by Lara Temple
He was seated with his back to her, in an armchair facing the empty fireplace, dressed in buckskins and top boots and a plain white shirt. He was leaning over an elaborate book of maps open on the low table in front of him and he did not turn around upon her entry. Even just the sight of his back filled her with an almost overwhelming feeling of relief and joy. She had no idea if she was welcome, but right now she could not think further than the fact that he was here, close enough to reach in a few short steps, and that she loved him.
‘I said—’ He turned and broke off as he saw her and she stopped. The silence stretched out and she tried to read his expression, but the gloom defeated her.
‘So. You’re back,’ he said at last. There was no anger in his voice now—it was flat, uninterested.
She nodded and cleared her throat, but he spoke first.
‘What do you want?’
She struggled to even begin to answer that loaded question.
‘I came…I thought… People said you aren’t talking to anyone. I was worried…’
He stood up abruptly and moved towards her. In the dark he looked even taller and once again she had the sensation of facing a stranger, but this time rather than a cynically detached stranger, he looked dangerous and she had to forcibly stop herself from taking a step back. When he spoke his voice was tight with a red-hot fury she had never heard before.
‘I am not a damn cause! Don’t you dare come here dripping pity!’
‘Pity? Are you m-mad?’ she stammered.
‘That’s one way of putting it,’ he said scathingly and stopped short of her, his hands fisted, and she stared up at him, her shock and confusion overcoming even her pain.
‘I don’t understand. Has something happened? Are you angry at me for going to London without speaking with you first? I told you I meant to go, and that day…I couldn’t wait any longer. I had to go,’ she finished lamely.
‘Angry!’ The word seemed to break something in him and he turned and went to sit down again, placing his hand on the map, blotting out most of the Continent.
‘Are you going away?’ she asked fearfully as she finally began to accept the meaning of the trunks and maps. She should not have left. She should have stayed and locked him to her. The thought of him leaving, of not seeing him again, was unacceptable.
‘Perhaps,’ he answered in the same flat voice as before.
She moved towards him, trying to think of how to stop him. She could not let him go.
‘Where?’
‘Does it matter?’
‘It does to me.’
He surged to his feet again.
‘Don’t play games. You’ve made your choice! What did you come back for? To tell me the good news in person?’
‘Yes, but…’
‘I don’t want to hear it.’ He held up a hand, his gaze furious and full of hatred, and she shook her head, trying to find some stable ground. He moved towards her again and she just stared at him. She felt as though she had been caught in the jaws of some giant relentless beast and was being shaken and torn to shreds. She spread her hands as if to ward him off and he seemed to realise what he was doing. His expression changed, softened.
‘Alyssa. Don’t do this,’ he said, his hands closing on her shoulders. ‘Don’t do it. He doesn’t deserve you. I know that is unfair, I don’t know a thing about him, but I know you. I am asking you not to do anything yet. You’ve seen me at my worst, but I can do better, I swear. Stay here for a while. He can’t love you more than I do. I don’t believe it. Give me a chance. All I am asking is that you don’t make any decisions yet.’
Alyssa stared up at him. His words were so strange and confusing and unrelated to anything that she almost missed what he was saying.
‘A decision about what?’ she asked dumbly. ‘It’s just a novel.’
There was a moment’s silence as he stared down at her, clearly as bemused as she was.
‘A novel?’
‘Yes. I sent it to them some weeks ago and they want to publish it. I went to meet the publisher, Mr Burnley. What on earth are you talking about?’
‘A novel?’ he asked again. ‘You wrote a novel? You went to meet a publisher?’
‘Yes, I—’
His frown returned and he interrupted her brusquely, his hands tightening on her shoulders. ‘What about the man…the one you were in love with? I thought you went to see him.’
The shifting ground beneath her settled and she surveyed the remains of the storm. She had been so caught up in her own longing and fear it had never occurred to her she had the power to hurt him. The enormity of what he was telling her was finally reaching her, filling her from within with joy and hope. She reached up to touch his cheek, but he brushed her hand away, the anger resurfacing.
‘I told you I don’t want your pity any more than you wanted mine!’
She looked up at him, past the anger and suspicion, to the man she knew and loved and who needed her. It was so clear to her now, she wondered at her own blindness in not seeing it before. She had been too caught up in her own emotions, but there was no room for caution now.
‘Adam, the very last thing I feel for you is pity. I never guessed you might care for me. Not the way I did. There never was anyone else. When I said what I did, that day, I was talking about you. It’s only ever been you.’
He grasped her face in his hands, his fingers pressing against her cheekbones, suspicion and need at war in his dark grey eyes. The tension did not leave his mouth and he shook his head after a moment.
‘No…you were just a child.’
‘To you perhaps. I might not have seemed it next to Rowena, but I was just about to turn eighteen. When you came back I told myself I had just been a silly girl with romantic fantasies which had nothing to do with reality, that I had been no better than Mary. But I knew it wasn’t true. I may have been young, but I saw what you were even then, Adam. I never felt more alive, and myself, as I did with you. That hasn’t changed. I know it’s very selfish, but I can’t help it. I just can see it more clearly now. I love you.’
