She’d never seen a man in such an unclothed state—but she presumed from her response that she rather liked it.
He allowed the perusal, patient, relaxed, a wry smile turning his lips, that enchanting dimple denting his cheek. “Do I pass muster?” he murmured after a charged pause, rotating the tiny screwdriver he held in his hand.
She nodded to the tool. “Do you work at all hours?”
He glanced at her bare toes peeping from the hem of her dress with a raised brow. “It’s what I have, Miss Mowbray. It’s what I have.”
She flushed, not about to tell him she’d raced from her attic bedchamber to his door without stockings or slippers. “Are you going to send me away?” she asked because he seemed to be guarding the room.
In response, Christian trailed the pointed tip of the screwdriver from the end of her ring finger to her wrist. She sucked in a gasp, her hand flexing, her knees trembling beneath her skirt. “Are you going to marry me, Raine? Not to sound missish, but if you want this”—he nodded to the bedchamber—“you’re going to have to marry me to get it. My body, mind, and soul are yours if you’ll agree to take them. But I won’t ruin you. I won’t. And I can’t share any more of myself and wonder if I’ll get it back. I’m in too deep for that.” He swallowed hard, his sapphire eyes darting to the floor, and she knew with such sweet simplicity that her roguish, complicated, brilliant watchmaker was as delicate of heart as she. “You fear being beholden, but what if I were to tell you I would be wholly beholden as well? What if we are worth more than any promise you made to yourself?” His gaze lifted, his earnestness smoothing away her fear like a plane to rough wood. “I won’t own you in any way you don’t own me.”
Encouraged by his passionate focus, she wiggled the screwdriver from his grasp and trailed it along the line of hair on his chest, over his ribs, halting at his navel. He blew out a startled breath and whispered her name beneath it. Two could play this game, she thought. And she’d always loved games. “You’ve decided then?”
His muscles quivered beneath the cool metal. “In 1810, as a matter of fact.”
She laughed, freely, joyously, astonished by her boldness. “What about the wenches?”
With a quick look down the thankfully deserted hallway, he grasped her wrist and dragged her into the room. “No more wenches. You, my lovely bluestocking, are more than enough for this lifetime.”
Turning, she rested against the door, the taper on the bedside table throwing a golden glow over a space that held his scent so firmly she felt a quiver run through her. Bluestocking. How odd. How enchanting. “Kit Bainbridge, if I tell you I love you more than I imagined possible, that I don’t want to be without you for another moment, that you are the most incredible man I’ve ever met, can I have a modest token of appreciation before the wedding? Our wedding.” She pressed her lips together, holding back her smile as he absorbed her adoring confession. “A kiss, perhaps. Like the one in the study earlier today. That little thing you did, when you nibbled on my bottom lip. Heavenly.”
“I think I can arrange that,” he whispered and reached, tugging her mobcap from her head and dropping it to the floor. Removed one hairpin at a time until her chignon collapsed over her shoulders in a golden shroud. “Your hair is divine. Never restrain it. Beautiful things should be able to follow their own will.” He filled his hand with the strands, trailing his fingers up the nape of her neck and bringing her against his hard body.
She caught his shoulders and swayed, melting into him. His skin was warm beneath her questing fingers, a smattering of hair on his chest, a mottled scar on his shoulder.
Tipping her head high, he captured her lips beneath his and circled her, once, twice, like they waltzed across a ballroom. He breathed into her mouth, used his tongue to engage and attack, unleashing her rabid hunger. Bowing into him, she threaded her arms around his neck and put every part of her lonely soul into the kiss, without hesitation or fear. Within moments, they were lost.
Obliterated, shattered.
When her hip bumped the bed, he halted, a fierce exhalation racing from his lips, his dazed eyes meeting hers. “Will that suffice? For the token of appreciation?”
Gazing at him, she searched her heart for what she wanted.
Not what society expected or what anyone would advise her to do. She searched for what she, Raine Mowbray, wanted. Obedience be damned, she thought. Presenting her back, she swept her hair over one shoulder, bowed her head. She could feel his moist breath against her neck as he leaned in but didn’t touch. Her awareness of another human being had never been this potent, desire connecting them as if the emotion held its own lifeforce.
“Undress me, Kit,” she whispered with a teasing look thrown back at him.
“Are you sure?” His pupils flared, a flood of dark black. “We have time. Thousands of nights.”
She closed her eyes as the screwdriver slipped from her hand to the carpet. “I love you. And I want our life, the ‘we’ you spoke of, to start right now.”
Goosebumps exploded along her arms as he went to work on her practical gown fit for summer servitude and nothing more, loosening the tie at her neck, releasing the hook and eyelets at her waist. The material drooped, and Christian swept his hand around her hips, pulling her back against his aroused body as his lips fell to her neck. Teeth nipping, tongue soothing, her muffled sigh expressed her arousal, her impatience.
“A slim form such as yours does not need a corset,” he
