Page 45 of The Duke's Mysterious Lover
“I…I’m flattered…”
When he chuckled, it sounded almost pained, and yes, there was somethingwrongin his gaze. “Ye should be. I think I was yer age the last time I felt this way about someone, and she was ten years my senior.”
He wasn’t kissing her again. In fact, he seemed as if he was holding himself back. “So…” Kit swallowed. “Is it the fact I’m your valet that makes you hesitate?” she whispered. “It’s not because I’m…dressed as a man?” Thorne had embraced Evie for herself, after all.
“A man?” he snorted. “Yer’re aladdie.” His forehead dropped to hers again, a grimace tightening his expression. “Ye’re far too young. Even if I desperately wanted to be the one to debauch ye…”
“I told you, I’m twenty-three, and I’m not a virgin. What if I wanted to be the one to debauch you?”
As the words slipped from her lips, she knew they were the truth. Knew it was time.
His chuckle turned to a little sigh, and then Thorne was pulling away. “Cheeky little brat. Whatever yer past, lad, I’ll no’ push myself on ye.”
“I want you, Thorne,” she whispered, grabbing for his hand before he could step back. She took a deep breath. “And I’m not a lad.”
Heart in her throat, Kit pressed his palm againstherchest, right over her right breast, and prayed she was doing the right thing.
Chapter 9
“And I’m not a lad.”
Thorne had just enough time to scoff at the claim—assuming Kit was trying to convince him of the ridiculous claim that he was a actually twenty-three, when he clearly wasn’t shaving yet—when his brain caught up with his mouth. Or more accurately, caught up with his fingers.
Instinctively, his fingers tightened, circling the lump he felt below Kit’s waistcoat. Nay, not a lump exactly, thehintof a lump.
Wool waistcoat. Cotton shirt. Then a thick—bandage? Perhaps? And beneath all of that, a lump.
Was it any wonder Thorne’s incredulous gaze was locked on Kit’s chest?
On…herchest?
Moving like an automaton, he lifted his other hand, and aye, sure enough, there was a matchinglumpon the other side.
So now he stood, not quite in the shadows, both his hands locked on his valet’s tits…and his gaze rose in amazement to meet the pale eyes he knew so well.
The eyes he’d come to love.
“What the actualfook, Kit?” he finally managed.
And his valet, the scamp, burst into laughter.
Granted, it was undeniably nervous laughter, but he—she—was laughing at him.
Thorne braced his weight against her and leaned forward. “Are ye mocking me? How long have ye been—?”
She tried to muffle her laughter, but it was apparently impossible. “Been a woman?” Her fingers—which, aye, he recognized not as slim and elegant butthe hand of a fooking woman—rose to press against her lips. “My whole life?”
Her lips.
OhChrist,her lips.
In his trousers, his cock had given up being merelyhardand was now doing a happy dance.
Kit was a woman.
His valet was a woman.
He’d kisseda woman.
