Her confusion had been calmed, but the pain still burned. It flared and scorched her, turning the love poignant and aching. She clutched him closer and kissed him harder so that the tears that wanted to spill out might not come. She wanted to hold all of him to her, in her, so that their union would let her forget for a while that this was the last time they would know this bliss.

His response grew harder, controlling. Wrapping her in an embrace, he sat back on his heels and angled her body across his. Supporting her in his arms, his kisses moved to her neck and breasts. His fingers worked on her back, and her gown’s lacing loosened. Sliding the shoulders of her cotehardie and gown down, he exposed her breasts.

He broke the kiss as he caressed them. He looked at his hand move as if the dark did not obscure his sight. With titillating touches he provoked an insistent, anxious arousal in her body. It joined the emotions pouring through her, deepening them, joining them all into one relentless ache.

Laying her down, he moved on top of her. He loosened his lower garment and lifted her skirt, and then nestled between her naked legs with his hips pressed against her thighs. She accepted his deep kiss, expecting him to take her the way her heart and soul needed.

He stopped the kiss, but did not move. He looked down at her face. She could feel him all along her body, warming her as he had promised, pressing against her vulva but not entering. It reminded her of their first night, and it incited the same crazed desire in her.

Above his head and shoulders, around them both, stretching into eternity, she could see the stars of the endless sky.

“Are you waiting for me to beg, Mark?”

“That is not what I am waiting for.”

“Then what?”

“I want you so badly that I almost took you in that chamber. However, I have decided that this time it should be slow and careful and full of pretty words.”

This time. The last time.

His head dipped, and he kissed her breast. His tongue swirled, creating wonderful sensations. Not just those of desire. Not only physical arousal spiked. He did not only give her pleasure.

It was the same for him. She could tell. Could feel his heart speaking to her. She heard the sadness in their silence.

She knew which pretty words needed saying, and she could not deny them. Stroking her fingers through his hair, holding his mouth to her. “I love you, Mark. It was never just simple pleasure. That was the danger, wasn’t it? Look where it has brought us now.”