Page 108 of A Duke Changes Everything
Mina woke with sunlight warming her face, and Nick’s long, hard body warming her everywhere else. She moaned and pressed closer, her back to his chest, his arm wrapped protectively around her.
Then realization crashed in.
She was in an Enderley guest chamber. In Nick’s bed. Emma would be up soon to light the fire and bring a breakfast tray.
Nick was still asleep. The gentle rumble of his breath warmed the back of her neck. She lifted his arm and slid as slowly as she could out from beneath his hold.
“Where are you going?”
“The sun’s come up. Emma will be here soon.”
Nick touched her, dragging his fingers across her skin. Just firmly enough to make heat shimmer down her back and pool between her thighs. “You’re still worrying too much about what others think.”
“It’s more a matter of what they’ll feel. Emma will be scandalized if she finds us like this.”
“Well, we wouldn’t want that.” He removed his hand and shifted on the bed.
Mina looked back to find he’d sat up, letting the sheet fall low on his stomach, his hands folded behind his head. Even with the bandages on his arm and face, he looked like a very self-satisfied demigod. Black hair tumbled in tossed curls and tangled waves, almost to his shoulders. The sun lit up his eyes and gilded the chiseled muscles of his chest and arms.
“At least kiss me before you go,” he said, reaching out one hand to cover hers.
He was the moon and she was the waves. His magnetic pull was irresistible, but she forced herself to resist offering more than the briefest brush of her mouth against his. “If I kiss you again, I won’t want to go.”
He leaned in and captured her lips again. “That is rather the idea.”
Mina got out of bed, scooped her clothes from the floor, and felt Nick’s gaze watching her every move as she dressed.
He surprised her by rising from bed too and bending for a fresh pair of trousers from the trunk he’d brought from London.
Mina gulped at the sight of him. He was sculpted on a different scale from other men, not just his height, but the thickness of his arms, his thighs, his everything.
“You sure you want to go?” He shot her a mischievous grin over his shoulder as he pulled on a shirt.
“Sometimeswantandmustare worlds apart.”
“Indeed.” He came close and refastened the top three buttons on her blouse that she’d misaligned in her haste. “There’s some business I must attend to as well before we head back to London.”
Mina reached for the buttons of his open shirt, making sure to fasten them correctly. “Please tell me you’re not going to confront the Lyles again.”
“God, no. Though I can see the sense in mending relations with some of the families in the village.”
“Can you?” Mina was quite prepared to leave Enderley and only come back rarely. Late into the night, she and Nick had talked of the future they wanted. He’d agreed that any Enderley staff who wished to could be employed in their future London household, or stay behind and maintain the property for when they were in residence. Nick no longer spoke of emptying or renting the estate out.
“I know this house means a great deal to you.”
It had. Always. But it was just a house. Nick was her heart. She could live without Enderley, but she couldn’t live without him.
“If we refurbish, rebuild parts, knock down a few walls.” He gazed around the guest chamber as if he could see through the wallpaper to the bones of the castle. “Maybe we can chase the ghosts away and make something of our own.”
“We needn’t decide today.” Mina slid her hand up to his face, traced the hard stubbled edge of his jaw. “After all, we have a wedding to plan.”
“Lavish.”
“Modest.”
“I’m thinking Westminster Abbey.”
Mina choked on a bubble of laughter. “I’m thinking the village church at Barrowmere with Vicar Pribble officiating.” She lifted onto her toes, leaned into him, and kissed his chin. “You did say I could have anything I want.”