He shook his head again, his eyes darkening, but she knew it wasn’t a negation. She reached up to touch his face again, her amazement only growing now that she was beginning to believe him. He pulled her against him, closing his arms around her as if he could absorb her. His voice was muffled by her hair, but she could feel every word.
‘Alyssa. You don’t know…I kept telling myself that if you found what you wanted I should be happy for you. But I wanted to kill him. And kidnap you. And keep you. I just wanted you back here, with me. I kept waiting for the axe to fall and I couldn’t stand it. Tell me again.’
There was a raw, almost fearful need in his voice and she drew back, looking up at him.
‘I love you, Adam. I’ve never wanted anything in my life as much as I want to be with you. I need you not to give up on me. Ever.’
He dragged her back into his embrace and she wrapped her arms around him as well, her cheek pressed to his chest, listening to the sharp striking of his heartbeat. She felt his breath shudder against her.
‘Oh, God, Alyssa, I love you. I could just as well imagine giving up breathing. I can’t stand it. Don’t ever leave again!’
She shook her head, filled with a joy she had never experienced before. That she had not known could exist.
‘I won’t. I love you, Adam…’
He tilted her face up, his eyes locking on to hers, filled with a fierce, uncompromising demand that did not need to be voiced. His arms pulled her to him as he bent to kiss her, gently and slowly, as if she might still be frightened away, his lips sliding over hers, leaving heat and tingling wherever they touched. It was melting her, burning her from within, and she wanted more, she wanted him to take her back to that unbearable peak of pleasure he had shown her
once before.
‘Adam, please…’ She pushed up against him on tiptoe as if she could shed all the layers between them by sheer force and tear down every barrier between them. ‘Please…’
He groaned, tightening his hold on her, digging his hand into her hair as he gave in and kissed her the way she wanted, the way she needed him to. There was something wonderful and terrifying in the feeling of being erased and released all at once. She kissed him back, dragging up his shirt so she could feel the hot, hard muscles of his back.
‘Alyssa, I want you…’ he breathed against her mouth, his hands searing her skin even through her dress. She wanted it off her; she wanted her skin on his, her breasts against him; she wanted him to touch her as he had in her study. She scraped her fingers down along his back, urging him towards her, but he pushed back slightly, his breathing harsh and his eyes fixed on hers.
‘I’m not letting you go this time,’ he said and it was clearly a warning. ‘Last time I did the right thing and stopped, but I’m damned if I am going to play by the rules again. If you want me to stop, you’re going to have to leave now. Do you understand?’
Alyssa shook her head impatiently. She had no more intention of playing by the rules at this point than he. She shrugged off his hands and strode towards the door and had almost made it when he grabbed her arm, turning her. She looked up, surprised at the expression in his eyes.
‘No. You can’t go yet. I didn’t mean to scare you, Alyssa. Stay, I won’t do anything. I promise…’
She stared up at him, amazed he had so little faith in her. She had thought she had made it abundantly clear she was extremely willing and had no more wish to wait upon propriety than he.
‘That’s a pity. Then there’s no point in locking the door?’ she asked.
‘Locking the door?’
‘I know you have scared everyone into leaving you alone, but since we always seem to get interrupted just when…matters are getting interesting I thought it would be a good idea to lock the door. I really, really don’t want anyone bothering us for a while. So, should I?’
Adam breathed in, his body visibly relaxing, before he shook his head slowly and reached past her to turn the key in the lock.
‘An excellent idea. Come here, wild girl. We have some unfinished business, you and I. And you’re marrying me as soon as I procure a special licence, are we clear?’
He grasped her hand and drew her towards a broad, Empire-style sofa. She followed happily but felt the urge to protest on one count.
‘Oh, no, that’s ridiculously extravagant. An ordinary licence should do just fine…’
Adam pulled her down next to him and tipped up her chin, his finger stroking her mischievous dimple, his own eyes filled with reluctant laughter and beneath it the banked heat that made her aware of every inch of her body and made her dress feel harsh and heavy on her sensitised skin.
‘No, it won’t,’ he replied, his voice as soft and warm as his fingers as he slid her sleeve from her shoulder. ‘It has to be very special and with a great deal of licence. By this time next week I want you living here with me.’
She arched forward as his fingers moved lower. She grasped his other hand and pressed it to her breast, too impatient to be embarrassed. He laughed and bent to kiss her flushed skin.
‘Is that a yes?’ he whispered against her and a shudder ran through her that she hardly realised as he slid off her dress, baring her, his hands moving hot and urgently, pulling her on to his lap so she could feel his need. She tilted back her head as he kissed her neck, her breast, his hand moving against her thigh, finding her again, melting her. She no longer knew what he was asking, just what she wanted of him, what she wanted to do to him.
‘Yes, Adam. My Adam…’
* * * * *
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ISBN-13: 9781488004377
The Reluctant Viscount
Copyright © 2016 by Ilana Treston
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