Page 76 of Winning Her Duke

Knowing this, she allowed him to determine what he used the word for.

“Thank you for saying so.” She kissed his chin, laughing at the way the hair tickled her lips. “You are rather lovely and if I didn’t need to get home, I would want you again.”

He wrapped his arms around her and she felt the evidence of his answering interest press into her hip.

“Oh.”

“It is a thing that happens in the mornings. Though even worse when there is an incredibly desirable, naked woman in bed with me.”

“It feels a shame to waste it.” She bit her lip deliberating on the best way to proceed while he laughed.

“You always surprise me, Gia. You never say the expected thing. My life is so much better for having you in it.” He frowned and she thought he was probably remembering how she hadn’t been in his life of late.

“I’ve missed you,” she admitted the feeling she’d kept from putting to words even in her mind. But now she just blurted it out.

“I’ve missed you too. And it was even worse because it was my own doing. I thought it was the right thing.”

“You should have asked me. I would have gladly told you how wrong you were.”

They laughed together and he pulled her close to kiss her neck. She pulled away giggling. “Your whiskers tickle.”

“Oh? You shouldn’t have told me that.” He rolled on top of her and made to tickle her breathless, but the naked wiggling distracted him from his torture and soon he was making her breathless for an entirely different reason.

When he was sleeping once more, she slipped quietly out of his bed to go home before he could distract her yet again.

With her clothing back in order, she stepped out into the gray mist of dawn. How strange to know she looked just as she had when she’d come to his home hours earlier, but inside she felt completely different.

How was she supposed to go about her day as if she was the same? How did others treat such an amazing thing so casually? And more importantly how would she manage to be in a room with him and act as if she didn’t wish they were naked in his bed? It would be impossible.

Tradespeople would be moving about soon, but dressed as a boy she could move about without question. She tugged her hat down on her messy hair and rushed down the street.

Bess would grumble at the state of her hair. Would her maid know what she’d done? It felt as if the truth were written plainly on her face.

She was forever changed.

Chapter Twenty-Two

Hale woke in his empty bed with sunlight streaming in through the windows. It was later than he was used to sleeping, but after their night together, there was no way either of them would be up for a ride in the park.

Their night together…

Hale smiled as he pulled the pillow across him, filling the void where Gia’s body had been just hours earlier. Letting out a sigh of disappointment he breathed in the scent of her still clinging to the pillowcase.

She should have woken him, he would have seen her home. But, of course, Gia wouldn’t need his assistance.

He wished she’d still been there.

In truth, he didn’t know that he ever wanted her to leave. If there was ever a person he enjoyed being with, it was Gia Landon.

She was fun, full of life and now with this new aspect of their physical relationship to consider, he found he was actually regretting that she’d turned down his offer of marriage. Not that it had been an offer. More of an expectation.

Still, it was strange that he would even be considering it now when at the time he’d suggested it, he’d thought he might be ill to be forced into marriage.

How quickly things could change.

He sat up and took in the room. The only evidence of what had happened the night before were a few pieces of hay in his bed and across his floor.

How beautiful she’d been with her hair rumpled with straw in it and her warm naked body against his.