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“Second,” she continued. “I had a realization today. I thought it might be the result of looking at you through vodka-colored spectacles, but now I know what I felt was true. Everyone wants to be loved, Raven. I want to be loved. I don’t want to be hurt. But I can’t have one without the possibility of the other. I’m strong enough to admit that I love you with no requirement that you say the words back to me.”
“Indy.” He clasped her against his chest. “Why?”
“Why do I love you? Because you trust me. Because we make a good team. You make me laugh. You love your family and made sacrifices so that they could have a better life. I love you because you rescued me from that madman with a knife.”
She lifted her head and stared into his eyes. “I love you because you laugh at my jokes, but you never laugh at my ambitions. And I love you because... I always have. And I always will. Now kiss me, you big dolt of a duke. And don’t worry about my head, I have a thick skull. Must have, if I love you.”
He was hers to command.
His heart overflowing, he kissed her tenderly, memorizing the shape of her lips, the sweetness of her words.
She loved him.
And he loved her. He just had to find a way to say the words, and to make her believe them.
A part of her wanted, needed, him to say he loved her. It had been sheer theatricality, saying she didn’t need to hear the words.
But for now it was enough to kiss, to be kissed. To be adored by his body, his tongue, his hands.
Her emotions had been ungloved. She opened her heart, giving herself permission to be fully present with him for the first time. Maybe she’d be hurt again.
But right now she was going to revel in this closeness, this warmth and tenderness between them. Her body alive with pleasure from the crown of her head to her toes.
She wore only her chemise. He must have undressed her earlier. Eager to feel his skin, she fumbled with the buttons on his breeches.
He drew his shirt over his head.
The map of his scars. Each one a story. A mission.
She trusted that he had lived his life by a strict code of ethics. As strict as the one she lived hers by. He’d thought he was being noble when he pushed her away.
He hadn’t been idly watching life go by. Collecting stolen antiquities was his cover.
He wasn’t a mercenary, but he’d stolen her heart when she thought she had no heart to give.
His hands found the hem of her chemise beneath the coverlet and lifted it slowly up her body. She lifted her arms to help him remove the garment.
Nothing left between them. Skin to skin. Heart to heart.
She sighed when his lips claimed the peak of her breast. Lovers throughout history had made these secret sounds.
He ran his hands along her waist and over her hips.
He was sculpted from marble, from his biceps to his bum.
And his cock. That part of him was hard as stone yet warm and soft to her touch. She guided him between her thighs. She needed to feel him inside her.
“I want to make you come first,” he said, halting her progress with his hand.
“You already did, remember? The carriage?”
“Again.” He slid down her body, parting her thighs with his hands and burying his tongue between her legs.
She wasn’t going to argue with the sentiment. What he was doing with his tongue felt too exquisite.
She didn’t have to be the perfect seductress.
She didn’t have to be perfect at all.
