Page 33 of Meet A Rogue At Midnight
“Sex should be longer. A thing enjoyed for a night,” he explained.
A man dressing was just as intimate as the undressing. With the mullioned window at his back, light outlined broad shoulders and made the gold glint on his ear. Black velvet strained to cover him, the fabric denting where his shoulder curved in to meet his bicep. Jonas had always been strong. He’d been her protector in their youth. When other village boys didn’t want her along, Jonas had defended her. When raiding local orchards, Jonas would toss the choicest fruit to her with a wink. When he labored in the Captain’s shop and she’d happen to stop by, he’d give her a moment and the promise of a ramble once the work was done.
She loved the smell of sawdust and wood, of ripe plums and Jonas.
Was it wise to tell a man she loved him the same night she’d confessed to being promised to another?
She covered her mouth and watched his beautiful hands button his waistcoat. He colored her childhood with fond memories. How much better and richer a future with him would be.
“We must do this again outside in the sun at the height of summer,” she said wistfully.
Fingers slowing, his blue gaze stabbed her heart. Summer was out of the question. He wouldn’t be here.
“Don’t say it.” She buried her nose into the sheets. “I forgot.”
Talk of lying naked with him meant a future together. Jonas wouldn’t be here past Twelfth Night. Her mouth filled with a plea for him to stay longer, but that would make her a grasping woman, especially since she was betrothed to another. She pulled the ends of her waistcoat together, tears pricking her eyes. Oh, this was lowering. Elspeth was quick to cry.Not her!Why, then, was this her second spate of weepiness in the same night?
Is this what happened when a woman yearned for a man? Wanting him turned her into a blubbering coil of emotions?
She would have none of it. Wiping her face, she’d not let him see these tears. They belonged to her alone. Nudging herself up, the sheets rustled a last invitation to stay put. Jonas didn’t feel the same pull. Fully dressed, he plucked her coat off the floor and tossed it over his shoulder.
“Come. The first order of business is to see you home.”
Chin to chest, she rose, stretching her shirt hem over her naked thighs. There had to be a better way for sex to end. Wasn’t it more romantic than this? She was half-dressed but fully bared to him, as good as admitting this was more than a lustful tumble. Accepting her coat, she couldn’t meet his gaze.
Jonas walked to the table for his coat and hat. “It’s late.”
She began putting herself together. Shirt hastily tucked in her breeches, she fixed her waistcoat. Her fingers fumbled on the straight line of buttons and button holes. The garment gapped where she’d missed two buttons.
“It’ll have to do,” she mumbled to herself.
The floorboards creaked with Jonas’s approach. Head down to close her placket, bronze velvet swung into view. Jonas’s deep voice broke the awkward silence.
“I could’ve made the night better had I known.”
Eyeing him from under her lashes, she sealed two top buttons and left the rest undone. “If I told you I was a virgin, you wouldn’t have touched me.”
Mouth set, he handed over her cloak. “Probably not.”
“What is it with us?” She swirled the cloak around her shoulders and raised her hood. “We’re so close, yet out of reach.”
His jaw muscles worked. The subtle twitch telling her he mulled this problem, too. She waited for him to say something, to share an ounce of feeling, but the truth was he showed more reaction when he was inside her than fully clothed. Jonas stood stalwart as ever, a man of few words and closely held emotions.
This should have been a momentous night. She’d given herself to the one man she truly wanted—her dearest childhood friend. Yet, the past bond wasn’t enough to bridge a future together.
She sped for the stairs. Footfalls hit the floors after her. She raced down the winding staircase out to the cold. Cold midnight air burned her lungs. The back of Halsey Manor in view, she marched through the back garden aware of the male specter behind her.
“Livvy. Wait.”
“You don’t have to see me home. As you can see, it’s right here.”
She didn’t regret her waspish tongue. Even the best of men needed a good set down. And for all the hurt, Jonas was still a rare man. Tonight knocked him off the pedestal. Or did she see him more clearly now? That was the rub with memories. They framed a man with the veneer of perfection. A grown woman couldn’t be fanciful when considering the future—even the best of heroes had feet of clay.
And imperfect heroes persisted. At least Jonas did. His long legs cut through the snow alongside her as she rounded the manor. He didn’t give up. Jonas trod the wide steps up to her front door at her side.
“There’s more I want to say but not like this. Not in these circumstances.”
She pulled her cloak tightly about. This was promising. Perhaps she’d been rash? A single candle lantern lit the front door, one of the minor economies of late. Her family wasn’t down in the heel, nor were they as flush in the coffers as in the past. The lone candle served as a reminder she had obligations to the people she loved. They counted on her, and she counted on Jonas.
