Page 89 of A Duke Changes Everything
“I need to speak to him.”
“Yes.” Nick spoke the single word from the threshold. “We need to talk. Alone.”
Mina had no notion how long Nick had been standing in the doorway. She only knew that the sound of his voice sent shivers across her skin. Her body responded to him differently now, as if some part of her was more alive when he was near.
“Would you excuse us, Mr. Fairchild? Downstairs, you’ll find a ticket purchased for your return to Sussex. There’s a hansom waiting out front to deliver you to the station.” The entire time Nick spoke to Colin, he kept his gaze fixed on Mina.
She didn’t miss how his eyes kept flickering down to her mouth. Each spot where his gaze lit, she felt a gentle pressure, like the brush of his lips against her skin.
“I am not leaving this room without Mina.” Colin stepped too close to Nick, a brawl-sparking distance. But Nick didn’t spare him a glance. He kept his gaze on Mina.
“You are, Colin. Please go home,” she urged. “I promise to come back by nightfall.” She lifted an eyebrow at Nick in question.
He nodded. “Mina and I will return this afternoon.”
“Then it’s settled?” Colin sounded breathless and utterly relieved. “Lord Huntley convinced you?”
Before Nick could answer, Mina approached her cousin.
“Colin, come and call at Enderley tomorrow. We’ll speak then.” She kissed him on the cheek and stepped away. She was done with his attempt tosaveher from her own resolve.
Finally, Colin relented. When he’d gone, Nick closed the door and waited.
She could read nothing in his expression but desire, and it set off sparks inside her. Suddenly, she wished she hadn’t donned so many clothes.
The moment she started toward him, he began to speak.
“We have much to discuss.”
Mina kept on until her chest was pressed against his. He tipped his head down to hold her gaze.
“I’d prefer that you kiss me.” She followed the edge of his mouth with her finger. His lips were full and flushed and bee-stung from the countless kisses they’d exchanged in the dark.
Taking her finger between his lips, he suckled her fingertip before releasing it. Then he cupped her face in his hands and lowered his mouth to hers. She thought the kiss might be perfunctory, but the moment their lips met, she knew they could never be that way with each other again.
She loved that the taste of him was familiar now, that she knew how to kiss him to make a moan emerge from deep in the back of his throat.
When they were breathless, he turned with her, bracing her against the door, the hard length of him nudging the spot where she wanted him most.
“You don’t have to do it,” she said between kisses.
He bit gently at her neck. “At this point, I’m not sure if I can stop.” He laved the skin he’d bitten with his tongue and began dragging her skirt up.
“I meant marriage.”
His breathing was ragged, and he didn’t stop touching her, at least. But he tensed, his shoulder muscles hard as stone under her fingers.
“I know that Lord Huntley spoke to you.”
He lifted his head, but he wouldn’t look at her. He fixed his gaze on the panel of door next to her head. “You’d say no if I asked?”
“No. Yes. I don’t know. You haven’t asked.”
Nick’s insides went from raging need to icy misery in a heartbeat.
All the way back to his chamber, he’d rehearsed ways to broach the topic. Ways to ask Mina to be his wife. He’d done battle with himself. She deserved a far better man than him. But he was enough of a selfish bastard that he could never imagine letting her go.
He didn’t live a life suited to matrimony. His days and nights were consumed by Lyon’s, and he’d never shared a bed with anyone in his life, aside from the extraordinary peace he’d found beside Mina for a few hours on this too short night.
