Page 46 of Miss Harvey's Horribly Lovable Fiancé
He kissed her. Kissed her. Kissed her once again. Until she had her arms around him and he moved nearer. She pulled him close and circled her thighs around him. Cradled in the vee of her body, he had to find some sanity or he’d take her then and there. He broke away. “I have no mistress. I have had in the past. But not in more than a year.”
She put a palm to his chest to hold him off. “No occasional encounters lately?”
“None.”
And she paused.
“Believe me.” He brushed his lips across her warm ones. “Now I want only regular encounters…with you.”
She rolled her eyes and laughed.
He cupped her nape and kissed her quite thoroughly again. She met him, ardor for passion, her lips crushing his as she moaned her need.
Christ. Who was kissing whom here?
But she broke the spell. So much for no impulsiveness. “Tell me where you go so often? Why are you so mysterious?”
“I work—worked—for the Foreign office. Here. In France. Spain. Vienna. I’ve been everywhere. Discreetly. And now my work is done. I’ve resigned. Louis does not listen to me anyway.”
“Louis?”
“And Richelieu.”
Pride shown in her eyes and she flung her arms around him and drew him down again. This time, she kissed him with all the fervor he desired from her. “Oh, Giles.”
He loved the way she surrendered and called his name. But he had to prove to her that other last fact that would either make her his until the end of time or end their relationship forever.
She unfurled his cravat and with both ends, tugged him closer to kiss him again.
He stilled her hands. “No.”
She worked at the buttons of his waistcoat and frock coat.
“I said no, Esme.”
She paused, sad, the corners of her mouth drooping. “But Giles.”
“Do you think I would allow more of this if you do not love me?”
Her mouth fell open. She was dumbstruck.
“How could we make love here without benefit of vows if you do not love me?”
“But I do.”
“How can you? You left me. Proclaimed for all to see that you do not care for me.”
“But I do. I do! Forgive me. I was rash but I ran because I wanted to save you from your father’s demands and save my own father from despair. But you? I have never loved anyone else.”
That helped but it did not solve the entire problem. “But you don’t believe I love you.”
Her lower lip trembled. “Giles.”
“You said it, did you not?”
“I did.”
He rose to his elbows, his knees, and he left her there. Beautiful woman, she would not learn from him the intimacies that might be the making of them both. But if she did not believe he cared for her, what good would all the techniques of love-making do for her? Or him?
