The Importance of Being Wanton - Christi Caldwell Page 0,107
Of which there were so many.
She sighed, and leaned her head against his shoulder. “We always see ourselves through the lenses of how the world views us, until it distorts our vision and . . . we can’t even truly see clearly who we are. But you . . . ?” Emma’s eyes roved over his face. “I have learned these past weeks, and in these past minutes, who you are.”
“And who am I?” he entreated, because he’d been lost so long he felt like a mere facade of a man, an empty shadow of a person.
“You really don’t know?” she said softly.
Some emotion stuck painfully in his throat, something that felt like tears, and he struggled to swallow around it.
“You’re a man who has put his family first when most any other man would have never made that sacrifice. You are a man who would storm across streets to save women.”
“You didn’t need saving,” he pointed out. She’d been gloriously in control, and marvelous in her spirit.
Her expression grew contemplative. “There are different ways to save a person, Charles. You have done far more than you ever give yourself credit for.”
Because it had been so very easy to focus on all the ways in which he’d failed his sister. “I stole your idea.”
Emma smiled wryly. “Yes, well, there is that. Perhaps don’t remind me of that,” she said, startling a laugh from him, transforming dark into light as she did. Her teasing smile faded, and a glimmer lit her eyes. “You made the idea your own.”
“I’m rubbish at it,” he said in honesty. For with Emma, it was somehow easy to speak of his failings.
Emma scoffed. “You’re rubbish at it? Charles”—she framed his face between her palms and squeezed slightly, shaking his head back and forth—“you managed to call the interest of some of the most respected women, friends I hold dear.”
“Because of . . .” He winced, unable to complete the rest of that thought.
“What?” Emma released him, that twinkle back in her eyes. “Because you and Landon are dashing rogues whom ladies are eager to interact with? That may have been part of it”—she paused—“at first. But many of them are women I know. And respect. If curiosity about two rogues running a club drew them in, whatever it was you shared at your meetings? It kept them there.” She pressed her palms against his chest. “You created a forum for people to come together, and did so in a way that uses literature they love.” Emma darted out her tongue, the tip of it trailing along that flesh that continued to torment his days and his nights with equal fervor. “That is the manner of gentleman who is honorable, Charles.” She paused. “The manner of man I could see myself spending my life with.”
His heart forgot its function was beating. He frantically moved his gaze over her face. “What are you saying?”
Emma smoothed his lapels the way a devoted, loving wife might, tempting him all the more with that promise. “I am saying I want us . . . to try. To be a couple without our parents’ interference. Not because of the arrangement they had, but because . . . we want to.”
He briefly closed his eyes. And just like that, she offered him all he’d ever wanted, and had discovered he wanted only after she’d gone.
Her expression wavered. “Unless you don’t—”
“I do!” he blurted, and touched his brow to hers. “I want that very much, Emma.”
She smiled and tilted up her head.
Charles lowered his to meet her, but she drew back.
He stared at her questioningly.
“I will have you know that this does not mean I don’t intend to woo back my former members, Lord Scarsdale,” she whispered against his lips.
“You may try, Miss Gately.” Charles nuzzled at her neck, laving the place where her pulse beat.
“O-oh, I intend to do far m-more thannn”—Charles suckled on the shell of her lobe—“Mmm.”
“What was that?” he teased.
“I was going to say something about . . .” Charles kissed the remainder of that admission from her lips in a brief meeting of their mouths.
Her lashes fluttered, and when she opened them, a dazed little glimmer shone within those blue depths, one he reveled in. “What was I going to say?” she breathed to herself.
“That you’d won the battles, but I would win the war.”
And then twining her arms about his neck, she drew herself up on tiptoe and pressed against him. “Yes, but in the reverse, Lord Scarsdale.”