Page 154 of The Wallflower Takes All

Then he drew the coverlet over them and gathered her against him.

Poppy rested her cheek upon his chest.

His arm curved around her waist. His other hand moved lightly through her loosened hair, untangling one curl from another with the same patient attention he gave everything that mattered to him.

Downstairs, a door closed. Farther away, Freddie barked once, lodging an official objection to his exclusion.

Poppy smiled against Gabriel’s skin. “He knows.”

“Freddie suspects everyone of conspiring against him.”

“Frequently with cause.”

Silence settled over them, intimate now rather than uncertain. Gabriel pressed a kiss to her hair.

“Poppy.”

“Yes?”

“We should marry.”

She went still against him.

Joy rose first, swift and bright. She wanted him. She wanted mornings beside him, Freddie stealing his gloves, Mama scandalizing him over breakfast, and every orderly corner of his life made warmer by theirs.

But she had not missed the word he had chosen.

Should.

Poppy lifted her head. “That is a very Gabriel Ashby proposal.”

His hand stilled against her back. “It is a proposal.”

She tilted her chin to look at him. “Why should we marry?”

His expression tightened. “Because I have compromised you.”

“You have taken nothing I did not freely give.”

“That does not release me from my duty.”

Her happiness dimmed. “No. It merely proves you still do not understand.”

“Poppy—”

“You have told me you want me. You have chosen me. Yet the moment you speak of marriage, you return to duty, protection, and what you owe me.”

“I do owe you protection.”

“I do not want to be another debt you spend your life repaying.”

He stared at her.

Poppy drew the sheet more closely around herself, though no covering could have made her feel less exposed. “You believe marrying you would cost me my place in Society, my friends, and the life I have known. You fear I shall wake one morning and discover I have surrendered too much.”

He searched her face. “Would that fear be unreasonable?”

“It would be unreasonable to decide it for me.”