Page 78 of Falling Into Bed with a Duke
He drew her up, latched his mouth onto hers, welcoming the taste and feel of her. She pushed back slightly.
“Lovingdon.”
“Let him watch.”
“I fear he’ll do more than watch. He’ll claim you compromised me and insist we marry.”
“Would that be so bad?”
She furrowed her brow. “You mentioned marriage last night, but you can’t be serious.”
“I’ve never been more serious.” He pressed his thumb to her lips. “Don’t answer, but think on it.”
“Why would you marry me?”
“Why would I not?”
“You can’t answer a question with a question.”
He snaked his arm around her waist, drew her up against him, and angled his mouth over hers. Why did she have to be so suspicious? Why did she have to question his motives? He cursed every man who had come before him so that his task now was all the more difficult. Then he cursed her brother because hewasprobably watching. Ashe didn’t want to force her into marriage. He wanted to lure her into it. Drawing back, he gazed down into her languid eyes. “There’s fire between us and no reason to think that another night together will extinguish it.”
“For anything long-lasting, there has to be more than the passion.”
“I’ve already told you that I adore you. I admire you. You fascinate me. So perhaps the fault is with me. You find me lacking.”
Turning on his heel, he returned to his equipment to begin packing it up. The duchess did want a family photograph taken, but thank goodness, she wanted it done on another day, when the heir wasn’t so cranky.
“Ashe?”
He glanced back at her.
“I don’t find you lacking,” she said. “I’m simply not accustomed to a man’s desiring me. I had decided to accept my life as a spinster.”
“Decisions can be changed.” He picked up his equipment. “And I’m not one to give up, so get used to that as well. Walk me to the gate?”
With a nod, she fell into step beside him. “When will you show me the photo?”
“Soon.”
“I might not want to see it. When I was eight, my mother had a portrait painted of me. When I saw it, I took a piece of coal and blackened out the face. I have the most unattractive nose.”
“Sometimes, Minerva, we look at things and see what we expect to see rather than what’s really there. But when I look through the camera lens, I see the truth.”
“The truth isn’t always pretty,” she said.
No, it wasn’t. And there were truths about himself that he would never tell her.
Chapter 16
ASHE was standing in the foyer of Ashebury Place when he heard the gentle sneeze and spun around to find Minerva in the open doorway. It had been three days since he’d seen her, since he’d taken the photograph of her in the garden. While the servants were managing most of the move, he needed to oversee some areas. Spending much of his time here did not leave him in the most amicable of moods. But seeing her now, he realized his foolishness in withdrawing. The gladness that swamped him at her presence was a bit disconcerting, was far beyond anything he’d ever before experienced.
“My apologies,” she said. “I was passing by on my way to the milliner when I saw all the activity going on here and recalled that you were moving in. I thought to stop by to see how you were doing with the memories.”
The only memories revolving through his mind at the moment involved her: at the Nightingale, at the club, at the ball. He wanted to jerk her to him, claim her mouth, carry her up the stairs, and claim her body. Instead, he tamped down the beast ravaging through him, and lacquered on a veneer of civilization. “I’m afraid I’m not really set up for visitorsyet.”
“I don’t mean to impose, but I hadn’t seen you at the Dragons. I just wanted to ensure you were all right. I know how difficult all this must be.” Sneezing again, she pressed a lace handkerchief to her nose.
“Sorry, the servants have been uncovering things for days now, disturbing twenty years of dust.”
