Caroline laughed with him, but then her doe eyes grew somber.
“I have been so unfair to you,” she whispered, the pain evident in her voice. “You were truthful with me the entire time, and I was too afraid to see what was right before me. Please forgive me, Damien.”
Damien shook his head before he pressed his forehead to hers, still struggling to believe that they were finally reaching a good place.
“There is nothing to be forgiven. You had every right to your beliefs. I took too long to show you anything otherwise,” he replied.
“I just... I could not believe that a man like you would really like me for me,” she confessed.
“You have no idea,” he rasped, his thumb tracing her cheekbone as he looked down at her. “I have wanted you for so long that I have forgotten what it felt like not to. Every room you walked into. Every time you looked anywhere but at me. I have been half mad with it, Caroline, and too much of a coward to tell you.”
He felt her rise to her tiptoes again, and he readily met her lips with another kiss. It was slower, sweeter, and when he pulled away, he let out a husky chuckle.
“What is so amusing?” Caroline asked, her eyes twinkling with affection as he met them.
“I was just wondering if this makes me a good dog now,” he teased, and her laugh sent flutters through his bloodstream.
“Oh, yes,” she giggled. “A very,verygood dog,” she teased back.
“Oh, angel,” he breathed, and kissed her as he still smiled. “You do not know how long I have been waiting for this...”
When she pulled back, he found her eyes questioning.
“What is it?” he asked, smoothing his palm up her back and to the nape of her neck, relishing in the way she shivered and then leaned into his touch.
“I just… I noticed that you no longer call me little mouse,” she confessed, blushing adorably. “You started calling me angel instead. I certainly do not mind, but I am curious as to why?”
Damien rubbed the nape of her neck, loving that she let out a soft sigh of relief at his touch.
“After you told me that awful story about what your stepsister did with the mouse, I decided that you needed a different name. I did not want anything I said or did to remind you of them,” he confessed.
Caroline’s lips parted as her eyes filled with emotion and tears, and she stroked her fingertips along his jaw and up to his hair.
“You did that for me?” she asked, her soft voice wavering.
“Oh, angel, there issomuch I would do for you,” he rasped, feeling a lump form in his throat. “I would do anything for you.”
“It was them I feared,” she confessed, a tear sliding down her cheek.
Before he could help himself, he leaned in and brushed it away with his lips.
“Not you,” she whispered into his ear. “I see that now. I do not fear you, Damien. I want you.”
Something gave way in his chest at those words. He had waited so long to hear them. Longer than she knew. He had watched her from across rooms for years, wanting her and telling himself he had no right to. He had gone five years without touching another woman because none of them were her. He had built this entire marriage around the slim hope that she might one day look at him the way she was looking at him now, and he had never once let himself believe that she actually would.
And here she was.
Desire swept through his veins, pushing away any sad thoughts or residual worries, and he smoothed his hands up to cup both of her cheeks. He pulled away, just enough so that he could meet her eyes.
“You have me,” he said, unable to hold back the ache in his voice. “Every part of me that is worth having, and some parts that are not. I have been yours for longer than you know, angel, and I am done pretending otherwise.”
Caroline shivered under his touch as his amber eyes darkened with desire, and she nodded as she pressed herself close.
“Then, please, Damien,” she pleaded, curling her fingers into the lapels of his jacket. “Show me.”
“Come here, wife.”
Chapter 27
