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“And now?”

What was he asking of her? Love was such a complicated word. When it meant devotion and loyalty and care for another’s comfort, all the most nurturing qualities, it was simpler. But when twined with attraction and desire—that was dangerous ground for her.

She’d never been attracted to her husband. She’d never desired him. She knew that because when Rowden stood this close to her, the heat of his body touching her skin, that enticing scent teasing her nostrils, her insides warmed like a loaf of bread enclosed in an oven.

This, then, was desire.

“I—I care for your well-being. I want the best for you.” Her voice came out thin and ragged, like shredded lace.

He moved closer. “What if I know what is best for my well-being? Will you help me achieve it?”

“Y—yes, if it is in my power to bestow it.”

The space between them disappeared. He filled her vision. She stood on a very high ledge, with no ground beneath her, and when she fell, he would either catch her, or she would hit hard and break.

“How fortunate, because the thing I think most essential to my well-being is something you possess. A quality only you have the ability to dispense.”

What could he mean? She held no particular assets, no fortune she could gift him, no special knowledge she could convey. She was the most ordinary and common of women.

He touched her chin with two fingers, and the contact seared her skin. Her breath dangled in her throat, trapped.

“I can’t think what you might be referring to.” How extraordinary, that she could string an entire thought together, much less put it to words. Her head was pulled like the wind in every direction, her senses rioting.

“Perhaps I can show you.”

His mouth on hers this time was familiar and devastating. She knew what to expect, yet the sensations staggered her. His kiss was a windstorm, pulling the air from her lungs, the volition from her body. Yet the pressure of his lips poured something into her, a startling awareness of each extremity, the intense joy that she was alive and could be here, could feel this, kissing Rowden, clasped in his arms.

She moaned and burrowed closer to him, curling her fingers around the lapels of his coat. He gathered her in, his arms strong bands about her sides, his hands sweeping from her shoulder blades to the small of her back as if he were tracing the curve of her. He pressed her waist, urging her near. His body was a hard wall of heat, and she was afraid to lean against him entirely, afraid she would fall if he let go. His kiss was a whirlpool and she was drawn in, devoured, lost. Small price to pay for the heady knowledge that Rowden desired her, too.

He kissed her with a tenderness she had never known, but then, Henry had never kissed this way. Only Rowden could make her feel this. She had wanted this from the moment he walked into that parlor and watched her being painted, from the moment she sketched out her impossible situation and begged him to save her. She’d wanted him to swoop in then and claim her.

She’d wanted him then. She’d wanted him always.

He pressed forward, and she moved backward until the edge of the folio desk hit the back of her legs. There were items on it, small chests of drawers, and a microscope, she thought. She didn’t care if she knocked it over. She didn’t care if her skirts picked up dust. All that mattered was that Rowden was kissing her, his body pressed against hers, their mouths fused, and she wanted nothing to come between them. Her entire body was one swirling ache, a vast emptiness that could only be filled by him.

He lifted her with ease and settled her bottom on the desk, stepping between her legs. He was too far away from her like this, his body no longer wrapped against hers, and she moaned again and tried to pull him closer. He dipped his tongue into her mouth, a bold plundering, and her knees turned to liquid with the bolt of heat that shot to her core. She was a burning fire and he was the fuel that fed her. She was a broken reed, the air rushing through, and she could only be complete when his body joined to hers.

He dragged his mouth over her jaw, kissing below her ear, then down her neck to her collarbones. Her breasts felt tight and heavy, and she made a mewl like a kitten when his hands came there, his palms chafing the tight buds of her nipples. She hadn’t known she could be so sensitive. She hadn’t known she could want like this, or that there could be such physical pleasure when he touched her, nor such a sense of total, glorious joy. They stood in a world apart, on a cloud high above the earth, and the entire universe held only them.

“Sophronia.” She reveled in how her name was a deep grate in his throat, as if she were a primal need. She basked in the reverent kiss he planted on her breastbone, putting a seal on her heart. “You should have married me.”

His words froze the inferno with a cold, sharp, sudden blast. Those words tore apart the clouds of fancy and brought her shuddering back to earth, jolted by the hard wood of the desk beneath her, the dust stinging her nose.

He would never forgive how she had hurt him, would he? He would never be able to move past that first and awful betrayal.

Whatever time they had together, he would always be circling back to this: what she should have done, how she should not have hurt him. What they could have had, had the world been different.

But the world was what it was. Sophronia was practical. There was no changing the world, any more than he could spin that globe and turn back to that moment in her parlor when he told her he was leaving for university and she knew she must marry Henry Hinton.

Anything they shared between them now would bear this shadow of blame.

She untangled her hands from his hair and leaned away from his mouth. “We should not do this.”

He kissed the side of her face. “Not here, you mean? We could return to the house.” He gave her a devilish smile. “I thought you might enjoy being seduced in a library.”

That smile cracked her heart. Of course she wanted to be seduced by him. Of course she wanted to follow this bliss. She wanted to know every facet of this searing desire, and she wanted to explore its culmination, and she wanted that only with him.

“We…you and I…we cannot.” She swallowed the cry of despair that wanted to break from her. “We cannot have an affair.”