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“You have nothing to fear now,” he said gruffly. “I promise.”
She looked down, gathering her courage. “Don’t leave.” She hadn’t the nerve to addme. And yet, how many times had she asked that of him when they were children? Too many to count. But he had broken that promise in the end.
When she dared to glance up again, Alec still hadn’t moved, but his mask had fallen away. Everything he worked so hard to keep hidden was laid bare before her: the wariness, the pain, and, most important, the desire.
Her eyes were drawn to the sensuous curves of his lips, almost indecently full for a man. How badly she wanted him to kiss her again, but not for show this time. Not for anything other than the sheer pleasure of it. The want. Theneedof it.
He stared at her for a long moment. His piercing gaze stirred something so raw within her she almost fell to her knees. “It’s the shock of earlier,” he finally said. “You don’t know what you’re—”
“Stay with me. Please.”
Alec closed his eyes and muttered a curse.
It was thepleasethat finally broke through Alec’s last remaining barricade, though it had been steadily crumbling for the past hour. The overwhelming desire to protect Lottie from every possible danger was nearly as consuming as his desire to have her—but only nearly.
When Alec had left all those years ago, he had been certain that doing so would ensure her future. Sir Alfred made it clear that with him gone, Lottie would marry a respectable man of good standing and become a pillar of the community, as was her destiny. But if he stayed, Sir Alfred promised to do everything in his power to ruin Alec. With his scandalous heritage and lack of fortune, who was he to tear her away from the only world she had ever known merely in exchange for his pitiful little heart?
She may be happy at first, Sir Alfred had allowed,but in time she will come to resent you. Will you sentence her to that fate?
If he had loved her any less, perhaps he would have.
But instead Lottie had surprised them both and found her way in the world, on her own terms. Alec could not help but admire her for it—even if his worry had nearly driven him mad. She might want him for comfort this evening, but she had already proven she did not need him. Not the way he needed her. Since he had first stepped out onto that hillside terrace in Tuscany, somewhere, in the deepest part of his heart, Alec had wished for something like this. Prayed for it.
When he opened his eyes, Lottie was slowly stripping off her evening gloves. He had yet to respond to her declaration beyond a muttered curse, and the sight of her bare arms was not helping. The open shutters let in the bright moonlight, casting her in an otherworldly glow. Standing there proud and tall in her gown, she looked like a fairy queen—one who came to visit every five years for only a few precious hours. Alec’s mouth filled with both the familiar tang of regret and of longing so visceral, so all consuming, that it suffused every cell of his body. She met his gaze, those green eyes as sharp and determined as ever, and Alec had to swallow past the lump in his throat. He was wrong. She was no fairy queen, but a warrior goddess.
“Tell me what you want.” He tried to inject the words with a cold, clinical authoritativeness to mask the pathetic need currently coursing through him.
“I…I want you to touch me,” she breathed. As her eyes heated, a kind of desperation stirred within him, a brutal greed he had never before experienced. And he craved more.
Her hands then went behind her back and the gown puddled to the floor. She wore only a paper-thin chemise. “The corset is built into the bodice,” she explained with an impish smile.
“A modern marvel,” Alec managed to quip, while his gaze roved all over her body, taking in every newly exposed inch: the slope of her slender shoulders, the length of her arms, the delicate collarbones framing her décolletage, the soft swell of each breast. A shard of moonlight illuminated her pale skin dotted with freckles. If they’d had all the time in the world, he would kiss every one.
Lottie canted her head. “Are you going to stand by the door all night?”
Alec’s eyes lifted to hers. He had been staring. Coveting, really. Yes, he would always covet what he could never truly possess. Lottie held out her hand and Alec willed his legs to move. As their palms slid against each other, the shock of familiarity was as strong as ever, even through his gloves. Alec tore them off. Then, in another instant, he crushed her against his chest and thrust a bare hand into her silky hair, sending those thick russet waves tumbling out of her coiffure. Lottie stared up at him in wide-eyed surprise at his sudden movements. Alec forced himself to take a steadying breath and focus on the moment, before he gently set his mouth to hers.
The very air seemed to crackle as their lips touched, just like their last kiss, but Alec had been an entirely different man then. One whose walls were still intact. One who had no idea what he was getting into. And one who had grossly overestimated himself.
How could this be only thesecondtime they had kissed? The thought of kissing her again had become a steady, insistent murmur these last few days. But now it was as if a whole orchestra had reached a violent crescendo. Something burst forth inside him, like a bird escaping its cage. As if kissing her freed him. Made him anew.
And he could not let her go so easily this time.
Lottie pressed her lips harder against his, kissing him like her life depended on it. Like he was her only source of air. And Alec was no better. He kissed her back with equal hunger until the taste of her lips was no longer enough. He brushed his tongue along her bottom lip. It was only a cursory, cautious lick to gauge her interest, to see if she would grant him entrance, but she let out a squeak of delight as her fingers tightened and twisted in his hair. Then she boldly pushed her soft, velvet tongue into his waiting, eager mouth.
Damn.
“Lottie, wait,” he said raggedly, breaking the kiss. Alec tried to pull back but the lapels of his jacket were fisted in her hands.
She shook her head stubbornly as she tugged on his shirt. “I’m tired of waiting.”
Alec chuckled. Try waitingyears.
Before he could do something incredibly foolish, like voicing such a thought, Lottie rose on her toes and found his lips again. His arms automatically went around her and he pulled her close once again, until her entire body, every bloody, lovely inch of her, was pressed against his. But it still wasn’t close enough. He needed nothing between them—no skin, muscle, sinew—nothing until their very hearts could beat as one.
The thought gave him a start and she pulled back, concerned. “What is it?”
Alec shook his head and tried to speak, but it was far too much to put into mere words.
