Page 88 of Bound By the Duke
Then, she darted away, laughter trailing behind her.
The earlier silence returned, thick and charged.
CHAPTER 27
Her brown eyes were fixed on the imposing figure still standing a few feet away.
Seeing the look in his eyes, she knew what he would have done if the child hadn’t been there. Something devastating and titillating at once.
But, before her thoughts could wander any further, he broke the silence.
“She adores you,” he mumbled.
She looked up at him, having not expected him to say that, especially with the kind of softness that stripped him bare. For a fleeting moment, she felt as though she were staring into the very heart of him.
“She only… She only wants to be seen. And loved,” she responded, her voice trembling slightly before steadying withquiet insistence. “When she draws, praise her, even if the sketch is nothing but crooked lines. When she waters the flowers, tell her she has done well, even if she soaks her dress in the process. When she cleans her room or pricks her fingers trying to embroider…” Her eyes softened, molten brown locking on piercing blue. “She is trying so hard to make you proud. She deserves to know that she already does.”
The words struck him harder than he had expected. He had thought himself unreadable, like a stone fortress. But at that moment, he could not hide his passion. And that broke through his walls and reached something raw inside him.
Percival knew that he should look away. In fact, he should turn around and say something cutting. End it the way he always did before it unraveled him.
Instead, he smiled. Not the faint, polite twitch he showed society, but a genuine, unguarded smile.
When Aurelia saw the corner of his mouth lift and his gaze soften, her heart fluttered, and heat bloomed low in her belly.
“You should smile more,” she blurted before she could stop herself. “Do you know that you have the loveliest dimples? They only appear when you stop trying to hide your real self.” Her words faded into a whisper.
Something flickered in his eyes, something dangerous. Then again, he moved toward her, slowly and deliberately. He onlystopped when the space between them had shrunk, such that she could feel his warmth.
“Dimples?” he teased huskily.
However, the storm underneath was evident. Evident with every sweep of his eyes that felt like a caress, stripping her layer by layer without a single touch.
“I doubt they are half as lovely as the dress you’re wearing,” he murmured, his voice lowering further.
Aurelia shivered at the unexpected compliment. She swallowed, unable to decide whether to step back or sink into him.
But then he made matters worse by leaning closer.
She blinked. He was certainly acting differently. Bold and dangerous. In a way that made her nervous with excitement.
“Or half as tempting—” His voice dropped to a heated whisper. “—as the way you look right now.”
The words rushed like molten fire through veins, fierce and intoxicating. She tried to speak, tried to laugh it off, remind herself that she was a duchess, not a trembling debutante.
But no sound came out. Her lips parted in silent surrender, her body betraying her with desperate breaths.
And he drank in every part of her reaction. The wild blush on her cheeks, the subtle flutter at her throat, and the hot need in her brown eyes that she tried so hard to conceal.
Aurelia wasn’t sure if she could survive his stare. Every inch of him, from his broad shoulders to his strong legs, was temptation itself.
She was rooted to the spot, unable to flee, unable to speak, trembling. Though her lips parted to speak, the words remained stuck in her throat.
“Duke…” she breathed.
She tried to suck in a breath, tried to collect herself, but it was useless.
Still, she managed in a voice no louder than a whisper, “You…” Her gaze dropped for the briefest second before rising to his. “You should not say such things.”
