Page 89 of Duke of Pride

“I love that—though I do not deserve it—you keep looking at me as if I am better. I am better because of you. I will be better for you. I love your sharp intellect, even if it scares me to think how much smarter you are than I am.”

“Confirmed,” she said shakily.

He came closer, his voice dropping. “I love your lips, how they mold against mine.”

Victoria blushed.

“I love how you make me lose control just by looking at me, how your body feels against mine.”

She gave him a scorching look that defied rules and propriety.

He smiled at her and cupped her face in both hands.

“This is not duty, Victoria,” he said with pain in his eyes this time. “You were never a duty.”

Tears were ready to flow.

“Please don’t cry, or else I am obliged to throw myself in the water.”

She laughed, but one tear slid down her cheek. He wiped it away.

“I guess this one doesn’t count,” he said, his own voice shaking. “I wantyou. Your laughter in my mornings, your arguments at my dinner table, and all your lilac tablecloths and dangerous mallet swinging.”

She was shaking from both laughter and ready tears now.

“Victoria, my Victoria,” he choked out. “Stay. Be my wife. Let me spend forever proving that I’m worthy of you.”

They looked at each other so deeply, so intimately, that the world stopped to matter. There was only them. Her free hand went to his chest to feel his beating heart. She took one step closer, modesty be damned.

“I love you, too, Stephen,” she confessed.

He exhaled and closed his eyes in relief, his chest heaving with laughter and tension.

“I love you exactly the way you are. Because of who you are. I love?—”

He didn’t let her finish. He kissed her right there on the docks, in full view of sailors, merchants, and her brother. Not the chaste peck Society would allow, but something wild and feral.

One hand cradled her face, while the other went around her waist to pull her closer. Victoria made a small, startled sound against his lips, but then her gloved hand slid up his neck.

He broke the kiss but didn’t release her, afraid he might lose what his heart desired most in the world.

“I wasn’t done,” she joked.

“Marry me.”

A cough interrupted them.Maxwell.

“When I warned you not to make her cry, I didn’t mean that.”

Stephen still didn’t let go of Victoria. This was outrageously improper,scandalous, but he didn’t care. His gaze remained locked on Victoria, his thumb tracing the curve of her cheek where a flush still burned.

“Marry me,” he repeated, his voice rough.

Victoria arched an eyebrow, her fingers still curled into the fabric of his coat. “You’re rather impatient for a man who took so long to get here.”

A low, breathless laugh escaped him.

“I’ve waited a lifetime for you. I refuse to wait another second.”