A Scot in the Dark (Scandal & Scoundrel #2)(82)

And while he did it, while he protected her, Lily would remain in a box high above the stage, and fall in love with Stanhope.

He gritted his teeth at the thought.

It was what was best for her. It was the way she would survive everything—the gossip, the rumors, the truth. The earl was obviously keen on her, and willing to overlook her past. The money helped, no doubt. But he seemed a decent fellow.

One Lily deserved. One who might one day be worthy of her love.

Unlike Alec.

He exhaled harshly, turning down the hallway to what was kindly referred to as the master’s suite, ignoring the long shelves of figurines and collected useless rubbish, aching for sleep. For a night unconsumed by fits of self-loathing and the nearly unbearable desire to rise and go to Lily. And fall into her arms and make love to her until the past had fallen away and the present was all there was.

And she was all there was.

He shook his head, reaching for the handle to his rooms, desperate to put her away from his thoughts even as he knew he would not be able to. Even as he knew he would enter the room and strip himself bare and take to the bed, hard with the memories of her hands and mouth and mind.

He pressed his forehead to the great mahogany door, shame and desire flooding him, making him desperate to turn around and head for Grosvenor Square, and take her. Make her his. Revel in her, and damn the consequences.

He willed his breath calm, his hands still.

Three days. He could stay away from her for three days.

He opened the door, already dreading the room’s cluttered decor and the small, spindly-legged bed with its flimsy canopy. Inside, candlelight spilled across the floor, warm and golden. Hardy lifted his head from his spot at the foot of the bed, tail thumping on the heavy coverlet.

But Alec wasn’t looking at the dog.

He was looking at Lily, fast asleep at the center of the bed, in a pool of golden candlelight.

Wearing nothing but his plaid.

A better man would leave her. Close the door and find another bed. Another house. Another country.

A better man would have the strength to protect her from himself, the greatest danger she would ever face. The man who would claim her, keep her . . . despite being desperately, wholly unworthy of her.

He was not a better man.

His hand tightened on the door handle. He had tried to be. He had wanted to be. But now, here, bearing witness to her utter perfection, he no longer had the strength for it.

He ached for her. He wanted her. He wished for her.

It had only ever been her.

And in that moment, everything he was, everything he would ever be, was hers. And tonight, perhaps, he could fool himself into believing that she was his.

He looked to Hardy, pointed to the hallway. “Out.”

The dog followed the order instantly.

Alec closed the door, already heading for her. He stopped at the bedside, looking down at her as she slept, her hair a pool of auburn fire against the crisp linen. The bed was not too small. It was the perfect size for her—a fairy queen in her bower. She moved, one bare shoulder peeking out from the red tartan—pink and perfect and calling to him. He could not help himself. He groaned.

She opened her eyes at the sound, immediately finding his, as though the universe had connected them with a string. She did not start at his presence, as one might expect, finding a man of his size at one’s bedside. Instead, she smiled, soft and full of sleep, and Alec warmed with wicked pleasure. “You are home.”

She waited for him.

“How did you find me?”

The smile widened. “You are not the only one with access to Settlesworth, Your Grace.” She looked to the table several feet away, hosting a porcelain animal tea party. “I would not have thought this would be quite your aesthetic, though.”

He might have laughed if he did not want her so much. If he were not so broken by her presence. “Why are you here, Lily?”

She blinked, and he loathed himself for the doubt that flashed in her gaze. “I—” She stopped. Took a deep breath. Met his gaze with renewed certainty. “I came for you.”

His knees weakened, but he resisted the urge to go to her. To touch her. To give in to his desire. Somehow. Instead, he said, “My mother was English.”

A pause. Then, “As was mine.”

He ignored the reply, edged with humor, her eyes glittering and making him want her more than ever before as she threatened to laugh. As she tempted him more than he’d ever dreamed possible. “She was beautiful. My father was wild over her. Allegedly.”

“Allegedly?”

“By the time I arrived, neither cared for the other. They lived in Scotland—in the Highlands—and he worked the family distillery. She thought he was wealthy and landed, and he was, but the business—the estate that came with it—it was not run by another. It was run by Stuarts, had been for generations. He was a man who harvested wheat and sheared sheep and tarred roofs and mucked stalls. And she loathed it.”

She sat up as he spoke, the Stuart plaid wrapped about her, auburn hair down around her shoulders, and he resisted the urge to drink her in. Focused on the tale—once cautionary, now prophetic. “She was not made for Scotland, my father would say. She was too perfect. Slender like a reed, but unbendable. She could not bear the cold, the wet, the wild. We moved south, to the border, to another estate owned by the family. And my father thought the proximity to England would change her. Would return the girl he’d once loved.”