“Someday I’ll kiss you…right here.” His fingers had stroked her agonized flesh, somehow knowing precisely how to touch her to elicit a shiver or a whimper.
That had shocked her enough to wrench a protest from her lungs. “No,” she’d said desperately. “That’s…that has to be wrong.”
His chuckle had singed her ear. “I promise you’ll like it.”
She’d thrashed her head in denial, but he had shocked her yet further by putting truth to Nora’s claims on the matter of physical intimacy, and breaching her body with one long finger, stealing the startled cry from her mouth with a kiss. She had hovered there on the precipice of something terrible and wonderful, as he’d invaded her body in that strange new way, working a kind of dark magic on her.
And he had whispered in her ear, “I would do it now, except that I don’t know what sort of sounds you’ll make, and I don’t trust you not to scream your pleasure for the whole theatre to hear. I’m going to have you, Jilly, but not because you’re forced into it. You’re going to marry me because you want to, because you want me.” And then he had done something particularly wicked, and shoved her straight over into paradise, and she would have screamed had he not blanketed her mouth with his, smothering it before it could erupt.
She had never experienced anything like it. She hadn’t known that that kind of bliss existed. Nora had been right—it wasn’t at all dignified, but somehow that made it all the better. That neither of them had been dignified or polite or proper, and it had still been the most glorious moment of her life.
And he had known it. And despite the licentious words he’d filled her ears with, he’d gathered her so gently into his arms, holding her when her legs would have failed to support her, crooning soothing nonsense to her as if he had known how he had shattered her, how devastating she had found his touch.
He had straightened and smoothed her skirts, had managed, even in the darkness, to tuck her stray curls back into place. And then he had kissed her, not fiercely as he had before, not with a surfeit of passion, but so tenderly that she could almost believe that he did hold some affection for her. And his hands had stroked her back, her shoulders, the nape of her neck with soothing sweeps, as if he had thought she needed the comfort he provided. And she had—she didn’t know why, but she had. She should have felt ashamed. She had been raised better than to act as she had. Instead she had felt cherished, protected. As much as he had jeopardized her reputation with his carefully-orchestrated seduction, he had also protected it. It was a level of courtesy that she had grown not to expect from men.
And then he had whispered into her ear, “I’ve already procured a special license.