Romancing the Duke (Castles Ever After #1)(34)

Here is my soft caress.

Here is my patience.

Here is my understanding.

Here is my tender, beating heart.

He whispered her name, and the raw emotion in his voice undid her. His hands cinched the fabric at the small of her back. As though he needed her. Not only to remain standing, but to go on existing at all. “Izzy.”

Light footsteps sounded from the far end of the corridor.

“Miss Goodnight?” Miss Pelham’s voice.

Izzy pulled away from the kiss. His brow rested against hers. This was madness.

“I have to go,” she whispered.

They couldn’t be discovered like this. It would require too many explanations that would embarrass them both. “Miss Goodnight, are you there?” Miss Pelham was closer now.

“Your Grace. I must go.”

He held her tight, forbidding her to move. His breathing was still labored.

And then, suddenly, he lifted his head. His eyes, unseeing as they were, seemed to narrow.

He’d jolted back to himself, she could tell. A sudden lightning bolt had filled him with realizations: who he was, and who she was, and every reason he shouldn’t be holding her.

With familiar brusqueness, he released her. “Go.”

Chapter Eleven

That night, Ransom dreamed of dark hair and a lush, red mouth. And heat. Tight, wet heat moving over him, under him.

Yes.

No.

No, no, no. He was waking.

Don’t wake, he told his mind. Not all the way. Not yet.

He rolled onto his side. Keeping his eyes shut tight, he unbuttoned his breeches and curled a grip around the rigid column of his cock. He rarely felt like a frig anymore, despite how long he’d gone without a woman.

Maybe release wouldn’t elude him this time.

He stroked his hand up, then down. Slowly, at first. Then faster.

In his half-dream trance, he felt it as her grip. And then as her mouth. And then as her sweet, wet, tight . . .

“Fascinating.”

Ransom jolted fully awake. Damn him to hell. He knew that husky voice.

“Goodnight?”

“Good morning.” Her tone was distracted.

What was she doing down here at this hour? Hopefully not watching with schoolgirl curiosity as he tugged away at his cock. He wasn’t ashamed, precisely, but he wasn’t eager to explain himself, either.

“I didn’t mean to wake you,” she said. “It’s just that your family’s history is so fascinating.”

He heard the flip of a page.

She’d been reading a book. Not watching him.

He stretched back on his pallet and released a string of profanity. “Good grief, Goodnight. It’s too damn early.”

“It’s morning. Almost. And I’m reading this book Miss Pelham gave me about the history of the area. The Rothbury story is just marvelous.”

“I’m glad my family’s centuries of bloodshed, tyranny, and conniving amuse you.”

He blinked, trying to make some sense of her. Visually, if not rationally.

She sat in profile, silhouetted by firelight, tucked into an armchair not five feet away. Her whole body made one pale, sensuous, spiraling curve. He glimpsed a bare foot dangling just over the seat’s edge, twisting idly to and fro.

Her foot stopped. Stretched forward, with tantalizing slowness.

She turned another page. “I’ve only read through the fifth duke’s imprisonment for treason. What happens next?”

“He was held in the Tower of London for years. Queen Mary held the throne just long enough to remove the charges.”

“Ah,” she said. “A stroke of luck there. I suppose they had to recover the castle by purchasing it back. That must be why the property was no longer entailed?”

Ransom struggled to a sitting position, his loins still pulsing with unspent lust. He reached for his boots and began tugging them on. Judging by the faint gray cast of his vision, it had to be damned early. Barely daybreak. And if she’d been sitting there reading for some time, as her cozy posture indicated, that must mean she’d come down while it was still night.

“Are you feeling well this morning?” Her question was cautious.

“Yes.” His answer was curt. Ransom left no room for further discussion. He couldn’t abide thinking about last night—couldn’t begin to even make sense of it.

She set aside her book. “Just so you know, I’ll only work until noon today. Miss Pelham is hiring housemaids in the village this morning, and we have plans to clear a dressing room in the afternoon. You’re welcome to help.”

“Goodnight,” he said in a low, warning tone. “You’re not going to waste more time cleaning house.”

She set the book aside. “You’re not the only one with a goal here, Your Grace. You want to find out what’s happened to your business affairs? Well, I want a home. Mornings will be correspondence, afternoons will be castle. If we do this my way, we both get what we want.”

Ransom pushed a hand through his hair. He wanted about a thousand things he wasn’t getting, and approximately nine hundred of them involved her lips.

If she was so interested in a cozy home, why wasn’t she up in her room?

“Is something wrong with your turret?”

“No. Not at all. I woke and . . . I suppose I was just a little cold. I came down to sit by the fire.”