Winter's Whispers (The Wicked Winters #10) - Scarlett Scott Page 0,54
are you doing here?”
Christ. That was not the reaction he had been hoping for.
He straightened. “Waiting for you.”
“You are the perfect gentleman?” she asked, lips parting.
He wanted to kiss her senseless. To toss her over his shoulder and carry her away from everyone and everything.
“I’m neither a gentleman nor perfect,” he answered, flashing her a grin, the one he knew showed his dimple. “But I am the man who loves you.”
Her hazel eyes went wide. “You…what?”
“I love you, Felicity.” It was deuced difficult to make his confession past the knot rising in his throat, but he managed the words.
Had to. No choice. This was not a game of vingt-et-un. This was the rest of his life. If he wanted to win the lady, there was no bluffing.
“You love me?”
She looked as if she were about to call for her smelling salts.
“I think I fell in love with you the moment I saw your arse.” His grin deepened.
“Blade,” she chastised, her cheeks turning that utterly charming shade of pink he adored.
Adored?
Hell, yes.
It was a word he never would have used before. But it was a word that went quite well with the way he felt about the woman before him. The woman who mothered a lost kitten and planned to sacrifice her future for the sisters she loved. The woman who was bold and brave, who looked past his faults and saw him as a man instead of a lowborn bastard from the rookeries.
The woman he wanted to make his wife.
“What?” he teased her with feigned innocence. “I was referring to the day you were poking about beneath my bed, trying to rescue your kitten. Not last night.”
Predictably—and deliciously—her color heightened. “You did not see my bottom last night.”
“Oh yes, love, I did. And I assure you, it was as beautiful as the rest of you.”
Also true. Moreover, he could not bloody wait to see it again.
“Do you truly love me?” she blurted next.
Ah, now they were back to the proper subject. “Yes. I truly love you.”
Belatedly, it occurred to him that she had not made any declaration of her own feelings. That it was entirely possible he was alone in the way he felt. That she did not love him back.
He told himself he would make the best of whatever situation he was presented with. If she did not love him now, perhaps she could grow to love him in time. He could love her enough for the both of them, he was certain.
“Oh, Blade.” She bit her lip, her hazel eyes glistening. “I love you too.”
Thank fuck for that. It would have been bloody awful if she hadn’t. No denying it.
Blade would have hauled her into his arms and kissed her until they were both breathless, but then he recalled they were not in their proper place just yet. He intended to get this business right.
He held his hand out for her. “Come with me.”
She settled her hand in his without hesitation, their fingers entwining. “Where are you taking me?”
“Not far,” he promised.
Only to the mistletoe. Not that he required an excuse to kiss her. But everything about this moment felt sacred. He did not want to ask her to marry him by the door.
She went with him. “Loving each other changes nothing. I still have to marry well for the sakes of my sisters, and you have no wish to wed. Do you?”
He stopped them beneath the mistletoe and took both her hands in his. “Marry me.”
“Marry you?”
Damnation, he had meant to say something flowery and sweet. Something about how he was not a gentleman, but he would do everything in his power to become the husband she deserved and no less. He had not even asked her. Rather, he had issued the words as a demand. If he could, he would have kicked his own arse. He had no excuse save the anxiousness swirling within him, along with the fear of her refusal.
His hands trembled. Quite embarrassing, that.
He took a deep breath and tried again. “What I meant to say was I ain’t a gentleman. No secret there. You won’t be marrying well if you marry me. But you will be marrying a man who loves you. A man who will do everything to try to make himself worthy of you. I may be from the East End and born on the wrong side of the blanket, but…”
She held a finger to his lips. “Stop. Stop talking. You want to marry me?”
He nodded, because her finger was