course. Yes, fine.” Dear Lord, this was awful. They really were like strangers, with the long, awkward silences followed by stammered-out reassurances. She rose and faced him, feeling way too uncovered in the revealing nightgown.
He blinked and announced gruffly, “Good, then. I’ll just be a few minutes.” He went through the door to the dressing room and bath, closing it behind him.
She realized she’d been holding her breath. Releasing it in one hard gust, she let her head droop and stared down at her bare feet on the gorgeous old Aubusson carpet. Would he actually come back? He’d said that he would. But there was that other bedroom in the suite accessible through the dressing area. Great lords and ladies, after all, shouldn’t have to actually share a bed if they didn’t wish to. Should she follow him, make sure that he...?
No. Time enough for that later if he failed to return. She drew her shoulders back, spun on her heel and turned off the lights, all but the one at his side of the bed. Then she climbed in between the heavy bed curtains, got in under the covers and sat up against the pillows to wait for him.
She pressed her hand to her chest. Her poor heart pounded away in there with a sick sort of dread. She feared that he wouldn’t come and she would either have to go after him—or know herself for the coward she was.
But then the door opened and there he was, huge and muscular and marvelous, really, in a pair of dark silk boxers—and nothing else. He strode right for her. Her heart pounded hard, but with excitement now rather than dread.
He turned off that last light before climbing in next to her. She sat there in the dark against the pillows, acutely aware of his presence beside her, of his size, his heat. And his silence.
About then, it became too ridiculous. The unreality of it all was too much for her. A silly, hysterical little laugh bubbled up in her chest. She tried to swallow it down.
But it wouldn’t be swallowed. It burst out of her, a breathless, absurd, trilling sort of sound. She slapped her hand over her mouth, but it wouldn’t stop.
“You think it’s funny, do you?” he asked from the darkness beside her.
She laughed some more. “I... Oh, God, I...”
And then she heard it, a low, rusty rumble. It took her a moment to realize that the sound was coming from him. He was laughing, too.
They laughed together, there in the dark, and she remembered...
How they used to laugh together often, over the simplest things—the antics of Moe and Mable when they were pups, or the way he would pop up out of nowhere, bringing a shriek of surprise from her. In the old days, they could laugh together at anything, really. She’d always felt so proud that he would laugh with her. He never did with anyone else. With her, he didn’t feel the need to be constantly on his guard, to hold himself in check.
In recent years, though, he’d become more distant, more careful with her. And she’d missed the playful times they used to share.
The laughter faded. The room was too quiet. Still, she realized she felt marginally better about everything.
And then he shifted beside her, moving closer and even wrapping his big arm around her. He pulled her against him.
She sighed in sudden, lovely contentment and leaned her head on his rock of a shoulder. “I think I’ve become hysterical.”
“Must be the hormones.” His wonderful huge hand moved on her bare arm, a tender stroking motion.
This was more like it. She snuggled in closer. “That’s the advantage to being pregnant. Anytime I behave badly, I can just blame it on the hormones.”
“You haven’t.”
“What?”
“Behaved badly.” His lips brushed her hair.
She rubbed her cheek against the hot, smooth flesh of his shoulder and wished it might be like this between them always. “Have you forgotten what happened when we told my parents we’d decided to get married? The way I made you promise not to tell them about the baby—and then went right ahead and blurted out the truth when you were trying so hard to keep the secret for me?”
“That wasn’t behaving badly. That’s just how you are.”
“Unable to stick with a plan of action?”
“No. Not wanting to disappoint your parents—and yet never quite able to hide the truth.”
“I’m honest to the core, am I?”
“Yes.” He said it so firmly, without even having to stop and think about it. His belief in her cheered her.
But then she thought about their marriage, which wouldn’t have happened except for the baby. Now, because of the baby, she had achieved her lifelong dream: to be countess of Hartmore. “But I’m not,” she said miserably. “Not honest at all.”
“Shh.”
She dared to lift her head. “Rafe, I—”
“Shh,” he said again. And then his hand was there, at her throat, caressing, brushing upward to lift her chin. “Gen.” His breath warmed her cheek. She drank in the familiar, exciting scent of him.
And then, light and questioning and heartbreakingly tender, his mouth touched hers.
A real kiss. At last.
She sank into it, parting her lips for him, welcoming him in.
He accepted her invitation, dipping his tongue in, making her whimper low in her throat as he pulled her closer, turning his big body toward her. She moaned in pleasure at the glorious feel of her breasts pressing into his broad, hard chest. Clasping his giant shoulder, she melted into him.
They sank down into the bed, still kissing. She pushed at his shoulder then, urging him over. He gave to her will, stretching out on his back so that she could ease her leg across him.
Her nightgown had slithered up. It was a crumpled knot at her waist. She didn’t care. She was lying on top of him, her body pressed along the length of his.
His big hands were on her hips, pulling her closer. She could feel the hard, wonderful ridge of his arousal through the thin silk of his boxers.
He wanted her.
And she wanted him. Surely they could make things good and right between them, now, tonight, on their wedding night.
She reached up to caress his face and felt the curving, puckered shape of the scar. And she moaned deep in her throat, in excitement. In pleasure. And also in sympathy for all he had suffered.
And then, out of nowhere, he froze. She made a soft, soothing sound. She stroked his shoulder, urging him to relax, to stay with her, to keep kissing her, touching her...
But he only shifted stiffly beneath her, tugging on her nightgown, smoothing it down to cover her. He eased her off him and gained the top position once more.
“Rafe, what—?”
He put a finger against her lips. She stared up at him through the darkness, waiting for him to explain himself, to tell her what had gone wrong.
But he didn’t explain a thing. After a moment, he stretched out beside her, pulling her close again, settling her head on his shoulder. “Let it alone for tonight,” he said quietly. “It will be all right.”
She wanted to believe him. But she didn’t, not really. And that had her thinking of Edward, for some reason.
Edward, slim and tall, with blue eyes and golden-brown hair. Edward was always so elegant, as sophisticated and charming as Rafe was stoic and tender. Edward had been the hero of her earliest fantasies. He used to flirt with her shamelessly. And she had thoroughly enjoyed every teasing glance and clever compliment.
Edward...
Maybe what they needed, she and Rafe, was