The Truth about Love

“Oh…”

He looked into her eyes, was drowning in them…With a mental curse, he shut his. “Don’t do that.”

“What?”

He gritted his teeth, and kept his eyes shut. “Look at me as if you want me to kiss you again.”

She didn’t reply. Three heartbeats passed.

He was debating whether to open his eyes when her soft whisper reached him.

“I’m not good at lying.”

Five words, and she vanquished him. Overthrew that part of his mind that was fighting to maintain control, and cast him adrift. Into the sea of desire that welled in her eyes as they met his when he lifted his lids.

She searched his eyes, hesitated for a heartbeat, then lifted her lips to his. Touched lightly.

He could no more resist the explicit invitation than stop the sun from sinking beneath the sea.

Summoning what restraint he could, he kissed her back, then, unable to deny her or himself, he pressed the caress further, aware that, just as he had expectations of the kiss, so, too, would she. He wondered what they were, why…but then he traced her lower lip with the tip of his tongue, her lips parted, and he stopped thinking.

Jacqueline quivered as his tongue slid between her lips, held her breath as he shifted and gathered her deeper into an embrace that, no matter how alien, felt safe. His arms were steel bands, caging her, but protectively, his chest a muscled wall of comforting solidity against her breasts. His lips moved on hers, impressing, engaging. Tentatively she met his questing tongue with hers, lightly stroked-and sensed his encouragement, his appreciation.

She relaxed, secure in his arms, and mirrored his actions. There was heat in the exchange, persuasive and tempting, beguiling yet contained, not overwhelming but tantalizing, a promise of more, later. For now, she was content returning his caresses. Raising one hand, she lightly traced his cheek, the angular planes quite different from her own, cloaked in abrading stubble lacing firm skin.

By subtle degrees, he deepened the kiss and she, knowingly, followed. With growing confidence she kissed him back-and gloried in his response, in the continuing exchange that spun out in delight and mutual pleasure.

The reciprocity, for she knew it was so, caught her, and held her enthralled.

She tasted like summer wine, heady and sweet, potent and warm. Faintly illicit, carrying the promise of dark sultry nights and stirring passion. Now he’d learned, now he’d savored, he should draw back, yet still Gerrard lingered. The question of what she sought from the kiss returned; he now knew she’d shared few kisses, if any, before, not like this.

The reluctance he felt to end the interlude was not solely on his own account.

And that surprised him. Who was leading whom, and was that safe? The question gave him the strength to act, to gradually draw back and lift his head.

He watched as she opened her eyes, as she blinked and refocused on his. He’d kissed many ladies in far more illicit encounters, yet this time his charm didn’t come to his aid. No glib words sprang to his tongue, no suave smile to his lips. This time, he didn’t want to end the moment, didn’t want to let her go; despite his experience, he couldn’t pretend he did.

Looking into her eyes, a glorious medley of greens and gold, he could only hold her, and wonder…

Jacqueline saw his equivocation, felt it in the arms surrounding her that didn’t ease. She comprehended something of what she read in his eyes; she, too, felt…distracted. As if she’d just experienced something that was important to explore further, but…the moment was already slipping away.

Her hands had come to rest against his chest; she found a half smile and gently pushed back. After an instant’s hesitation, his arms eased, and he released her.

“The sun’s almost gone.” She looked down the valley to where the burning orb of the sun was disappearing below the horizon. Shifting along the coping, she glanced his way. “We should go inside. It’ll soon be time to change for dinner.”

He nodded and stood. He picked up his sketch pad, stuffed the pencils in his pocket, then he looked at her, and held out his hand.

She met his gaze, then placed her fingers in his and let him help her to her feet.

He released her once she was steady. Together they turned, and, side by side, without words, walked up through the gardens.

With one long, shared glance, they parted on the terrace.

7

Late that night with the moon riding the sky, Gerrard stood in the balcony doorway of his bedroom staring moodily out at the silvered gardens, and considered where fate had led him.

Not by the nose, but by another part of his anatomy, together with a section of his psyche he hadn’t previously known existed.

He could hardly claim he hadn’t known what he was doing, that he hadn’t been cognizant of the dangers, the risks. He’d known, but had acted anyway; he couldn’t remember when last he’d been so heedlessly impulsive.

Arms folded, he leaned against the doorjamb; eyes fixed unseeing on the shadows below, he tried to get some mental purchase on what, precisely what, was driving him. It wasn’t anything he’d experienced before.

He knew what he wanted: Jacqueline. He’d wanted her from the moment he’d seen her watching him through the window when he’d arrived at Hellebore Hall-but what was driving him to it? The compulsion that was growing day by day, pressing him to make her his-from where did that spring?

Lust was certainly there, familiar enough, yet this was lust of a different order, an unusual degree. He’d lusted after ladies before; it didn’t feel like this. With Jacqueline, the drive came from deeper within him, from some more primitive, more intense realm of emotion…Words, as always, failed him, yet if he painted it, it would glow with myriad shades of red, all the varied hues, not just one.

The vision shone in his mind. After a moment, he shifted his shoulders, then settled back against the frame.

His reaction to her, his fascination with her, was only half his problem. The other half was her fascination with him. He was aware of that to his bones; every little twitch, every instinctive feminine response she made, he felt like a sharpened spur, digging in, heightening his awareness of her, stirring his lust, and the need to slake it.

Never before had he been in the grip of such elemental and reckless desire.

That was what had led to that kiss. Then her curiosity, her directness, had snared him, and drawn him with her into deeper waters.

Unwise. He’d known it at the time, but hadn’t called a halt, as he could have done.

Worse, he knew beyond doubt that it would happen again, and it wouldn’t end with just a kiss. If he stayed and painted the portrait he was now desperate to paint, met the irresistible challenge fate had laid before him and painted the work she and her father wanted and needed him to paint…

For long minutes, he stood gazing out at the night-shrouded gardens, grappling with what he now faced. If he stayed and painted Jacqueline’s portrait, he would risk falling in love with her.

Would the passion, the lust, the desire-all that love encompassed-drain the passion he drew on to paint? Or were the two separate? Or complementary?

Those were the questions he hadn’t wanted to face, that he’d hoped, at least for the next several years, to leave unbroached.

But they faced him now, and he didn’t know the answers.

And could think of only one way to learn them.

Yet if he took that route and the answer to his first question was yes…he would have risked and lost all he was.

Resigning Lord Tregonning’s commission and leaving Hellebore Hall immediately was the only way to avoid putting those questions to the test. The ultimate test. A good portion of his mind, the logical, cautious side of him, strongly urged leaving as the most sensible course.