Page 37 of Daisy and the Duke
“But not me?”
She paused, reconsidering his words. “Wait, didyousend me a letter?”
“More than one,” he said, his brow lifting in surprise. “Are you saying you didn’t receive any of them?”
“No.” Daisy frowned. “My stepmother must be behind it.”
“Does she hate me that much?” Tristan stopped walking, having reached a little clearing where Stormer waited patiently, just as Tristan had waited patiently for Daisy at the roadside.
“She doesn’t hate you at all, your grace. She can’t wait for the day that Bella will be your duchess.”
“Bella?” he echoed, his jaw going slack. “She thinks I fancy Bella?”
“Well, you do send for her to come to Lyondale every day, your grace.”
“So she can read out loud to Jack!” Tristan ran his hand through his hair. “Which is exactly what I told you, in the letters you never received…”
Daisy had a sudden, uncomfortable realization. “I hope you didn’t write anything in those letters that would be, um, awkward.”
“Such as how much I want to see you?” Tristan asked, his gaze turning intense. “Such as how many times I wished I could take back what I did at the pond? Such as how I wish that this…nonsense about titles and income could be burned to the foundation?”
“That would be awkward, yes,” Daisy murmured. “A duke ought to hold up traditions.”
“Hang traditions.”
He moved closer. “Daisy, I know I shouldn’t keep you here, but—”
She dropped the flowers to put her arms around him, feeling as bold as she ever had in her life. “You’re not keeping me here. Ichooseto stay here.”
Without waiting another moment, he kissed her.
“Tristan,” she breathed, then pressed her lips against his neck, relishing the slight scrape of stubble against her skin. She inhaled deeply, smelling soap and sweat and the leather of the saddle and the scent of the outdoor air. Daisy reveled in the sensation his lips provoked, and she let her eyes drift closed, hoping to enjoy this moment of delicious freedom to the full.
She opened her mouth, and the move elicited a low sound from him, something both very satisfied and very primal. Tristan held her closer, his mouth exploring places on her body that no one had ever touched before. He pulled aside the edge of her neckline with his teeth, and Daisy gasped both at the rawness of the move, and the fact that it sent heat shooting up and down her limbs.
Then Tristan pulled away, murmuring, “Wait here. Half a minute.”
He looked very unhappy to leave her arms, but he did so. He walked over to Stormer in three big strides, and raided the saddlebag for a rolled-up blanket. Returning, he spread it on the ground. Then he shrugged out of his jacket, so that he had only his white shirt, which was voluminous but made of thin cotton. Stepping up to him, Daisy ran her hands over his arms.
“Stay with me a little while,” Tristan whispered. “I can’t tell you how badly I’ve wanted to be with you, really with you alone…”
Daisy kissed him, silencing his words. Whatever he was asking, she’d already committed to being here with him as long as she dared.
A breathless moment later, he was laying her down on the blanket, stretching out alongside, pressing himself to her. Daisy loved it, and wiggled closer to him, burying her head into his chest and shoulder. The books she’d read in secret had failed to mention how just being next to a person could inspire rapture.
“I wish we could stay here forever. To not have to go back home, to work and all the judgment…”
“…all the eyes staring at you. I know how it is.” Tristan brushed a few strands of hair away from her face, his touch light but electrifying.
“But everyone admires you!” she said. “They envy you.”
“They envy the position I hold,” he said. “Not me. I could die tomorrow and they’d just summon the next heir.”
“Don’t say that,” Daisy said, putting her hands on his face. She pulled him in for another soft kiss.
The kiss stretched out into many. Daisy sighed with pleasure when Tristan proceeded to kiss his way down her neck and chest. He tugged lightly at the edge of her dress, using his fingers this time. “Can you loosen this somehow?” he asked, the frustration evident.
“There are buttons at the back. I can’t reach them.”
