fly through her ribs. Her head tilted up to come across him looking down on her.
“Why will you not say my name, Otilia?” He drawled, standing an inch from her, his mass of muscle and sinew overflowing her vision.
Her eyes opened wide as her tongue moistened her lips,
his attention lowering to them. “I do not know what you are talking about.”
“I think you do.” Their stares linked while she was about to become a puddle of melted yearning right before him.
“Are you not Lord Thornton?” For the life of her, she would not externalise her feelings, her messy, undefined, swirling feelings on the matter.
“We count a lengthy acquaintance,” he replied hoarsely.
If he continued to press on her like that, she would not answer for her actions. “Unfortunately,” she breathed.
“Indeed.” He was so close she could see the bristles on his sculpted jaw. The crazy impulse to trace his hard mouth almost got the best of her.
“There is nothing to say about it, my l—”
“Say it again and suffer the consequences.” In that nutmeg, syrupy tone, the threat sounded like a promise, a wicked, worth-the-fall promise.
She was losing her footing here. He was not holding her so tight she could not break free. The problem was she lacked less and less will for that. “All right.” Her brain became cotton, and she must concentrate on what she would say, “Mr Brentwood.”
