Aimée widened those blue eyes at him. “It is not his wealth you should worry about losing. It is his regard. He is your father. Your family. It would be a great sorrow for you to lose him.”
As she had lost her family.
Remorse seized Lucien. “I’m sorry, I’m a brute. I didn’t think . . . I didn’t realize . . .”
Aimée shook her head. “No brute. Perhaps no angel, either. But I think you are a very good man.” Standing on tiptoe, she brushed her lips against his cheek. “Thank you for helping Finch.”
He was not good.
But he felt, at that moment, very much a man. God help them both.
He stopped in the snow and placed his hands on her shoulders, turning her to face him. She stared gravely up at him, her eyes clear and unafraid.
With a groan of longing and surrender, he covered her mouth with his.
Lucien’s kiss was warm and firm and seeking, his lips parted. Aimée could feel the heat and moisture of his mouth, and an answering heat and moisture rose in her, in her stomach and br**sts and between her thighs. He pressed against the seam of her lips and then he . . . Yes, he did, he put his tongue right in her mouth, shocking and delicious.
Her toes curled in pleasure.
She ought to stop him. She knew the dangers of indulging in desire. She had too much sense to throw away her heart on an inappropriate liaison.
But what had her good sense ever gotten her but alone? For years, she had been starved of affection, of connection, of simple human touch. She was hungry for life.
For Lucien.
The branch she was holding slithered to the ground. He licked into her mouth, coaxing, exploring, and she grabbed the lapels of his coat and sucked eagerly at his tongue.
Heaven.
His tongue stroked, dabbled, thrust. Against her stomach she could feel that part of him, the part she had glimpsed when he rose from his bath. A picture of him formed in her mind, large, dark, exciting. She squirmed against him, trying to get a better fit between their two bodies. His hands slid from her shoulders to her upper arms, lifting her, aiding her.
There. She shivered in delight.
He raised his head, his eyes dark and penetrating. A flush stained his cheekbones. “You are cold.”
She was tingling. Melting. “No.”
Don’t stop.
His hands tightened again on her upper arms before he put her gently from him. “We have been gone too long already.”
Disappointment speared her. Disappointment and desire. “There is a gamekeeper’s cottage close by.” Her heart beat faster at her own daring. Her knees trembled. “We could shelter there.”
His muscles were rigid. He did not move. Indeed, she almost fancied he did not breathe.
He exhaled. “I will not risk your reputation more than I have already.”
She honored him for his concern. How could she not? But she also saw her opportunity to know passion, to feel close and loved and alive, slipping away. She had no illusions. Lucien had made her no promises. But she was terribly afraid that if she did not grasp at life now, she would regret it all the long and empty years to come.
“It is my reputation,” she said. “My risk. My choice.”
Lucien stared down at her, an arrested expression on his face.
For a moment her words seemed to echo between them. My life. My choice.
For no reason at all, her heart stood still.
“Sometimes our choices have consquences beyond what we can imagine,” he said at last. His face was flat, unreadable. “Let me take you back.”