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His lips hovered barely a centimetre away from hers, she felt his breath against hers, she drew it into her lungs and her stomach clenched as she wished so much that she knew what to do next. Instead, they hovered on this almost kiss, fire scorching through her veins, heart beating so wildly she thought she might never find equilibrium again. Then, as one, they moved, coming together—she opened to the tongue he’d pressed against the seam of her lips and she met it with her own, the first shocking feel of him against her, inside her, filling her and delighting her completely. She lost herself to the kiss, the dance of their bodies, the impossible almost dizzying feeling that consumed her.
She felt his hands in her hair, his fingers curling into the thick tendrils and tightening just a little in a way that strangely made her feel both safe and wanted at the same time. She stretched into the feeling, trying to hold on to each different strand of emotion and desire he was wringing from her with just a kiss.
She couldn’t hold back the moan of pure pleasure that fell from her lips to his and regretted it instantly as he finally broke the kiss, his forehead resting against hers, breathing as harshly as she, as if as shocked as she.
‘Is it...is it always like that?’ she dared to ask.
‘No,’ he replied darkly. ‘Never.’
He took her hand in his, gently pulling it down from the side of his face, his thumb pressing against the palm of her hand soothing a little of the hurt, until it tripped over the scar that stretched over her palm to the top of her wrist. She pulled her hand away, rubbing at the scar with her thumb, not from pain but from the tingles and sparks his touch had created there.
She huffed out a little laugh, disguising her shock from the pleasure he’d just given her.
‘My stepmother hates them.’
‘What?’ he asked as if confused.
She shot a dark look his way. Surely he hadn’t missed the callouses, the little scars and nicks around the pads of her fingers, and the larger burn scar that topped the oblique arch of her palm.
‘My hands. The scars. She thinks that all well-born ladies should have delicate, unblemished, dainty hands and bathe in milk daily.’
‘And sleep on rose petals, I’m sure.’
‘And wrap themselves in cotton wool,’ she replied, continuing their word game.
‘And what do you think?’ he asked quietly, as if more weighed on her answer than just her thoughts about herself.
Maria turned her hands over, inspecting them impartially for the first time in a very long time. Seeing them as more than a body part, but as the tools she used to create her jewellery, to meld and mould precious metals, to create beautiful things.
‘I think they speak of hard work and sacrifice, hard-earned lessons, and I am proud of every single one of them.’
It was strange to hear her talk of the thing that had blighted so much of his life in a way that was full of pride and defiance rather than disgust or sick fascination. He had certainly met both those reactions. And then there was the other kind. The women who simply viewed what he could give them, in spite of the scars that covered almost half of his torso. The women who were more interested in his wealth or what pleasure he could give them.
‘You wouldn’t understand,’ she said dismissively and he laughed. Properly then, out loud, from deep within him. She turned back to him, curiosity shining in her eyes.
He nodded once, quickly loosening his tie, releasing the button behind it and, moving his head to the side, he pulled slightly at the collar of his shirt. He knew that she would see the tendrils of scars that licked at his neck glinting in the moonlight. Then held out his arm, the same side of his body, and released the cufflink that held his shirt sleeves in place to reveal the edges of the scars that reached from his neck to his wrist.
‘I’m sorry.’
As he secured the cufflink, forgoing the button at his neck, he reflected that he’d heard that phrase so many times. From the doctors and nurses who had originally treated him, even from Malcolm. And worse, from the women who decided they couldn’t bear to be near him, to touch him. They’d all held that tone. Apologetic and, more often than not, disgusted. But this woman’s voice held neither of those and for the first time he found himself asking, ‘For what?’
‘That you feel you have to hide them.’
A jolt passed through his body. No one had ever said that to him. No one had ever accepted his scars so simply and his mind went blank. Well. Almost blank. B
ecause suddenly he was plunged back into the memory of their kiss. He’d not lied when he’d said that a kiss had never been like that for him.
Even now he felt the throb of desire coiled tight within him. His heart was still racing, which had probably accounted for why he had shown her his scars. Perhaps unconsciously he’d been trying to scare her away. Because she was threatening to undo him in a way he’d never experienced before.
‘Passionate, mindless kisses that are all-consuming, thoughtless and more than a little selfish.’
His words came back to haunt him and he realised the truth of them. Because it had made him selfish. Her kiss had made him want more, a need rising within him, demanding to be heard and satisfied. More. He laughed at himself cynically. He didn’t just want more, he wanted it all. Everything she could give him. Need fired his blood, throbbing thick and heavily through his veins. He desperately fought the urge to haul her into his lap and simply feast on her like the beast he was.
‘They’re from smelting,’ she said, cutting through the raging desire he felt and pulling him back to the present. ‘It’s—’
‘I know what smelting is.’ His voice had come out harsher than he’d intended and she had noticed, if her look of confusion was anything to go by. ‘Professional interest. Mining.’
She nodded as if that explained everything, including his seven-point-four-billion-dollar net worth that she clearly didn’t know about. ‘You don’t like it though,’ she stated.
