My Once and Future Duke (The Wagers of Sin #1)(79)

He raised her hand to his lips and pressed an openmouthed kiss to her palm. “Are those all your deepest secrets?”

“No,” she whispered, watching with dilated eyes as he made love to her hand. “There is one more . . .”

“Tell me, darling.” He didn’t think there was anything she could say that changed his mind now.

Her lips parted, and she raised her gaze to meet his. “I love you.”

His heart jumped in his chest, and for a moment he forgot to breathe. “Sophie . . .”

She pressed her fingers to his lips. “I didn’t say it in expectation you would feel the same.”

“No? Then you hope I don’t?” He removed her hand from his face and bent her backward on her tiny sofa.

“What? Well—-No . . .” Her breathing grew uneven as he hooked one finger into the neckline of her dress and tugged the fabric down to bare her shoulder.

“Good.” He shifted his weight until she was beneath him. His luck, so poor all day, had undergone a sea change. She loved him. He felt bold and invincible, and his next move seemed so right, he wondered why he hadn’t already made it. “I’ve been falling in love with you since you stormed into the library and called me a lunatic. You were entirely correct, and I wanted to say that it was because of you—-blowing kisses to the dice at hazard, declaring you would walk to Alwyn through the mud and the rain, taunting me with your bare feet while you wore my banyan.” He pressed his lips to the soft skin atop her shoulder. “You drive me mad, Sophie, and I never want it to end.”

Her fingers plowed into his hair as he kissed his way along her collarbone. “Madness is not something to crave . . .”

Jack lifted his head. “For me it is—-your kind of madness. My father, like his father and his grandfather and undoubtedly several other generations before them, married for sane, calculated reasons. Some of their unions were civil and harmonious, some were not, but I can’t imagine one of them felt as I do when I’m with you. Marry me, Sophie.”

Her eyes flew wide open.

“I want you, darling,” he breathed, skimming his palm up her waist. Exeter had shown him how to cleave the knot: marrying someone else would put paid to any rubbish rumors about an engagement. Tomorrow he would call on Lucinda and make it clear there was no understanding, no promise, no betrothal. He was prepared to do almost anything else in his power to see to her comfort and safety, for the sake of the promise he’d made to his father, but he would not marry her. Worth any scandal, echoed Exeter’s words in his mind.

Then he was going directly to Doctors’ Commons in pursuit of a special license. Sophie wasn’t the woman anyone would expect him to marry, and it would astonish, if not scandalize, most of London. But she was the only woman he could imagine spending his life with, and by God he meant to have her—-in his life, in his bed, in his heart.

She put her hands on his face and searched his eyes. “Jack—-No, you can’t mean that. I have nothing to offer you that’s worthy of a duchess—-”

Jack made a scornful noise low in his throat. “Only a duke can determine that, and I have determined that you offer everything I want in my duchess. Will you have me?”

She surged up and kissed him, her mouth soft and hot. Jack kissed her deeply, shuddering when she sucked on his tongue. “I will,” she whispered. “With all my heart and soul.”

“And body, I hope.” He began drawing up her skirt. “I intend to have you here and now.”

Her eyes shone dark with desire. “Yes.”

“Do you know, I’ve thought about making love to you on a sofa again ever since we returned to London.”

“Have you?” Her eyes drifted closed and she arched her back, pressing up into him.

“Every night.” His hand reached the garter tied above her knee. He tugged it loose and hooked his fingers under her knee, urging her to put her legs around his hips.

“Then . . . I hope you do . . . every night.”

He grinned at her breathless reply. “Nothing would give me more pleasure.” Jack’s heart beat so hard he was sure she would feel it. He wanted her to feel it. It never beat that way before her, and he thought it might stop beating altogether if he ever lost her.

He made love to her on the sofa, and then he took her upstairs and made love to her again, leisurely this time, in her bed. When Sophie had fallen into an exhausted slumber, draped over him, and his muscles felt as though they wouldn’t support him if he tried to stand, Jack wound a lock of her hair around his finger and dismissed any thought of sneaking home before dawn.

He was home. And he wanted the world to know.





Chapter 24




Lady Stowe had let an elegant house in Berkley Square, facing south across the garden at the heart of the square. Jack fleetingly wondered how much of the rent he was paying before dismissing the thought. After last night, when Sophie whispered that she loved him over and over as he moved above her, joining his body, heart and soul to hers, he’d pay the rent on every house in this street and thank Lady Stowe for it. He tied up his horse and rapped the knocker.

His arrival caused a bit of a flurry inside the house. The butler showed him to a bright morning room while the sounds of running feet echoed upstairs. He strolled to the window and watched the traffic roll by outside as his mind drifted to Sophie—-his love. He wanted to spoil her with every luxury he could. Perhaps he’d whisk her back to Alwyn for a month after their wedding.