Page 88 of Seven Nights with the Wicked Duke
Together, they remained in silence for some time. Her head rested on his chest, listening to the steady beat of his heart. In the silence, every memory of them swam her mind. Sure, they have known each other for a long time but the one that felt so real had been the nights after the party.
She traced slow, absentminded circles on his skin, marveling at how natural it felt to be beside him like this. As if all the longing, all the denial, had led to this inevitable quiet.
"I used to think…" Cecilia began softly, her voice half-swallowed by the hush in the room, "that I would always belong tosomeone. My brother. A husband I hadn't chosen. Society. But I never imagined what it would feel like to belongwithsomeone."
Theo's arm tightened around her, his breath catching as he exhaled into her hair.
"You do belong with someone," he said, and she felt the brush of his lips at her temple. "You belong with me."
She tilted her chin up, their noses nearly touching, and the weight of what had passed between them filled the space with warmth.
"You said that so simply," she whispered. "As if it was the easiest truth in the world."
"It is. I've spent so long convincing myself that I didn't deserve this. That I wasn't made for it. But tonight, you undid every lie I told myself."
She looked at him, truly looked. The golden light from the fire kissed the sharp lines of his face, softened him, made him something close to vulnerable. "Do you still think you don't deserve to be loved?"
"I think," he said, carefully choosing the words, "that I spent years trying not to want it. But with you, it never felt like a want. It felt like breathing. I never stood a chance."
Her throat tightened. "Good. Because I was always going to love you. Even when I hated you for rejecting me. Even when I told myself I should marry the viscount and forget."
Theo groaned dramatically and buried his face in her shoulder. "Not that stickhead."
She giggled, running her fingers through his hair. "Yes, well, you can thank your scandalous mouth and ridiculous charm for ruining me. I'll never be able to look at another man the same."
He lifted his head. "And I'll never paint another woman."
That made her blink. "Truly?"
"I used to think it was my way of capturing beauty," he said, brushing his fingers along her arm. "But now I realize I was always searching for something I hadn't yet seen. Something that made sense of everything I felt and feared. Then you came crashing into my studio in your wild rebellion and impossible dreams—and there it was."
"The gown," she said softly, remembering the portrait. "You painted me wearing that gown from the solstice ball."
He nodded. "Because that was the moment I knew. The first moment I knew I wouldn't survive you."
She felt the words in her chest like an arrow. It was sharp, piercing, permanent. She leaned forward and kissed him so softly.
When they broke apart, her fingers brushed across the curve of his shoulder, lingering on a jagged scar there.
"Tell me about this one?" she asked, curiosity soft.
He hesitated. "France. A duel. Foolish reasons, really."
"Were you defending someone's honor?" she asked.
"No," he said. "I was defending my own. I hadn't yet learned it wasn't worth the blood."
She kissed the scar gently. "What is worth the blood, Theo?"
"You," he said, without hesitation.
And suddenly she was blinking rapidly, tears threatening again, not from sadness, but from the sheer intensity of everything he gave her. No man had ever made her feel anything close to this.
"You say the most dangerous things," she murmured.
"I mean every word."
They fell into silence again, their bodies wrapped up, exposed and divinely. She could stay like that for hours. She didn't mind breathing in his space for hours. Then, she shifted even closer, crawling on top of him slowly with her hands resting on his chest.
