Page 97 of From Rakes to Riches

“What about Lady Margaret?”

Her question surprised him. “She will learn to live with the pain of her loss. She has other family to ease that burden and her upcoming marriage to look forward to.” He wasn’t sure what Lola was seeking. Reassurance, perhaps?

“We all just go on, don’t we?” She said with a wry twist of her lips. “Some of us together, and others alone.”

“Lola, I would like us?—”

“I miss my family.” She stared out the window, the raindrops racing down the glass like a cascade of tears. “I don’t think I will ever see them again.”

The chance to understand her better overrode what he’d intended to say. His suggestion would keep. “Why don’t you return to Ipswich? It isn’t very far.”

“No, it isn’t.” She shook her head slowly. “But it may as well be.”

He didn’t know how to reply to that and instead reached across the width of the carriage and wove his fingers with hers, keeping them connected. At least for the time being.

Lola watchedthe blur of scenery through the carriage window and blinked back the onset of tears. She wasn’t usually maudlin or sentimental about her past, but kissing Theodore so intimately had stirred up all kinds of emotion and the sudden angst threatened to overwhelm her.

Her fingers remained laced with his. Her lips still stung from their passionate embrace. She could easily slip back into his arms and continue what they’d started. But there was the rub, wasn’t it? He was an earl. He had no use for a Vauxhall worker other than a little slap and tickle. She knew the way of the aristocracy and the inevitable pain promised at the end of that kind of relationship wasn’t worth the risk and heartache.

Drawing a cleansing breath, she beat back this rush of inconvenient truths and conjured the comforting image of her family. Were her parents well and happy? Her sister would be old enough now for a come-out in London. Hopefully Lola’s choices hadn’t stained her sister’s reputation. At the time, there had been no other way to resolve the problem and Lola had taken the matter into her own hands. If her sacrifice saved the family’s honor, then so be it. She would make the same decision again in a heartbeat.

The carriage wheels hit a rut in the road and the interior shook from the impact. Theodore tightened his hold on her hand, but he didn’t speak. For a man who always had questions, she appreciated him knowing when not to ask them.

Instead, she memorized how he looked in this moment, his shirt still dampened from the rain, his expression a mixture of patience and curiosity. The tightness in her chest eased. He was pleasing to the eye in more ways than she could count.

“Tell me about your family,” he said, noticing her attention.

A command, not a question this time. Interesting that the one topic she was most reluctant to discuss was the one he’d chosen. But then, she was to blame. She’d admitted to missing them.

“I have a sister. She is two years younger than me.”

“And does she excel at the tightrope?” He asked, a hint of humor in his voice.

“Anna excels at watercolors. She also sings quite prettily.”

“Anna,” he said thoughtfully. “Lola and Anna. What is your last name?”

Aah, now she had to tread carefully, it would be so easy to misstep.

“York,” she answered, acutely aware of how his thumb brushed over her palm in the gentlest of touches. Her entirebody responded even though each stroke was featherlight and fleeting.

“Lola York,” he said in a charming murmur, disarming her with his handsomeness. “How old are you, Lola York?”

“I don’t believe it’s polite to ask a woman her age. One would think with your lofty title, you would know the rules of etiquette,” she replied in her usual tart tone.

“Indeed.” He didn’t say more, but instead tugged her forward, their fingers still locked as he settled his mouth over hers.

There was something incredibly intimate about this kiss. The first had been hungry, seeking, wildly assertive, as their lips and tongues tasted and explored in a race to learn each other and satisfy an irrepressible need.

But not this kiss.

This kiss was entirely different. It was unhurried and languid, as subtle as the raindrops that slid down the steamed window glass, yet potent for the spell it cast. This time, they savored and seduced, unconcerned with anything other than the desire to make the moment last, as if time held no significance. Their kiss was exquisitely tender and at the same time fraught with emotion, and in that way, it frightened her with the power it possessed.

Releasing his hold on her, he cradled her face, slanting his mouth at the perfect angle to capture her lips in another long, lingering caress but she pulled away. She opened her eyes noticing his were heavy lidded. Their breathing had become the loudest noise inside the carriage or perhaps it was the pounding of her heart. She couldn’t be sure. Her hands trembled and she gripped the edge of the bench so he wouldn’t see.

“I should go home now.” The quiver of emotion in her voice solidified her decision.

“I’ll take you anywhere you want to go.”

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