Page 83 of Of the Mind

“I love you,” she said, so softly that he felt it more than heard it.

Torturous as it was, he pulled away to look down at her. “Say it again.”

It was only then, despite being bared to him in every other way, that her cheeks flushed with embarrassment.

“I love you,” she said, just a little louder. Loud enough for him to know it was real.

He would not last long in this condition. Deftly, he pulled his trousers down until he, too, was bared, then he kissed her, hard, harder than he thought he ever had before. So hard, in fact, that the both of them crashed back onto his desk. Hiswork went flying, and he could not find a care for it.

Very well. His desk was not as comfortable as a bed, but it would do.

Finding his balance with his knees upon the hard wood, he lined himself up with her, delighted by how ready he found her. Indeed, when he looked into her eyes, they were glazed over with lust. He suspected his own looked the same.

Those eyes widened only slightly as he slid inside. It was glorious to watch her lips part as she took him fully, but only half as glorious as actually feeling it himself.

Too shaky to hold himself up completely, he brought himself down to one elbow and closed the distance between their lips. His hips worked faster and faster, the pressure of his impending release building each time.

“Say it again,” he breathed against her.

“I love you,” she said, clear as day, though half of it was a gasp.

He wanted to kiss her, but he wanted her to say it again, but he wanted to kiss her…

She bit back a moan, but he would have none of this wordless nonsense.

“Again.”

“I love-”

Her words cut off as she squeezed her eyes shut, her mouth dropping open into a wordless O. She clamped around him, taking him over the edge of that proverbial cliff with her.

In that moment it was all so clear to him; their future. The sleigh rides and the dinners where their conversation was easy. The warmth of her pressed against him in bed at night. Every “I love you” she would say.

As he came back down to earth, he realized that Augusta was saying something. No, mumbling something, over and over again, her eyes still closed as she rode out the last bit of her high.

The mumbling faded and her breath slowly returned to normal. Her eyes fluttered open, and her gaze locked with his.

“What were you saying?”

Her brow knit together, as though it should have been obvious to him.

“I said I love you.”