Page 112 of The Tempting of Thomas Carrick
But still, she said nothing.
He watched her openly and saw no sign of encouragement, yet neither did he feel any sense of being pushed away. Not even of being truly locked out. She just hadn’t let him in again, hadn’t yet accepted him back.
He sighed. He could see that they might go around and around for hours, even days, debating the fine point of whether he loved her or not—whether he would say the words, even if he wasn’t yet certain.
Looking down, he linked his fingers, stared at them for several seconds, then said, “I went to Glasgow because I didn’t believe the position by your side was the right one for me—for the man I wanted to be. But in Glasgow, I learned a deeper truth: That I can’t be the man I wanted to be—I can only be the man I am.”
He looked at her—waited, and waited, until at last she glanced at him. Capturing her gaze, he simply said, “The man I am is yours, Lucilla—the only life I now want is one by your side, filling the position of your husband, your consort, and all that comes with that.” He drew in a deeper breath, exhaled, and said, “So if that position’s still vacant, I’m here to claim it. Will you have me?”
She didn’t really have a choice. Lucilla knew that, yet still she held back. Not from any wish to prolong the discussion, to extract more revelations from him, or to make the interview more difficult for him. He’d come back to her of his own accord, exactly as she’d needed him to, exactly as she’d prayed he would. Yet his going had opened a vein of uncertainty inside her, and that was something she was ill-equipped to deal with; she had no experience handling…not being sure.
So now she hesitated, wanting to simply say “yes” and have done, yet…
She continued to hold his gaze. He’d been open and honest; she had to be the same. She dragged in a breath, and let it out with the words “If I accept you as my husband, are you sure you won’t, at some point in the future, come to regret it—to resent the demands the position makes of you—and leave me again?”
With those few simple words, that straightforward question, she cut Thomas to the quick. She didn’t lower her shields, didn’t let him see her emotions, yet those words communicated them oh, so clearly. She had never doubted her power—would never have questioned the very force they’d been discussing—before.
Before he’d turned his back on her and walked away.
He drew in a long, slow breath—then, his eyes still holding hers, he slipped from the wall to stand beside her.
She shifted to face him, her shears in her hand. He recalled Marcus’s warning but ignored it. She wasn’t going to stab him with her shears; she’d already stabbed him with her words, with the proof of the vulnerabilityhewas responsible for creating inside her.
He’d spoken of his own vulnerability; he knew what it felt like, recognized the effect of it in others.
Slowly, giving her plenty of time to react if she would, he raised both hands and cupped her face.
Instinctively, she shifted closer as he tipped her face to his.
He looked down into her eyes, reached as deeply as she would allow. With the force of everything inside him, he stated, “I will never—ever—leave you again. I will never quit the place by your side. I want you, but more, Ineedyou—you and only you. You are the center point, the pivot, the fulcrum of my life, the anchor about which I must and always will revolve.” Drowning in green, he paused to draw breath. “You are, and always will be, all and everything I want—all and everything I need.”
Her free hand rose to cup the back of his.
And, at last, with that feather-light touch, through that and the thinning of her shields, he saw acceptance bloom within her, gradually strengthening in her eyes.
He lowered his head, drawn to kiss her, to claim her mouth at least.
She didn’t retreat but came up on her toes to meet him.
He paused with a bare whisper separating their hungry lips. So hungry—he could feel her hunger rise to meet his. Once their lips touched, all talk would be behind them.
He spoke breath to breath. “Do you accept me as yours, forever and always?”
Her lids rose; green fire met his eyes. “Yes.”
He exhaled and briefly closed his eyes. “So my lady’s—your Lady’s—prophecy is fulfilled.”
She didn’t answer, just slid her hand to his nape and drew his lips to hers.
* * *
So my lady’s—your Lady’s—prophecy is fulfilled.
But it wasn’t. Not quite.
Thomas knew that as surely as he knew the difference between a negotiated agreement and an effective partnership. They’d managed the first; they had yet to achieve the second.
They walked up from the gardens hand in hand, with their awareness of each other, courtesy of that kiss and the several that had followed, back in full force, and acceptance, carried in the warm clasp of their palms and the gentleness they showed to each other, slowly settling upon them.
