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“So do I,” he said instantly.

“Not from you.”

He went still again. She couldn’t see his face, but his hands fell away from her, and he stepped back. “From Lilford?”

“No.” It would be easy to let Jake think that, but it wouldn’t be fair. “I don’t mean more, as in marriage or a title.”

“Then?” Jake’s body was tight as a kite string, not with rage but with some other emotion she couldn’t name. “Whatever you want, I’ll give it to you. Except a title. Though I believe I could buy one of those.”

“You can’t.”

“The hell I can’t. I’ll give you anything you want, Cleo.”

Cleo felt a wave of panic. Jake’s voice had a dark, liquid confidence in his own abilities that made her want to give in. But she had decided long ago that she deserved more than her mother ever gave—or her father ever got.

Jake wanted her, but he loved Merry. The duchess whom he had meant to marry if a bear hadn’t felled him.

If fate hadn’t intervened.

“I want to be the only one,” she said.

Jake’s face softened. “There hasn’t been anyone else for me since the moment I saw you.”

Cleo’s heart sank, and she bit her lip. She had replaced Merry, at least to some extent. “That’s exactly what I’m saying.”

“I don’t know what you’re saying.” Jake reached out and rubbed her lower lip with his thumb. “I saw you in Quimby’s, and I moved to Germain’s the next day, Cleo. I loathed your turban, but I had to be near you.”

She blinked, registering the set of his jaw, the intensity in his eyes. “You were buying Quimby’s, not me.”

“I saw you,” he repeated.

“Now I feel like a piece of china.”

He pulled her into his arms. “I understand if you want more than me, Cleo. Better. Titled. British. Fancy, like Lilford.”

She wrinkled her nose. “I don’t want fancy.”

“Perhaps I put you off with the kippers.” His voice was confident, but his eyes searched hers. “I can give them up. Believe me: no woman has entered my mind since I met you.”

“I do believe you.”

His tongue licked her bottom lip, making a shiver run down her legs. “Good.”

“I saw you and the duchess together,” she blurted out.

“So?”

“You wanted to marry her, except you were trapped in the wilderness, and she married before you could get to her, and now you’re just friends—and I believe that, I really do. But I want more.”

“I want more, too.”

His lips caressed hers, and Cleo gave in with a little moan. Jake’s kiss was greedy, licking into her mouth as if he wanted to drink her in. They didn’t stop kissing until she was wound tight in his arms, her body shaking, her breath ragged.

Jake pulled away and rumbled into her ear, “Tell me what you want, Cleo. I’ll give it to you.”

She looked up at him. She never cried. Ever. But her eyes felt hot.

“Darling.” His voice dropped even lower.