In the end, she said nothing, because—the baby having been tucked in his bed—Wick pinned her against the wall and kissed her until she was melting against him, and instead of carefully crafted questions designed to make him realize that he should marry her . . . well, he seemed to like those soft sounds she made when he kissed her, which was good because the way he kissed her, put together with the way he touched her, made her intoxicated. Even more intoxicated than old Fettle, when he was lying in the road singing.

The next night was the same, and the night after that. All during the daylight hours, she mulled over ways to make Wick marry her. Somehow. Because if he didn’t ask her soon—well, she really did have to write her father. She had begun to feel horribly guilty, certain that he was worried to death about what had become of her.

But when the nighttimes came, and Wick found her in the portrait gallery, their eyes would meet, and all those anxieties would fly from her mind. The world would shrink to fit that room. She would shiver if his arm touched hers, bite her lip at the look in his eyes.

And then, when Jonas was in his cradle, she would slip into Wick’s arms as naturally as the baby had settled down to sleep. Once she was there, the world disappeared entirely, and the only thought in her mind was a dazed wish to know more of him. Wick was like the best present she’d ever received, a gift wrapped in hundreds of different layers. Every night she learned something new, something that the rest of the world didn’t know.

He kept vital parts of himself secret, even from his own brother. Yet she’d found the magic key that shook him free of that enormous reserve: she kissed him and kissed him. Slowly, his face would change, move from its implacable cheer into something wilder and fiercer. A look that was for her alone. A look that came close—very close—to revealing a Wick who was no longer in control.

But every time she tried to coax him over that final barrier, allowing her hand (scandalously) to brush his thighs, or even, one night, arching against him like the worst kind of Jezebel . . .

He never broke. She could feel him tremble, hear the groan in his voice, but his self-control held.

And every time she tried to bring up the subject of their relationship, he withdrew. In a second his face would change to that of a calm and unmoved butler. He would bid her a polite good-bye and leave, closing the door politely, and quietly, behind him. Still . . . he came back the next night, as if he couldn’t stay away.