Page 63 of An Unexpected Earl

He secured the last pin, and she began to move away. “Thank you—”

He took her shoulders and stopped her. This time when he lowered his mouth to her ear, he was deadly serious. “Thank you for trusting me about your brother.”

She hesitated, then gave a jerky nod. Not at all the vote of confidence he’d wanted, but he would take it. And take hope in it.

Yet he couldn’t bring himself to step away from her and instead nuzzled his cheek against her exposed nape. She trembled.

“All those years, I never forgot about you,” he admitted. “But I’d moved on, accepting the new life I’d been given, just as I’d hoped you had.” He pulled in a deep breath. “I hated your father for what he did to us, but I also knew that he wasn’t wrong. You deserved a better man for a husband than me.”

“Don’t say that,” she scolded, but the chastisement was barely more than a breath. “It isn’t true.”

“It is—itwas. The life I could have given you then would never have been enough.”

He slid his hand over her shoulder, to trace delicate patterns with his fingers against the side of her neck. This time it wasn’t just a tremble that he elicited from her but a quickening of her breath, a racing of her pulse beneath his fingertips. She was affected by him as much as he was by her. Her body couldn’t lie.

“You deserved riches, a grand house, jewels and furs, a fine carriage…the respect of society. I couldn’t have given you any of that.”

Not then.

The words lingered around them, as palpably as if he’d spoken them aloud. She stood frozen beneath his hands as he slowly began to caress them up and down her arms in slow, reassuring strokes.

“But your father can’t harm us any longer.” He dared to place a single kiss against her ear, in hopes of stirring the same longing inside her that now pulsed through him. “And I’m no longer a man you would be ashamed to be with.”

“I wasneverashamed,” she whispered between quick and shallow breaths. “You were a good and kind man. The rest never mattered to me.”

“It mattered to me.”But no longer.Now, everything had changed. “There’s no reason for us to stay apart. No reason that we can’t rekindle our friendship.”

“Only friendship?” The tremble in her voice undercut the challenge in her question.

“Of the very best kind.” This time when he kissed her ear, he sucked gently at her earlobe in a seductive and obvious gesture that showed exactly what he hoped would happen between them.

Her answering shiver proved how much she longed to be in his arms, but except for closing her eyes, she made no move of capitulation. The past and the present warred inside her, so fiercely that he could see it in the strained expression gripping her face, could feel it in the stiff way she stood frozen against him.

If only she would let herself go, let herself have what they both wanted… He took her chin in his fingers and gently turned her around to face him so he could kiss her full on the mouth, so he could tease apart her lips and claim the decadent sweetness waiting inside.

She murmured his name in soft permission, and the tension melted away.

He tugged the blanket loose and dropped it to the floor, leaving nothing between them but her thin shift. He slipped his arms around her and drew her tightly against him to plunder her kiss in sweeping licks and thrusting plunges that made his body ache to have her beneath him, to hear soft sounds of pleasure and release falling from her lips.

She sagged bonelessly against him, her arms snaking up around his neck to keep herself from falling away.

As she clung to him, with her breasts flattened against his front, each panting breath she took rubbed her hard nipples against him and left him groaning with an aching need to possess her, with an unbearable desire for her to surrender herself completely to him. Tonight and always.

He placed his hands on her hips and lifted her onto the desk. Her hand struck the plate of food, tossing it onto the floor with a clatter. The tankards of ale tumbled away next, the bucket of remaining water kicked and spilling across the floor—

None of it mattered, because he’d grabbed her shift, lifting it up around her waist and baring her to his eyes.

“Dear God,” he rasped out as he slid his hands up her inner thighs and gently parted her legs, revealing her completely to his eyes. Her feminine lips glistened in the firelight with proof of her desire. “So beautiful…”

“I’m not,” she protested softly, closing her eyes in embarrassment. “Not…there.”

“You have no idea how beautiful I find you, Amelia. Here.” He caressed her, mesmerized as her soft folds quivered with anticipation. “And everywhere.” Slowly, he circled her with his fingertip. “Every inch of you, from your toes to your soul. The most beautiful woman I’ve ever known.”

“You’re just saying that.” But her hands at his shoulders shamelessly kneaded his muscles. She wanted the pleasure he could give her, so much that she shook with it.

“I mean it.” With every quickening beat of his heart.

“Then…” She exhaled a deep sigh of surrender and whispered in challenge, “Prove it.”