Della did not give Ash a chance to respond to her declaration before she took a taste of his mouth. She sank onto his thighs and prepared to besiege him.
Ash grasped her gently by the arms, as if he thought to lift her off his lap. “Della, we need to talk, to think this through.”
“Talk later, love now.” Inside her head, arguments and misgivings were as noisy as a group of musicians all intent on practicing a different etude at the same time. “I will think myself into a taking, but when I kiss you…”
He cupped her elbows. “When you kiss me?”
She rested her forehead against his. “Everything is lovely when I kiss you, and lovelier when you kiss me back.”
He smoothed her hair off her brow and obliged her, his lips lazy and sweet against her mouth, on her eyelids, on her forehead. The cacophonous debate in her head gradually grew quieter. The anxious roiling in her belly eased.
She took Ash’s hand and pressed it over her breast. That he didn’t jerk away, rise, and leave at a dead run encouraged her.
Though he did shift his hand to her back, urging her against him. “Della, you haven’t said you’ll marry me. I will not take that which can be given only once.”
“You can’t take it,” Della said, cuddling close. “I gave it to Freddy Throckmorton.”
“Who?”
“Some cousin or other of our neighbors in Kent. Freddy was very dashing. I was an idiot, and the cherry cordial was much stronger than it tasted. Freddy was forever offering me cherry cordial that summer. When Freddy went back to university, I was honestly relieved.”
“You didn’t miss your first love?” Ash sounded more amused than dismayed.
“He wasn’t my love. He was a rake-in-training who might have turned me into a sot. I had a narrow escape. Might you resume kissing me, please?”
Ash stroked her back in slow, smooth caresses. “I’m deciding whether I should invite Freddy Throckmorton into the ring with me at Jackson’s.”
“You can’t. He married some American and left England before my come out.” Why won’t you kiss me? Della would normally have put the question to Ash directly, but the soothing movement of his hands on her back suggested she was—as usual—fretting over nothing.
“My first was my Greek tutor’s housekeeper,” Ash said. “Lovely woman, probably ten years my senior, and while I don’t recall much Greek, I have very fond memories of the instruction I received from her.”
“You won’t let me ravish you, will you?”
“You sound gratifyingly disappointed.”
Della was actually quite comfortable, bundled into Ash’s embrace, drowsing on his shoulder while he rubbed her back.
“I have it in my head,” Della said, “that you will think up some noble reason why we must not marry, but if I can compromise you, then you won’t abandon me again.”
His hand stilled, then resumed stroking her. “I am sorry, Della, for not explaining to you at the time why I left Town. I was fine one day—better than fine—and the next, the beast had me in its grip. Sycamore put me in the coach with instructions to the coachy to deliver me to Dorning Hall in one piece. I don’t recall much of the journey.”
“No apology needed. May I ravish you now?”
He anchored his hand at her nape and shook her gently. “We must talk first.”
Della sat up, the better to read his expression. “About?”
His gaze was serious, his grip on her neck gentle. “I would rather avoid the near occasion of fatherhood for the present.”
Della traced his lips with her index finger. “You don’t want a seven-months firstborn? I suppose there will be talk, between my elopement with Chastain and being found behind a closed door with you.”
He shook his head. “That has nothing to do with it. My concern is that I am not fit to raise children. You are an adult, and should I become incapacitated, you can turn to others for support. A child ought to have a father he or she can rely on.”
In all of her worrying and what-if-ing, Della hadn’t foreseen this difficulty. “You don’t want children?”
“That’s not what I said, Della. I said I would not be a reliable parent. I don’t want to be a father unless I can be a good father. At present, I cannot make that promise.”
Could a man have too much honor? “I never thought to have a white marriage, Ash Dorning, but if those are your terms, then I can live with them.”