Page 57 of The Dravenhearst Brides
“Don’t look at me like that,” Margot whispered, half begging. She ripped out a handful of grass and swatted, throwing it senselessly at him. “The last thing I want is your pity.”
He held quiet.
Margot brought her knees to her chest, wrapping her arms around herself. She gazed skyward, desperate to look anywhere but at him. Clouds rolled in overhead, beginning to obscure the moon. A single raindrop landed on her arm.
“What do you want from me then?” Merrick finally asked.
The question struck her dumb, for its answer was as vast as the cloud-shrouded galaxy above them. As unreachable.
“What do I want?” she repeated. Her crazed laughter shattered the night. “What do Iwant? Oh, I want a different life, a different past. I want to be sitting in this field with you to stargaze and talk and dream. Not chasedhere, fleeing my own ghosts. Having to be carried because my own two feet aren’t strong enough to hold me up.”
“What else?”
“I want to hear a different voice inside my head. Different stories. I want my family to look and seeme, not ‘the one who lived.’ I want to change the song that’s been playing on the phonograph for eight straight years. And I…” She faded, glancing away. “What I really want, more than anything in this world, is to not be afraid. To not be so afraid of who I might be without him, I stay frozen in time. I want to be brave enough to step forward, even if it means stepping forward alone.”
His teeth bit into his lip, and something ripped free in her gut. Something wild with want. Being laid so bare before him…she was wild with the desire to beseen. Just this once.
“And I really,” Margot huffed, “reallywant you to stop looking at me like I’m a wounded animal.” A second raindrop landed on her bare shoulder. “I’ve had enough of those looks to last a lifetime.”
“I’m not looking at you like that.”
“You are.”
He leveled her with a powerful stare, amber eyes pooling into her own. It was a different stare than she’d ever seen, one that made her toes curl. “How do you want me to look at you?”
She didn’t answer. She turned away, grateful for the darkness. It hid the color in her cheeks. The desire swimming in her eyes.
Merrick scooted closer. He took her chin in his hand and turned it toward him. Rough skin, gentle touch. “How do you want me to look at you, Margot?”
He pinned her with his gaze. She couldn’t have looked away if she tried. Her mouth opened, barely parted. “I just…” Her voice dropped to a whisper. “I just want you tolook.”
To see me and not turn away.
Several more raindrops fell, one grazing her cheek, dripping like a tear.
Merrick thumbed it away. “Believe me, I’m looking.”
She blinked once. Twice.
And then his lips were on hers. Her response was instinctive and immediate—hunger. It coursed through her with a rippling shudder.
She reached for his shirt, gripping it in her fist to drag him closer. His lips moved to her neck, beneath her ear. He nipped the lobe and tugged gently, eliciting a moan from deep in her throat. The carnality of the sound surprised her. Her cheeks flooded pink again, a voice in her mind telling her to be quiet and complicit and demure. To begood.
But he did it again, and she surrendered all pretense.
She wasn’t quiet or demure or good. She wanted things that were very bad indeed. Starting with this hulking, beguiling man. He was everywhere, all fumbling hands, greedy lips, warm breath. He wasn’t being gentle, and the realization made her feel strong. She was so very sick of being treated like a porcelain doll.
The rain fell in earnest now, speckling her hair, her dress, her arms. His fingers tangled roughly in her damp hair. His tongue slipped into her mouth. He leaned close, weight pressing, and she fell back in the grass, dragging him with her.
He tugged at her dress, pulling it down to fully expose her chemise. His lips dropped to her collarbone, vibrating against her as he murmured something unintelligible into her skin.
Her hands moved of their own volition. Moved over broad shoulders, strong arms, muscled chest. Margot couldn’t explore all of him fast enough. She was shocked by her own fearlessness, by her mounting recklessness. Her fingers found his shirt buttons, began to work their way down.
He shrugged out of the shirt, and she pressed her lips against the dark hair on his chest. Her fingers streamed across the ridges of his back, growingwetter and wetter as the rain fell. A rumble of thunder boomed in the distance, and she pulled back, her mind hazy.
We should stop. We should go inside.
“Or we can stay outside and get very, very wet,” he said.
