Page 56 of Pride: The Rogue
If he were a better man, a respectable one, maybe he could have couched his vulgar language. But she belonged so far outside his league, he didn’t even bother to try.
Livian trembled; her lips formed a soft moue. “O-Oh.”
As anticipated, shock and gentle embarrassment met his crudeness.
Latimer went, fetched his things, and headed for the door.
She called out softly after him. “Where are you going?”
He stopped in his tracks and cast a questioning glance over his shoulder.
“You were going to stay.”
Had it not been for the nervous way she fisted her skirts and the uncertainty in her eyes and voice, he’d have believed hers an invitation of a different sort—of one he really, really wanted it to be.
Latimer managed a smile. “I think, given the recent turn of events, you’d have a change of heart, darlin’.”
She shook her head. “No. It’s…fine. You are welcome to stay.”
Run and fast.
Staying here could only lead to further complications, and the last thing he could afford in his life was more complications.
And yet, he slowly nodded, and prepared to settle in, knowing he couldn’t help himself from making that very worst, terrible, mistake.
Chapter 10
Despite Lachlan’s husky warnings, following their kiss, from the moment he’d decided to share the room with Livian, he’d been nothing but a gentleman.
When she’d unsteadily changed from her dress to nightshift, he’d stood facing the wall.
And when she’d collected a pillow and extra blankets to help make a bed for him, he’d taken them from Livian, and himself overseen the task.
After he’d finished, he’d lain on the makeshift bed, and kept his back to her and his face to the wall.
That’d been—she squinted at the brooch timepiece Verity bought Livian for her last birthday—an hour and twenty-one minutes ago.
While he lay perfectly still, silent, and slumbering, Livian, for what had to be the thousandth time, turned onto her side and punched her pillow several times.
Releasing a frustrated sigh, Livian flopped onto her back, and stared at the ceiling.
How could he sleep so easily?How, after that embrace. Lachlan’s kiss had been the one she’d always dreamed of knowing, and then resigned herself to also being the stuff of mere romantic books and girlish musings.
In his broad, powerful, arms, she’d felt more alive than she ever had before. He’d moved his strong hands over her with a skill and understanding of a man who knew just how to touch a woman to make her feel like she was all he wanted in the world—a mere illusion of every last hopeful woman like herself who’d enjoyed the pleasure of being in his arms for even just a moment.
His kiss had set her ablaze, and she’d lain here, that fire festering within her.
“If I don’t stop now, darlin’, the only way this ends is with me between your legs, and my cock buried deep inside you.”
Livian stared thoughtfully at the ceiling.
She should have been horrified at his crudity, but instead it had the opposite effect. He hadn’t said the things he had to shock or horrify her. He was just a normal man who spoke plainly. He didn’t put on airs and that forthrightness, his ability to speak plainly—that, when she’d ceased believing there was any man to do so—left her feeling…left her wondering…
“Unable to sleep?”
Livian gasped.
Heart racing, she whipped her head sideways and looked over at the hearth. At some point, Lachlan turned onto his other side. He now lay with his shoulder propped up and his head in his hand, facing Livian.
