Her lips parted at his demand that she confess her most terrible desire. Her betrayal of her sister, even if Anne had clearly not given a damn.

“Jasper—” She tried to tug away, but he kept her close.

“Please don’t run,” he said. “I won’t judge you. I cannot, if truth be told, because I knew it was you, Thomasina. I knew and I wanted to kiss you so badly that I could hardly maintain control over myself.”

She stared at him, at that renewed flare of desire that burned in his gaze. She felt every flex of his fingers against her arm, and the wall of his body heat curled around her and made her want to sink into him and disappear forever.

“Yes,” she whispered, her voice cracking. “I wanted you to kiss me. I hated myself for it, but I wanted that so badly that night.”

He smiled. “And when I did finally kiss you right before I left, did you want…more?”

“More kissing?” she asked.

He nodded, a jerky motion. “I—yes. More kissing, but did you also ache, deep within yourself, perhaps in a way you don’t fully understand? Did you want something more than the kissing, something that keeps you awake at night, something that makes you…need?”

She was shocked to find he had exactly described her constant struggle since he kissed her. Her mind had flown so many times to what might have happened next. What would happen on their wedding night, an act that had only been described in the barest of details by scandalized female figures who mostly seemed to see the act as one to be borne, not enjoyed. And yet when Jasper touched her, she wanted to know more.

She wanted to feel more.

“Thomasina.” Her name was a prayer, begged from his lips, filled with far more meaning than it ever had before.

“Yes,” she burst out. “I wanted more. I want more now.”

“Good.” His shoulders rolled forward in further relief. “I want to touch you and taste you and pleasure you. I want to explore that need, that passion. Do you think you could do that even if you knew I might not ever offer you my heart?”

She shivered, aching to give him exactly what he had just denied he could return. Aching to give him the body he wanted over anything else.

But she had one tiny hesitation. One thing she had to know. “Did you…did you ask the same of my sister?”

He flinched at that question, as if it were abhorrent. “Never,” he reassured her. “Wrong as it may be, I never wanted Anne. I want you.”

She had spent her life feeling interchangeable with Anne and Juliana, part of a unit and not an individual. But this man…he saw her as more. That didn’t seem to be a lie or a manipulation. When he said he wanted her…she believed him.

And in that moment, she couldn’t say anything but, “Yes.”

His mouth dropped against hers and his arms came around her, dragging her against him as he devoured her with far more passion than he had allowed in the driveway the day before. He tasted her, coaxing her lips to part, delving inside to tease and explore while her legs shook.