To Sketch a Sphinx - Rebecca Connolly Page 0,56

his head against her, burying his face into her hair as his frame shook with relief and fear. “Ange,” he eventually managed. “My Ange…”

“I’m sorry.” Hal hiccupped and pressed him closer. “I’m so sorry, John. I should never have gone in there… I shouldn’t have risked… I shouldn’t…”

“Hush,” he murmured, sliding his lips to her ear, his arms encircling her back. “Nothing to be sorry for. This wasn’t your fault, darling. Couldn’t be.”

Another cry broke from her, and John could nearly feel an accompanying crumple in her body. “John… Forgive me…”

Swallowing hard, he lifted his head from her and brought his hands to her face, letting her slide until her feet touched the floor and pulling her slightly away from him. He cupped her cheeks, his thumbs smoothing the steady stream of tears away. “Ange… look at me.”

She opened her tear-splattered lashes, and the brightness of their shade almost startling in its beauty.

John brushed his thumb against her cheek again. “There is nothing to forgive. There is no blame to assign. You were magnificent, and brave beyond imagining. You risked everything for our assignment, as we should. As I should. But you… brilliant, breathtaking, beautiful you…” He shook his head, breaking off as his emotions surged. He leaned forward and pressed his lips to her brow fervently. “I’ve never been more proud or more terrified in my entire life.”

Hal’s face lifted, nuzzling against him. “I was so afraid for you.”

“For me?” he asked as his fingers began to thread through her hair. “When you were the one facing a room filled with our enemies?”

“That was nothing,” she whispered, her hands gripping at his coat, sliding towards his neck. “It was leaving without you that I couldn’t bear. Not knowing…” She exhaled, the air dancing across his neck, sending shivers down his spine. “I’m never leaving without you again. I can’t.”

John groaned against her, the words echoing the sentiments that had haunted him all night. He tilted her face towards him, and his lips found hers almost at once. The contact stilled them both, heartbeats pounding between them, every sense attuning itself to that tenuous, powerful connection.

One of them sighed, possibly him, and then there was no hesitation, no pause. His lips molded to hers, blending with them in a heady fusion of familiarity and newness, dancing in a pattern that knew no tutor, needed no guidance. She arched into him, her hands pulling at his neck, fusing them together with an insistence that spurred him on. Yet her lips were tender and giving, generous in their attentions and gentle in their replies.

For it was a conversation between them, the revealing of every admiring look, every teasing smile, every moment of connection that had been steadily building. Words that could not be uttered were shared in each pass of lips, the stroke of each finger. This was no moment of sheer passion; it eclipsed anything that could be so easily written of, so lightly defined.

This was nothing like he had ever known, and nothing he would ever know again.

Slowly, gradually, and with grazing encores, the kisses began to fade, their hold on each other relaxing, their bodies softening against one another until they simply stood in the center of the room, holding each other without speaking.

There was something to be said for being held by the person one loved.

And even more for holding them yourself.

Hal sighed as she burrowed her face into his chest, her arms now loosely wrapped about his back. “How did you get out of there?”

John smiled, quite sure he would never be able to do anything else while holding her in his arms.

“Ruse,” he murmured, his fingers running through her hair as his chin rested atop her head. “He knew the servants’ corridors well and scuttled me out through them. Then we darted about the streets of Paris until we arrived home. I think there were some brutes sent after us, but I never saw for sure. You?”

“Skean.” She leaned back just a little, smiling up at him. “The operative Ruse mentioned. It would seem he is quite familiar with my family and is rather an enigma. I liked him, once I decided to trust him. He bade me keep up my swooning spells, settled me into the parlor I was rumored to be in, and even convinced Jean that I was unwell. He posed as you for the Voclains’ servants and brought me home in our coach. I hope you don’t mind.”

Chuckling, John kissed her softly.