A Kiss For Midwinter (Brothers Sinister #1.5)(23)

Lydia spoke first. “I think, Doctor Grantham, that I’ve been unfair to you.”

He shut his eyes. It wasn’t love, but by God, he’d take it. It was hope, one little ray of hope, that there was a chance for him. That she might know the worst of him and want him anyway. And she didn’t let go of him. He liked the feel of her against him. She was warm and sized right for his arms.

“You didn’t do anything wrong,” she finally said. “You were—how old when you accompanied Parwine? No older than I am now. You were there to learn, not to speak. I should never have blamed you.”

He let out a breath.

“There.” She gave a little hiccough, and then, of all things, a smile touched her face. “Now you can’t say that I never have a kind word for you. Did you really say back there that you would rather I hit you than disturb the cleanliness of your bag?”

He couldn’t help but smile back. “I did. And it’s true. I’m a horribly flawed man, Lydia.”

Another long moment. She rested her cheek against his shoulder, and for those moments the world was perfect.

“I have never given you leave to use my Christian name,” she pointed out.

“Yes, you have,” he responded. “I’m no expert in these matters, but when a lady cries on my shoulder, I take it as tacit permission to address her by name.”

“Hmm,” she said, but didn’t disagree.

Holding her in his arms was having its inevitable effect. He shifted against her. “Little as I wish to suggest we end this embrace…it would probably be a good idea.”

“Would it?”

Jonas paused, this time a little longer. He wasn’t going to say it. He really wasn’t going to say it. He was… Oh, hell. He was going to say it.

“It has been eighteen months since I last had occasion to make use of a French letter, and I am becoming physically aroused. It will become apparent in a minute or so, and that will prove embarrassing.”

Lydia gasped against his chest. “My God. Are you always this plainspoken?”

“It’s a natural physiological reaction,” he returned.

She pulled away, but just enough that she could look into his face. “Doctor Grantham, never tell me that you’re ashamed of a natural physiological reaction.”

She hadn’t let go of him. She hadn’t let go. Hope was not just present, it was incandescent. He found himself smiling down into her face. “Yes, I am. I have not completely crushed the restrictions that social mores place on me, however absurd they are,” he countered. His hand stroked her hair as he spoke. “I’m working on that.”

“Then work on it for another two minutes,” she said quietly. “I’m not done.”

“Ah, Miss Charingford.” That was all he said, but he put his arms around her, pulling her closer, breathing in her old hurts, and exhaling the emotions he had not yet managed to voice.

“The part that makes me angriest,” she whispered into his chest, “is that I miss this. I miss being held. I miss the feel of lips on mine, of arms around me. I miss the feel of warmth. Sometimes, I even miss all those things that he did to me. It’s a palpable hunger, one that eats me up inside. I shouldn’t want that. There’s something wrong with me.”

Jonas cleared his throat. “Actually …”

She made a little noise.

It wasn’t as if he was suddenly going to fool her into believing him proper. “This is not my area of expertise, Miss Charingford, but there are specialists in London who do nothing but treat women who do not enjoy intercourse. It is physiologically normal to feel as you do.”

His erection was becoming all too apparent. She had to have noticed by now. Even if there weren’t that thick bar growing between his legs, pressing lightly against her body, there was the change in his breathing.

“Really?” she asked.

“Really.”

He could detect the changes in her. He was standing too close to her, too attuned to her, to miss the signs. Those telltale capillaries in her skin widened, and her skin flushed pink with blood flow. Her lashes fluttered down; her mouth opened a little bit. She held him too tightly, too precisely.

“Sometimes,” she said, “it feels like there are some hurts that can only be cured by this. By warmth. And touch.”

He slipped two fingers over her wrist, taking her pulse. He knew all too well the difference between a resting heart rate and an aroused one, and that knowledge of her body’s response only fed his own desire.

He bent over her a little more, his lips breathing warmth against her ear. Just a little kiss. He could give her a little kiss, now.

But he didn’t. He knew all too well that physical arousal needn’t mean that she liked him. She’d only just decided not to hate him. She’d needed a shoulder to weep on, a form to hit, a generic repository for all the emotions that she couldn’t fit in her life. She didn’t need a kiss from a specific man, no matter how much he specifically wanted to give her one.

“Miss Charingford,” he said, “Henry awaits, and I shouldn’t delay any longer. We must go on.” He pulled away from her. She looked up at him, her eyebrows screwed up in quizzical confusion.

But when he offered her his arm, she took it. He set his fingers over her wrist and took comfort in the beat of her pulse—a little faster than could be explained by the mild exercise of walking.