Page 110 of The English Duke
He was suddenly kissing her again, just like in her dream. She wrapped her arms around his shoulders, knowing it was the worst thing she could have done.
In only a few hours he was going to marry her sister.
He kissed her mouth and then trailed a path across her cheek to her ear and then down to her throat, murmuring words that made her heart swell.
“It could never have been anyone but you,” he said.
Just a moment. Only a moment and then she would leave. She would go with only the gift of his words to hold for the rest of her life.
She reached out both hands, framed his face, and kissed him back.
For a moment she couldn’t hear anything but the rush of the blood in her ears, the pounding of her heart as he kissed her. Just like before, time seemed to slow and stop. Only the two of them existed in the entire universe. They were the only ones who mattered, who breathed and lived and touched.
Her arms wound around to his back, his dropped to her hip.
He was her lover. Perhaps her only lover. The only man who’d ever touched her naked skin. The only one to know the shape of her breasts, her limbs. He’d taken her virginity and given her something precious in return, a taste of pleasure and bliss. A knowledge of fulfillment she’d hold dear for the rest of her days.
Oh, how hard it was to leave him. She never wanted to move, wanted to go on kissing him for as long as she drew breath.
She should slide off the mattress and leave the Queen’s Rooms as quickly as possible. With any luck, no one would know she’d been here.
This instant. She was going to leave any second. But if he could just kiss her once more beneath her jaw, or perhaps in front of her ear. On her lips, please. A deep kiss that explored her mouth and conquered her without a word spoken.
He wasn’t drugged. He wasn’t under the influence of an opiate. He knew who she was. Neither of them had an excuse.
She would never feel for another man what she felt for Jordan. She knew it somehow, the knowledge seeping through her bones. No one would ever matter as much or be capable of hurting her so easily.
Yet no one could ever stir her simply with a look or a quick smile.
What kind of person was she to contemplate making love under the circumstances? She’d never before considered herself hedonistic, but it seemed as if she was, especially when he touched her just that way.
Suddenly her petticoat was gone, thrown to the floor. Her bodice was loosened as was her corset.
She should sit up and put herself to rights. She should gather up her scattered clothing, lace her corset, and be gone.
He slipped a sleeve off her shoulder, kissing his way down to her elbow. She’d never known an elbow could be such a source of pleasure or that she could feel the touch of his lips there so acutely, the sensation traveling to her core.
“Jordan,” she said softly, his name so easily tumbling from her lips. “Jordan.” She’d meant to utter a caution, but his name sounded more like an endearment.
She really should leave. She really should. This very moment before she lost any more of her clothes.
But, oh, the temptation was too much. This was the reason mothers cautioned their daughters against passion.
This might be the last time in her life she tasted it. Here, now, with Jordan, might be the last memory to last her for years and years of yearning.
She wasn’t going to leave. She wasn’t going to pull away from him.
If anyone caught her here, she would claim she was half-asleep, or that she’d been seduced against her will. No, she wouldn’t blame Jordan. The responsibility lay with her. Perhaps she would tell anyone who asked that she’d taken some of the elixir and was the one who was drugged.
“Jordan,” she said again.
“Martha.” He pulled back, smiling down at her.
He wasn’t drugged unless passion could be considered an opiate.
She reached up with one hand and placed it against his heated cheek.
“I should leave.”
