Hauling air into his lungs, he bent his mouth to her neck, her breasts, the damp contour of her throat. She pressed her body to his, and he could not leave her yet. He was exhausted, and he was exactly where he wished to be.
Eyes closed, she allowed him to caress her. “I did not know it could be done quite like that. With a man’s mouth,” she said between slowing breaths.
“I bloody well hope you didn’t.”
“A gentleman should never swear in the presence of a lady,” she murmured. “Rule Number Seven.”
“When you speak of ‘a man’s’ mouth rather than mine in particular, naturally it concerns me.”
Her lapis eyes opened. “No other man has touched me like you have. You know that.”
“I do.” He brushed her lips, which were tender from his enjoyment of her, and her hand came up and around his jaw tentatively, then into his hair. Gently she explored the wound on his temple with light fingertips. There was no pain there now, only the pleasure of her caress.
She drew away first. He stroked a damp curl back from her brow and her lashes dipped. But this quiet, sated woman was not all of her. Given her fight, their affinity would not last for long, and he must see her to a safe place now.
He pulled back and fastened his breeches as she pushed her skirts over her legs and tucked her beautiful breasts back into her gown. The darkness surrounded them, the muffled silence of horses in a nearby stall, and the distant Watch calling the hour through the muting fog.
Wyn watched her. “How did you make him do it?”
Her lashes flickered, but her fingers continued picking straw from her wrinkled skirts.
“How did you convince Eads to take you there?”
She pushed to her feet on the uneven ground and shook out her skirts. “Thank you.”
“Thank you?”
Her head shot up, eyes alight. “Thank you, Diantha, for saving my life. For caring enough about my brandy-swilling hide that you risked yours despite—despite the fact that I lied to you. Again.” Her voice cracked.
“Thank you.” He grabbed her shoulders. “Goddamn it, thank you. Is that what you wish to hear?”
She pulled out of his hold and went from the stall. He followed, her every motion in the dark so natural, so unconsciously beautiful even in her haste, that it stole his anger. She bent to retrieve her cloak and bonnet from the floor and the shape of her body made him breathless. He could not watch her enough.
“What did Lord Eads intend to do to the duke?” Her voice quavered, but he could hear the purpose in it, her bravery.
“I don’t know.” He touched her shoulder.
She whirled around, eyes glittering, a tear staining her cheek. “Don’t touch me. I don’t want this.” She backed away, clutching her cloak before her. “Why didn’t you simply tell me you did not wish to marry me? Why did you have to take to the bottle again? Were you afraid that I would not release you from your obligation? That I would beg for your attention?” Pain clouded her eyes. “Well then, Mr. Yale, you don’t know me well after all. So I suppose you won’t know this unless I tell you: I don’t need you. Mr. H is still eager for my hand. Even if I do come to be with child from this—this—”
“Truth?” He stepped close again and Diantha’s throat caught, cutting off her words. He was very tall, his wide shoulders and chest in clinging linen intimidating, and the line of his delicious mouth severe. His arm wrapped about her waist and he trapped her jaw in his palm so that she was forced to look up at him. “This truth?” He was beautiful, anger sparking in his silver gaze that moved across her features as though he meant to memorize her.
“This is not truth,” she whispered. She forced her arms to hang at her sides, not to cling to him as she wished. “I hate the feelings inside me now.” Inadequacy. Hurt. Need so profound it made her ache.
“You will marry me, Diantha.” His throat constricted in a rough swallow. “Marry me.”
She pushed against his chest, her insides swimming in confusion. “You pretended you had been with a prostitute so I would refuse your offer only this morning, and now you are insisting that I marry you?” She broke free of his embrace. “You are insane.”
His fingers scraped through his hair around to the back of his neck. “Yes, I am insane when it comes to you. I nearly did take to the bottle again last night in a desperate attempt to put you off.”
“Nearly?”
“Do you know what would have happened to you if we had not bested the duke’s guards? Did Eads warn you, or did you go off half-cocked on a rescue mission once again, heedless of the consequences?”
“I have never been heedless of any consequences,” she shot back. “Ever. And I did this to help you!”
“I don’t need that kind of help from you!”
She couldn’t breathe. “You were not drunk last night or this morning? You pretended it so that I would refuse you?”
“Yes.”
She hadn’t thought she could hurt more, but she had been wrong. “You are a beast.”
“I did it to protect you from Yarmouth, who threatened to harm you because of his grudge against me.”
Diantha’s heart slammed over.
Wyn’s voice lowered. “I knew that if I told you of his threats you would invent some reckless plan to save me, which you did anyway despite my charade, because you are tenacious beyond reason. But my pretense was a mistake far beyond that. And part of me hoped, I think, that you would see through it. But you are not to blame, and for it I beg your forgiveness.”
He had done it all to protect her? He had thrown himself into the hands of a villain so that she would be safe? And now he was begging for her forgiveness?
Diantha’s heart pounded, her thoughts staggering. She had forced him into rescuing her time and again. He had never failed her and still would not, even if it continued hurting him, over and over. He would insist upon wedding her though she only caused him trouble. Wayward, foolish, unbiddable. Everything she had tried to do for him had bound him more tightly to her though he had never wanted it.
“It is over now, Diantha, and you must marry me.”
She could not bear to do this to him. “But don’t you see why I cannot? Don’t you see anything?”
“No, apparently.” His chest rose on a hard breath. “I barely even know the words I’m speaking. When I am with you, thinking of you, I don’t actually think. For God’s sake, I just made love to you three hundred yards from the house in which I was held prisoner today—in a stable, with my boots on. Fifteen years of perfecting every move I make thrown to the dogs the instant I see you. It is like nothing I have known before.”
“Do you think I don’t regret that it has gone this way as well? That I ever asked you to help me?” She strapped her arms about her middle. “And it is worse even than you know, because it was all for nothing. My mother is not in Calais but London. Tracy took me to see her tonight, but . . . I didn’t care.” The truth of it spiraled through her. The old cruelty no longer imprisoned her. “I didn’t want to see her any longer. I didn’t need to.” She only needed him.
“Diantha.” He came forward and pulled her into his arms. He kissed her and she loved his kisses and his embrace and him. She loved him so much it hurt. She loved everything about him except how she forced him to be a man he was not. But she lifted her lips to him and allowed him to kiss her because this would be the last time. The last kiss. It astounded her that—even briefly—she had ever dreamed another ending to this story. He was her hero and he always would be, but she was not the heroine he deserved.
“Forgive my anger,” he whispered huskily against the corner of her lips. His silvery eyes sought hers, a crease between them. “I have no regrets. None.”