Page 75 of Make Mine a Marquess

“Phoebe!”

He heard a distant voice from the terrace.

Damn.

He lifted his head. Her blue eyes were smoky with passion, her lips swollen from his kisses. Her naked breasts filled his hands, both nipples turgid with arousal. Her beauty was beyond compare.

“Phoebe!” the voice called again.

“It’s your mother,” he hissed.

She blinked. “What?”

Pulling back was the hardest thing he’d ever had to do. He deftly lifted her bodice. “Hurry. Your mother is calling for you.”

“Oh!” She touched her lips. “I have to—”

“Go now. But don’t forget what I said about tonight.”

She picked up her skirts and fled. From his hidden position behind an oak, he watched her scurry up the terrace steps, meet her mother, then disappear into the ballroom. He leaned against the tree, catching his ragged breath, gathering his thoughts.

Revenge, comingled with lust, and another emotion, one he refused to identify or acknowledge, was a heady combination.

Would she come to him? Or was that the last time he’d hold Phoebe in his arms?

Chapter Twenty

That night, Phoebe tossed and turned, waiting for the household to be asleep.

Come to me tonight. No one need know.

Throwing aside her coverlet, she sat on the edge of the bed. She’d thought of nothing else but those words all evening. She’d known what they’d implied. A tryst. A night with Landon. One night of passion before she resumed her life as a dutiful daughter and fulfilled her obligation to marry the baron.

Her past, no matter how long ago, was never far from her mind.

But this time was different.

This time, she was a grown woman. She’d make a choice knowing full well there was no future. No promise of marriage. Just one night with a man she desired. A man that made her pulse quicken with a simple glance. A complex man whom she’d grown to admire, whom she’d confessed about how she provided dresses to her charity, things she’d never dare tell her betrothed. A man who didn’t judge her for her charitable endeavors. Rather, a man confident enough to admire her work. An aristocrat who’d picked up tools and dirtied his hands to help the less fortunate.

She was no longer a naive sixteen-year-old girl and understood the risks. What she understood most of all was regret.

Was she willing to spend the rest of her life wondering what if? What if she’d had the nerve to take what she’d wanted, to seize a single night of happiness?

She wanted the man. She could have him. It would be different this time.

This time, it would be on her terms.

Soon enough, she’d become a wife.

She stood and donned her wrapper, then, opening the door, she slipped into the hallway. A sense of freedom made her giddy as her bare toes curled in the plush Aubusson runner. In her haste, she’d left her slippers behind, and she was glad for it now. The master bedchamber was at the end of the hall. She stood before it, her fist raised, and before her confidence waned, she knocked once, softly.

Landon opened the door, dressed in a shirt and trousers. No cravat, waistcoat, or boots. The top two buttons of his shirt were undone, revealing a sprinkling of hair and the corded muscles of his neck. He looked dashing and tempting, and her heartbeat doubled.

“You came,” he said.

“I did.” Nervousness rose and butterfly wings blossomed in her chest. She knew what she wanted, but to act so boldly was another matter entirely.

He opened the door wide. “I’m pleased.”