Some part of Celine knew they’d done this dance before. Knew how much Bastien despised ceding ground to anyone.
When he gazed at her like that, Celine thought she might catch flame. Bastien leaned closer, as if he might kiss her. Stopped a hairsbreadth from her face. “Go home, Celine,” he whispered, his words a cool brush across her ear. “Don’t come back here again.”
Celine snared his forearm before he could leave. The touch of her bare skin to his sent a jolt of awareness through her body. Bastien wrenched free as if he’d been scalded. Nearly stumbled before he caught himself. As if he were the one who should be afraid of her.
As if she had been haunting him this entire time, too.
Celine’s mouth fell open in amazement. She’d been wrong before. She did matter to him. Mattered more than he would dare to admit.
“It’s guilt, isn’t it?” she asked. “You are racked with guilt.”
He said nothing. Only stared at her, his chest rising and falling in time with her pulse.
“I’ll absolve you of your guilt,” she said. “I’ll do as you ask and never come here again.”
“What do you want in return?”
“Just one thing.”
Bastien kept silent.
“It won’t cost you a penny, nor will it involve anyone but you,” Celine continued. “And it can be granted in a moment.”
He pursed his lips in consideration. “You won’t say what it is?”
“Not before you agree to do as I ask.”
“You swear never to seek me out again.”
She nodded. “Do you agree?”
Another beat passed in weighted silence. Then he nodded.
Celine did not waste time. “I want you to kiss me.”
She expected him to be angry. To refuse outright. Instead he took a careful breath, as if he were making a study of the air around her. An emotion Celine could not identify rippled across his face. Then Bastien took her chin in his hand and leaned forward.
The closer he came, the faster her pulse raced. He smelled of leather and bergamot, mixed with something strange. Something cold and bracing, like a winter frost. The stillness around them grew, the silence becoming a low hum. She closed her eyes and angled her face toward his.
Bastien pressed a chaste kiss to her forehead.
When he pulled away, Celine threw her arms around his neck and slanted her lips to his.
It wasn’t what she’d expected. Her memories weren’t returned to her in a flash, as if she’d woken from a dreamless sleep. This was not that kind of fairy tale.
But Celine knew, the instant they kissed.
She’d wanted to free the chains around her mind.
Instead this kiss unlocked her, body and soul.
Bastien surrendered as Celine melted against him. The next instant his hands framed either side of her face. He couldn’t break away from this any more than she could.
This was as inevitable as death.
“Celine,” Bastien whispered into her skin, sending a delicious thrill down her spine. His fingers threaded through her hair, her curls loosening at his touch. Celine brushed her tongue across his lower lip, and Bastien deepened the kiss, one of his hands sliding to the small of her back. Celine didn’t realize they’d moved until they ran into the edge of a table.
Bastien lifted her onto the polished oak, trailing kisses down the side of her neck. Celine knew he could feel the way her pulse raced through her veins. The way she bowed into his touch. He shuddered when she pulled him even closer, her fingers shifting to the buttons of his shirt.
Celine turned her head and arched into Bastien. His grip tightened on her hips as he stepped between her thighs.
Then he stopped moving, his face buried along her collarbone, ragged breaths flying from his mouth.
“Bastien?” Celine asked.
He did not move.
“What’s wrong?” she asked, the words breathless.
He pulled away from her in a blur, faster than she could blink. It took Celine a moment to regain her bearings. To realize how close they’d come to complete indecency. Her bodice was askew, her breasts spilling over the top of her silk dress. Once her feet touched the floor, Celine stood on unsteady legs.
“Bastien?” she repeated. “What’s wrong?”
He did not turn around. “I gave you what you wanted,” he said. “Never come here again.”
Then he made his way up the stairs, never once looking back.
PIPPA
This was a ghastly mistake. The kind of mistake worthy of a cautionary tale.
Here lies Philippa Montrose, a girl who knew better.
It was certainly poor form for an engaged woman to be standing in a