Page 189 of The Good Duke
Groaning, Simon snatched her into his arms and clung tight. “Oh, I’m confident I know even more thanyou, Persephone, because it is impossible that you can love me as deeply and madly as I love you.”
She felt a hesitation in Simon and edged back enough that she could see him.
“What is it?” she asked, passing her gaze over his beloved features.
“It is…I-I…” Simon cleared his throat and started again. “I find I’ve not been entirely truthful with you, Seph, and in so doing, you’ve heaped praise upon me that I’m far from deserving of, and—”
“Simon?” she urged.
“I didn’t hit him, per se,” he blurted.
Persephone cocked her head.
Simon glanced about a moment like one considering escape and then, with a sigh, he finally met Persephone’s eyes. “Bute,” he explained.
“Yes, I ascertained that might be who you’re alluding to,” she said dryly.
Simon fiddled with his endearingly crumpled cravat. “I didn’t pulverize him.”
Persephone kept her face deadpan. “Given the lack of bruises and blood, I’d thought as much.”
“Nor did I rip his throat out,” Simon added.
“Simon, what—”
“I kneed him hard between his legs,” he said on a rush. Simon grimaced. “Hard enough that there’s reason to believe the Bute line may end with him.” Fire lit his eyes. “Even as you’re likely disappointed, I cannot regret my actions. He deserved far more than the pain I inflicted.”
Her lips twitched. “Well, I appreciate you didn’t kill him and find yourself off to a penal colony for hard labor.”
He flashed a droll grin.
Suddenly, his gaze grew thoughtful. “I wasn’t deserving of your earlier praise. Iwouldhave dealt him a full thrashing,” Simon said more to himself. “But then I looked down at him writhing on the garden floor, moaning and miserable and making no attempt to fight me. I sensed he wanted me to beat him, so I might inflict a physical pain so great that your words ceased to hurt him.”
Persephone framed Simon’s face between her hands and, leaning up, she took his lips in a gentle kiss.
When they parted, a half-grin brought his lips up. “Dare I take it to mean you’re not disappointed in me after all?”
She scrunched her nose up. “How could I ever be disappointed in you, Simon Broadbent, the keeper of my heart?”
He gave her a sheepish look. “Given my circumspect behavior at various points since you returned to me, I venture there are—”
“Simon, are you determined to flagellate yourself for past transgressions?”
“Uh…”
She stopped him before he answered and touched her nose to his. “Why don’t we agree webothpoorly handled a number of our exchanges and come to some form of truce and bury our recent blunders?”
He stilled.
As she’d anticipated, he’d detected the seductive query she’d less than subtly put to him.
“And how should we seal our truce, love?” he purred.
The silky suggestiveness in his low baritone caused a familiar stirring in her womb.
Her mouth went dry as memories of the things they’d done these past months marched in a naughty parade through her mind.
“I trust you have several ideas, Your Grace.” Persephone made no attempt to hide the sultry hunger in her voice.
