Angelika Frankenstein Makes Her Match(31)

“Anyone could see that you are.”

“I’m not sure about that—”

“Your smart green eyes are always watching, calculating, changing. They turn dark, like green glass, when you look at my mouth. You fill that dress sinfully, and your lips are my favorite pink.”

She felt hot. “Thank you.”

“But no matter how beautiful you look today, I still prefer you in men’s trousers. I know your true self, in a way he never will.” He sat back, laid an arm along the back of his seat, and nodded in the direction they had left. “I know what that man wants.”

Her heart leapt. “I prefer you.”

“Then come and show me.” He smirked at her shocked expression. “You have been unraveled since that kiss in the morgue the other night. I am boiling mad with jealousy right now, so come over here.” He slapped his own thigh.

“I’m annoyed, too,” she said as she moved to his side of the carriage, lifted her skirts, and slid a knee across his legs. “You walked out abruptly, leaving me wallowing in your cold bathtub.”

“I was the one who needed to soak in ice water.” The carriage rattled, causing each to clutch the other. Fingertips sank into flesh, and Angelika leaned forward. He put his cool hand on her face. She drew one breath, and then she was being kissed.

Her only thought was: I chose him so well.

He must have had residual lightning in his veins, because she was feeling it now, sparking at every press of his lips and the unexpected touch of his teeth. His forearm banded around her, grasping handfuls of her waist, testing and releasing her body.

He put his tongue in her mouth, his hand in her hair, and Angelika Frankenstein had never felt so alive.

He tasted fresh, and his lips prompted sensations into other parts of her body. It was of scientific interest, but also something alchemic that she did not want to understand. This was why humans courted and chased, primped and flirted. This was why there were groaning, shifting shapes in the alley beside the tavern and why humanity continued to produce new generations. She’d had one small glimpse with him before, but now, the experiment was complete. Kissing was absolutely, completely magical.

Together they made a sound: part groan, all lust.

Will lifted his mouth from hers, his thumb sliding down to her throbbing pulse. “I can say this with certainty: I have not had a kiss like that before. Is this acceptable to you, Miss Frankenstein?”

She pulled him back to her.

Their next kiss was gentle. His lips were barely on hers now. He was wordlessly repeating that question: Is this acceptable to you? She licked his lip, then his tongue, and his grumble vibrated through her body to the soles of her feet. “This is all I want to do from this point onward,” she said when he let her take a breath. “You will spend your life kissing me.”

“I feel inclined to say yes,” he replied, pressing ravenous kisses on her neck. “If Victor doesn’t hasten home, I will lie between your legs all night.”

“And I will love it,” she gasped, fisting her hand in his hair. She was no longer unkissed, and she was desperate to have everything. “I’ve studied the theory components of intercourse very closely. I have an ancient Indian book with so many drawings. I sometimes think I’m perverted, the things I want to try.”

“I want to. I ache for you.” His entire body shivered. “But . . .”

She caught him, right before he blinked out of the haze.

“It is just a game we play,” she said, and licked into his mouth until he groaned. “A little make-believe, to pass the time on this dull journey home. We can make up any nonsense thing. It is your turn.”

“When we live at Larkspur,” Will said, and her toes curled in her shoes, “I will have you all the time. In every room, outside, daylight, midnight, I will see your body.” He smiled at her frantic nod. “Your turn. Tell me all the times you’ve thought of kissing me.”

“After breakfast and you’d taken my empty plate for me, or stoked the fire for Mary. It’s your thoughtfulness and care that makes me sweat.”

Now she had to break off, because the kiss was dominating everything. Breath, thought, existence.

But she tried. “If a shadow slid across your face just right, or I saw your tongue on your water glass—” She was heaving breaths now, her hips moving and encouraging. “It is your turn. Tell me when you’ve touched yourself, thinking of me.”

He whispered in her ear, and she strained for every word. “I touch myself when I think of you naked in your bed. When I think about the life we could have, and the ways we would know each other. Closer and tighter than any two people ever were, and the loyalty I know you would have for me. Till death. Beyond death.”

The carriage hit a bump, and their anatomy aligned in a new way, through their layers of clothing. Every dip, rock, or pothole was creating sparks. And this was a very, very poorly maintained stretch of road.

“I really feel you,” Angelika confessed, and he bit his lip. “I really”—bump—“feel you.”

“We should stop,” Will said, but it was too late for her.

It was the idea of that perfect life that tipped her over the edge into a pleasure she’d never experienced, because it was shared with him. It was almost unendurable, endless tightening and releasing of every muscle in her body. And over her own heartbeat, Will said in her ear: