Page 10 of Eternal Love
“Right,” Julia replied, elongating the word. She took the beer and pushed a note toward her.
“Don’t mind my wife,” said a man coming up behind the bar. “You’ve bought the manor, is that right?”
“Yes,” she said, beaming. Finally, someone normal.
The man’s smile crinkled. “Lovely. It’s great that someone bought it, that place has been sitting empty for too long.”
Julia opened her mouth to respond, but a voice piped up from down the other end of the bar, “Just don’t go changing it into flats now. I know what you youngsters are like.”
She cleared her throat and addressed the man, “Wouldn’t dream of it.” She flashed him a smile and took a few swigs of her drink. Luckily, that seemed to perk everyone up to no end, and she ended up killing an hour or two, making small talk about her plans for the manor. She learned a few names, and that everyone, literally everyone, had lived in the village their entire lives.
By the end of the evening, most seemed to accept her.One of us, one of us, one of us.
Her thoughts had begun drifting to Theodore and how wrong he was about the village. Sure, they seemed set in their ways, but (minus the initial looks) they’d been nice to her and seemed genuinely happy she was taking over the manor. She rose, said her goodbyes, and began the short walk home. She had just put her key in the lock when the door flew open so violently she worried it would be ripped from its hinges.
“Careful, don’t hurt the old girl—”
Her joke stopped in its tracks when she caught sight of Theodore, wild eyes, curls askew, no suit jacket, just his white shirt clinging to him like smoke. And pacing. So much pacing.
“What’s wrong?” Her question came out as a whisper, falling into the room and settling like snow.
“What’s wrong?” He continued pacing, running his hand through his hair. “I was worried, I thought you were only going to be out for ... and I was trying to work out how I could come and...”
He seemed to be warring with himself, with two different strands of conversation. She just wanted to wipe the worry from him. That’s why she did it—stood on her tiptoes in front of him and raised her face to brush her lips against his. His eyes widened at the contact, and she began to step back, a smug smile playing on her lips that she’d managed to tame him, when he crashed into her at full force, slamming her back against the wall and seizing her mouth for his own.
Chapter Six
It was her turn forher eyes to widen. A strangled gasp left her throat as she kissed him back. There were no words for the way he was kissing her ... like he was starving, and she was his last meal. His hands roved over her back, meeting in the middle, traveling their way to her neck, fingers fisting in her hair, tilting her head to get a better angle to consume her.
Consume.
That was the word for it.
It was like she was thinking the word aloud. His eyes flew open, and he broke the kiss, one arm leaning on the wall behind them. She had to tilt her head to fully meet his gaze. She was flushed, she could feel it, her breath coming in fast gasps. His should be too. The fact that it wasn’t angered her for some reason. She could see, she couldfeelhow undone he was by their kiss. She wanted him to look the same way as her. So, rising to her tiptoes, looking at him under her eyelashes, she came whisper-close to his mouth and said, “Did I say you could stop?”
His gaze darkened, and the hand above her scratched along the wall.
