Page 29 of Avoiding the Merry Viscount
Suddenly, the hairs on the back of his neck stood up, and he had a nagging feeling like someone was watching them. He glanced around and didn’t see anyone. Nor did he notice anything suspicious. Narrowing his eyes, he scanned the area once more.
Looking back at Lydia, he shook off the concern. The innocentway she licked her bottom lip shifted his thoughts to the previous evening when he’d made her breathless from his hand.
He wasn’t certain he wished to know the answer to his next question, but he had to ask. “Did you ask what you did of me in the library because you thought me to be a rake who had fortuitously appeared to you, or for some other reason?”
She gulped and searched his face as if she were looking for something. “I…well, if someone else had been the one to enter the library, I wouldn’t have asked the same of them. If that is what you are asking.”
His heart beat so hard in his chest, he thought she might hear it. “That’s part of it. But did you proposition me because you believed me to be a rake who would give you what you wanted, or because you wanted me?”
Lydia shook her head. “Please don’t make me answer that.”
He glanced around them, and then pulled them into an alley where they had a better chance of going unseen. Turning her to face him again, he lightly clasped her shoulders. “I need to know.”
“I did believe you to be a rake,” she started, shifting on her feet. “But that wasn’t why,” she whispered, looking up at him through her lashes, her eyes pleading with him to understand her meaning. Her cheeks turned a deep crimson, and she was irresistible.
The sight knocked the wind from his body. He drew a deep breath and then stepped forward, pressing her back against the brick wall as he lowered his lips to hers. She opened for him immediately, and their tongues collided.
Elias warred with his body as his hands found her hips and pulled the bottom half of her against him. She gripped his hair and held his mouth against hers as she took more control over the kiss. The bulge of his cock throbbed against her, aching for even the lightest of touch.
Remembering where they were, and that she was still an innocent—albeit not entirely so—he forced himself to break the kiss. He was supposed to be leaving his rakish behavior behind.
“We risk being seen,” he whispered.
She nodded, her lips pink and swollen. He wanted to press her back against the wall and kiss her again, but the last remaining bit of his good sense urged him to do otherwise. His thoughts weren’t completely reformed, as he could imagine turning her around to face the coarse brick, lifting her skirts, and making quick work of pleasing them both. The fleeting daydream did nothing to settle his cock.
Poking his head out, he made sure no one was looking and then pulled her back onto the street. They began walking again, her hand gripping his arm.
The electricity from her touch continued to do things to him, and it became far too difficult for him to ignore or brush off as nothing.
Before he could ponder further, his body tensed again as if he felt eyes on them. He turned and noticed Lady Billings exiting a shop on the other side of the street, then heading in the opposite direction from where he and Lydia faced.
He didn’t believe Lady Billings saw what he and Lydia had done, especially if she was inside the shop, but could she have been watching them earlier when they were on the street? Elias shook off the concern, determining it was nothing, and that he was just being overly cautious. Instead, he refocused all of his attention on Lydia, and the fear that she was becoming far too important to him.
Elias wondered if what he felt had been what his father tried to describe. He did his best to shake that off too. Everything he believed he knew was changing far too fast, and he wasn’t certain he was ready to accept it. But the thought of Lydia leaving him at the end of the house party wasn’t something he was ready for, either. And that notion terrified him most of all.
Chapter Ten
Lydia
Lydia woke upthe morning of Christmas Eve still tense with need after she and Elias kissed in the alley the day before. She was starting to admit to herself that it wasn’t just for his handsome appearance, although there wasn’t a more handsome man alive in her opinion. He differed from what she thought he would be. He had proven himself to be protective and considerate, even caring.
When he expressed his desire to change from his rakish reputation, she had allowed herself to hope. Hope for what? She wasn’t certain. He made her feel things that no other man had, and it was just as thrilling as it was frightening.
The previous evening, when everyone played various games in the drawing room, she lost her ability to think every time his sandalwood scent invaded her senses. She had every urge to pull him from the room and beg him to do much more than what they shared previously.
Based on his reaction to her and the heat in his expression when he caught her gaze, she believed he had similar urges, but to his dratted credit, he remained the picture of a gentleman. She supposed she was the wicked one, desiring to corrupt the man who longed to abandon his rakish lifestyle. Although, he didn’t need to reform himself completely, did he?
After Tilly helped Lydia dress for the day, she joined the rest of theguests for breakfast, deciding she didn’t wish to wait for her parents. Once she had made her selections at the sideboard, she took one of the open seats across from Elias’s sisters, as she had for the last few mornings. She found she adored the sisters very much, even their arguing and banter. As an only child, she would have enjoyed having sisters to grow up with.
Not long after Lydia sat down, Hannah took the seat on Lydia’s right. The seat on her left remained open, and she could admit that she hoped Elias would be the one to sit there.
“Are we decorating today?” Hannah asked, her attention focused on Diana.
“Indeed. I planned to send everyone out to collect the greenery and the yule log after we break our fast,” Diana replied, then took a bite of her toast.
Lydia recalled the last time she had traipsed through the woods with Elias. She might have to encourage him to take her to that very spot. They would need to gather mistletoe for the kissing balls anyway, and fortunately, she and Elias knew exactly where to find some.
She licked her lips at the memory, and then her body tingled from awareness. The chair beside her moved, and she knew it was him before he sat down, almost as if she had conjured him from her thoughts.
