Page 100 of Courting Scandal With The Duke
Amazing and wild and glorious. Completely reckless. She could be expecting his child.
Barbara, carrying his child. The mental picture of her body swelling with his child was extraordinarily wonderful. Something sweetly painful pulled at his heart.
He groaned and threw an arm across his eyes to blot out the sun that had moved so it shone directly in his eyes, as well as to ward off the thoughts buzzing around in his head. They all ended up in one place.
They would have to wed.
‘If you lie out here much longer you will burn,’ he said. He could not let this happen again.
‘I know,’ she murmured softly.
She didn’t move a muscle.
He needed to do something. To make her safe. To protect her from the sun right above them.
He could not move.
He must.
He forced himself up and grabbed one side of the blanket, covering her.
He sank down again.
‘You?’ she said.
‘Shh. I’m fine.’ He relaxed into the darkness.
It could not have been long before he awoke again.
The sunlight and shadows looked more or less the same. His skin was warm. Her breathing had slowed, and her eyelashes formed a shadowed crescent above her cheekbones. He leaned forward and kissed that delicate place, inhaling the lovely scent of a woman well-pleasured.
What would it be like to wake beside this woman every day? To know she would be at his dinner table every night. The thought pleased him more than it should if he were sensible.
Her eyelids fluttered, her lashes tickling his lips like a butterfly kiss.
‘We should go indoors,’ he said. ‘We need to talk.’
One could not have a sensible conversation stark naked as they were. He was likely to get distracted again.
That might be fatal.
No. No sense fooling himself.What he had done meant no going back. After everything he’d promised his uncle, and himself. He’d proved the apple didn’t fall far from the tree.
He had always thought badly of his father for letting his lust control his decisions, but perhaps it wasn’t only lust—there were other emotions, gentler, warmer feelings stirring deep within him, feelings that seemed to soften his resolve and make him want more than a suitable match. If he wasn’t a duke and all that entailed…
What on earth was he thinking?
Great-Uncle Thomas would have been so disappointed in him.
Hell, he was disappointed in himself.
But, while he might have lost control, he still had his honour. He wasn’t going to let her take that from him.
He helped her dress then pulled his shirt over his head and put on his breeches and shoes.
She watched him in silence as if she sensed something of his mood.
He went down on one knee to help her on with her sandals while she used his shoulder for balance.
