Page 64 of A Lady of Means
“You don’t want me without a title, is that it?”The words came out harsher than he meant.
Moria grabbed his hands, held them to her heart.Her little fingers were trembling, nails digging in like little cold needles to keep him close.
“Listen to me, you don’t have to go.You don’t have to fight.Sell your commission.Stay.Take up the role that’s yours to take.”
“It’s not that simple.”
Moria was quiet for a moment.“I wish for once it could be.”
“Moria, I-”
She held up a hand, he hated the emotion in her eyes.“You listened to me.I told you my deepest, darkest secret.The darkest hours of my life.You promised yourself to me, but you kept this from me?”
“It was never my secret to tell, it’s always been Peregrine’s.”
“I trusted you, but you didn’t trust me with something that could make our lives so much different.You didn’t tell me because you didn’t want me to talk you out of going.You didn’t trust me to keep your secret.”
“It isn’t that I don’t trust you, but I can see how it would appear that I didn’t.”He shook his head to punctuate the words he said next.“I can’t lose you over this.”
Both of her hands came up to the back of his head.“You and me, we don’t need proposals or rings or formal introductions to define what we have.”
Her small fingers pressed into his nape as her ocean-colored eyes bore into his.
“You found me when I needed you, you kept finding me.You never let me push you away, and I kept holding on.I’ll keep holding on.Keep…” she gripped him tighter, like he might blow away on a breeze, blew some air out of her mouth.“Loving you,” she gritted out.
Tears marched down her cheeks like two steady soldiers.
“Because I know you’ll come back to me.You told me yourself, remember?‘Who could let something like death keep them from a face like yours?’”
His eyes were swimming, drowning in tears, in the sight of the woman he loved, the woman who loved him, in front of him maybe for the last time.He was here, in her rooms.A place he’d have given his soul to be invited into in the past.
With a fluid motion, he reversed their positions, so that she was on her bed, and he was above her.She wrapped her legs around his middle.He kissed the inside of her arm.
“You were supposed to see me off tomorrow,” he trailed kisses down her arm to her shoulder.“This is how I planned to say goodbye.”
Then he was possessing that stupidly perfect mouth of hers, losing himself in a kiss that just kept going.Every flick of her tongue to meet his, every nip, every little whimper, every roll of her hips to meet his bringing him that much closer to ruination.He was done for.
“Please,” she begged.“Devyn, you have to give me this, please.Just be mine, this once.I want you to be mine and I want you to possess me, even if it’s only the once.”
His hands bracketed her cheeks.“You’ve possessed me for longer than you realize, my love.You’ll possess me in body and soul until I’m nothing but dust and bones.”
“I want to possess youright now.”
“I’m afraid I haven’t more to give you than this battle-worn body.I’m not enough for you.”
She wanted it all, matrimony, a future with him.He wanted to give her that.He didn’t want to leave her like this, without something real to cling to.
He also had honor just like she had hers.
He loved his brother.
He loved his men.
He loved her too.
Agony must surely have been written on his face, for she burrowed into him.Her skirts brushed his thighs, her breasts a mere prayer from his face.She started removing her bodice, her sleeves, and cast them on the floor.
His throat constricted, he swallowed the lump in his throat.She removed her garments and let down her hair until she was standing in front of him in only her chemise and unbound hair.
