With a long breath, she faced the door and marched to it. She lifted her hand to knock and then hesitated. She was Jasper’s wife now. Did a wife knock? Did she just come in to show she was confident? It would be a lie, of course, but…

She cut off her thoughts by pushing the door open and caught her breath. It was a lovely chamber, with a large bed across the way. A fire burned on the back wall, brightening the room. And even if it hadn’t, there were dozens of candles and lamps lit to make the room glow in a romantic way.

If she’d thought Jasper might be sleeping, she was very wrong. Instead he stood beside the fire, poker in hand as he stirred the coals. When she entered, he pivoted toward her, the poker going slack in his fingers as he stared at her.

She stared back. Jasper had always been so pulled together, almost perfect. Even the day he had stripped her naked and pleasured her, he had remained entirely clothed. Tonight, he was not. While she had readied, so had he. His jacket and cravat were gone, his boots too, so that he was barefoot.

But the place her eyes went, could not tear away from, was his bare chest. He was shirtless and she could no longer breathe. He was spectacular, with a body that rivaled that of any statue in any garden or museum in all of England. All the world. He seemed to be formed from granite. He had defined shoulders, a broad chest, and there were ripples of muscle on his stomach. Muscles that trailed tantalizingly into the waist of trousers, which slung dangerously low, indeed.

She felt a little dizzy at the idea that she would be allowed to touch him tonight. He would touch her. And then they would truly be wed in the eyes of any entity that might question the union.

“You are lovely,” he said, and suddenly it felt like she could move again.

She smiled at him, trying to return focus to his face and not the shockingly bare chest displayed for what felt like her pleasure.

“Thank you,” she said. “I-I wasn’t certain if you would want me. I thought with it being so late you might wish to just sleep.”

His brows lifted. “You think after three days of being unable to think of anything except touching you that I would want to stay away tonight?”

She bit her lip. “You thought of me?”

He nodded. “Very much. Perhaps more than I should. But there it is.” He tilted his head. “Although if you are tired, I would never dream of making you—”

“I’m not tired,” she interrupted, her voice lifting. She blushed at her own ardor, revealed in three tiny words. “I want to be here.”

“Then come in,” he said with a half-smile. “And shut the door.”

She did so and caught her breath at what seemed like the exceedingly loud sound of the door clicking shut. Now they were alone in his chamber. And it was time for everything she both didn’t fully understand and yet wanted.