“About me?” He chuckled. “What was I doing in this dream?”
She heard her own audible gulp as she swallowed hard, gathering courage. She couldn’t believe she was confessing this. “You were... holding me.” She wished she could pull the words back into her mouth the moment she said them. This was stupid.
Another low chuckle. “Like a hug?” The only physical contact she’d had with him was holding hands, perhaps a lingering touch here and there. Being the gentleman he was, he understood anything else would have been inappropriate. Not that she cared that much about propriety these days. Her father had made it clear she wasn’t like her brother and sister, so why should she care about her reputation?
“Yes and no... it’s silly. I shouldn’t have mentioned it.” She put her fingers between her teeth and began gnawing on her nails.
“Well, don’t stop now, tell me.” His fierce white teeth showed in amusement.
“You were sort of... behind me, with your arms around my waist... and you were whispering something, I think.”
She heard the grass rustle. His face came inches before hers, propped up on one elbow, his free hand reaching for her face.
Her eyes went wide as an owl’s.
He gently pulled her hand free of her mouth, lowering it down to her side. “Terrible habit.” Those lips were mere inches from hers.
This was without a doubt inappropriate, but she wanted him closer, she wanted his lips to be the first to touch hers.
“Tell me...” He leaned in even more. His breath gently coasted past her ear. “What did I say as I held you close?”
She couldn’t speak. He had never been this close before, this bold.
“You s-said...” She willed her nerves to calm.
“Go on,” he encouraged. The back of his hand glided down her bare arm. Everywhere he touched, a patch of gooseflesh followed.
“You said you wanted to kiss me.” She imagined gripping the back of his dark hair right then and there and pulling him into her lips herself. Something described so often in the love stories she read. She had been reading those books more and more recently.
A smooth grin elongated across his cheeks. “A kiss? Where, pray tell?”
The lips, of course. Was there any other place? Suddenly she felt entirely inexperienced and regretted instigating this. She was sure he had to have been intimate with others. He was too attractive to not have been. Her sexual knowledge, however, was significantly lacking.
She had to backtrack, this was a mistake.
“I—I woke up... I’m not sure.” She let her bravado fall. Her entire plan to create closeness had worked, but... now she wasn’t quite sure what to do.
His eyes scanned over her body. He pulled his head back a bit, meeting her eyes. There was such heat between them, but he appeared to understand her apprehension.
He plucked her trembling hand from her side, placing her fingers between his. Then he ever-so-slowly bowed his head and placed a kiss on the back of her hand.
She watched those blue eyes peer up at her as he allowed his lips to separate from her skin.
“There... a kiss. I hope it doesn’t disappoint.”
His lips had touched her.
She pulled her hand to her chest and cupped it with the other as if to cradle the kiss close to her heart, savoring every tingling sensation from the brief contact.
“It was perfect,” she replied.
CHAPTERTWENTY-SIX
Helaina’s eyes fluttered open. Her vision was hazy. She was dry and comfortable, curled underneath blankets.
She patted her body down. Her clothes had been changed again, but this two-piece outfit of thick, fur-lined attire was definitely not from her own wardrobe. Her fingers roamed over brass clasps lining the right side of her ribs. The ensemble was unlike anything she had ever worn yet strangely comfortable.
She sat up, swinging her legs to the edge of the bed. The movement drove a gasp from her lips as pain shot through her. She hissed between her teeth, standing to roll down her pants, nervous for what she might find below the warm fabric. There was a clean bandage affixed to her upper thigh. They had dressed her wound.
