Page 66 of The Dove
“Dear God,” he said drily. “It has finally happened, hasn’t it? You’ve gone mad.”
She giggled and kissed the tip of his nose, using both hands to cup his face. “Tell me you love me.”
He flinched as if she’d struck him, his entire body tensing in reaction to her words. His voice came out gruff when he finally found the words to answer her.
“What?”
Sighing, she stroked his face, her fingers tickling the stubble that seemed to have grown on his jaw since just after he’d shaved this morning.
“Tell me you love me,” she whispered, her eyes wide and sincere, and bluer than he’d ever seen them against the backdrop of the cloudy sky. “Please. I know you do, but I … I need to hear you say it. I need to hear what we both know to be true.”
He shook his head, the words lodging in his throat and remaining there. He could not give her that … it was one line he hadn’t been willing to cross, even when setting her free. Because he’d known that once he declared it, it would be real … and once it had become real, he would never have been able to let her go.
“Damn you, little dove,” he rasped, warring with the part of him that needed to let her go and the parts of him that refused now that she was back in his arms. “You stupid little thing. You do not want this … my love isn’t the kind that nurtures or soothes. It’s the kind that hurts. The kind that destroys things. It’s the kind that consumes you until there’s nothing left.”
She sank into him, pressing her lips to his with a sigh, sending a shudder through his entire being.
“Then consume me,” she whispered against his mouth. “Take all of me, Adam. I give it freely … because if you tell me you love me, then that makes you mine. It will be an even exchange.”
They were kissing again, and he couldn’t stop drowning in her, tasting her, staking his claim with his lips and tongue and teeth.
“Goddamn you,” he growled into her mouth. “I was trying to do the honorable thing for once … I let you go … I walked away.”
“And I’ve come after you,” she insisted. “Now put us both out of our misery, Adam, and just say it. Say it, and I am yours always. Tell me you love me.”
The last bit of his resistance melted away, and before he could think better of it, he’d turned and begun walking toward his coach with her still in his arms. He tightened his hold when she moved, not willing to give her a chance to escape now that she’d put herself back in his clutches. Yet, she merely adjusted her grasp and clung to him, seeming disinclined to put up any fight.
“I love you, damn it,” he grumbled. “I fucking love you! Are you happy, little dove? Now you’ll never be rid of me.”
She laughed, kissing his neck, which only made his cock swell. The organ had taken on a life of its own, trying to push its way through the layers of their clothes to get to her. It wouldn’t wait much longer to have its satisfaction, and after six long weeks, he did not intend to force it to. He had tried walking in Covent Garden, perusing the offerings of the various whores, hoping one of them would prove enough to tempt him, to help him exorcise this madness in his blood. He’d returned to his inn disappointed, unable to follow through when no woman could give him what he needed like his little dove.
“I most certainly hope not,” she said, biting his ear.
“Control yourself,” he snapped, needing to keep himself in control until they were ensconced in the privacy of the carriage. “There will be time enough for me to punish you for doing this to me.”
“I hope you do not intend to hold back,” she teased.
Damn her, he was going to use that saucy little mouth. He’d missed it, missed her.
They reached the carriage, and he set her on her feet, gesturing through the door he’d left hanging open. “Get in. We are going home, and God help you once I get you there. You are never setting foot outside Dunnottar again.”
Bracing one foot on the carriage steps, she grinned at him. “Promise?”
He bared his teeth at her and growled, and she leapt up into the carriage with another laugh at his expense. She’d forgotten what it meant to fear him, but that was a problem easily mended.
Just before he stepped up into the carriage behind her, the figure of a man appeared at his side, having come from the waiting barouche. It was Robert Stanley, Daphne’s would-be fiancé, and the person he blamed for all of this.
“You,” he grumbled with a snort. “I entrusted you with taking care of her. You were supposed to marry her.”
The ever-amiable Robert simply laughed, shrugging one shoulder. “I did try, Hartmoor, but you know Daphne. She understands her own mind and cannot be convinced otherwise once she’s decided on something. Guess you will have to see to the business of marriage yourself.”
He grunted, but offered the man a hand, grateful that if Daphne were going to come after him like some fool that she’d at least had protection instead of coming alone. Robert might be a weakling, but he was honorable, and Adam supposed he could admire that.
“I suppose,” he relented as the other man shook his head.
Releasing his hand, Robert began backing away toward his own vehicle. “Don’t you have to pass through Gretna Green on your way to Kincardineshire? Just something to consider, Hartmoor.”
And with that, he was gone, disappearing down the dirt lane with his greatcoat flapping in the wind like some novel hero. A hero who had just delivered the fair maiden into the hands of the villain.
