Page 46 of A Viscount's Bet of Seduction

He knew that if anyone found them here, like this, she would be ruined. Pulling away, he placed his hand on her cheek. Her eyes were sultry with desire.

“Lucy?” he asked, breathlessly. His pulse was racing. He needed to know, immediately.

“Yes?”

“May I court you?” He was breathless. If she said no, then he didn’t know what he was going to do.

Lucy bit her bottom lip, considering it. For a moment, he panicked that she would retreat or push him away.

“Yes,” she said.

Beaming, he kissed her again. “Good,” he muttered, his voice a low growl. If anything, his appetite for her was now deepened. He could sense the passion between them, unlike anything he had experienced before.

She was smiling. Silas was so happy, he felt as though he might be dreaming. At any moment, he might wake up, and this would all vanish. He had gone, in the space of a few moments, from sadness and worry to incandescent joy.

“We should head back before they start to suspect something,” Lucy murmured. “No one has ever spent this long in looking at a few paintings.”

“Are we going to tell them our announcement?”

She laughed. “We have to. We’ll need to be chaperoned from here on out.”

He raised an eyebrow. That was certainly a bit of a setback.

“Until the wedding?” he asked wryly.

“We haven’t even courted yet,” she said, blushing and smiling.

Silas grinned. That was Lucy—she liked to take things slowly. He respected her more for it. Everything that he had hoped for had come to pass. He felt like the luckiest gentleman in all of London as he offered her his arm.

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