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“Thank god.”

“It’s what made me feel comfortable arguing with you in the beginning,” I tell him honestly. My anger is seeping out. Replaced with frustration, and warmth, and the confession. He didn’t mean it.

I wish things were simpler. That this little bubble here with him would never end, never stop, never burst.

“Then I’m grateful for it,” he says, and pulls me against his chest, “if it let me see the real you.”

CHAPTER50

WEST

I want every night to be like this.

Nora, sitting opposite me in the orangery, eating dinner, with her hair undone and a true smile on her face. Telling me about her final design and how nervous she is about the fashion show next week.

What would it be like? If she were the one I married? If Rafe wasn’t an issue, if I could make her love me… If she wore my ring. If this was dinner every night.

She’s excited about the Spring Ball tomorrow, the famous Calloway party, and Rafe showing up. I’m not, but her excitement is enough to make it all worth it.

“The cat?” she tells me, drawing up her knees after dinner. “I’m going to keep him.”

“Keep it, are you?”

“Well. On your behalf.” Her cheeks are rosy. “I bought him a collar, and I’m trying to think of a name. He belongs here. At Fairhaven. Don’t protest, because you’re starting to like him too.”

I tap my fingers against the table. “I am?”

“Yes, you are. You’re charmed, despite yourself.” She tilts her head a little and looks at me. She’s the one who should stay. Move in here permanently. There’s a fierceness in her tonight.

“I’m still a bit annoyed with you for keeping that secret, you know.”

“Mhm.”

“Despite that… I still enjoy being around you.”

My fingers still. “Is that a first for you?”

“Yes.” She cocks her head. Her eyes are narrow, and dancing, and beautiful. The whole reason she’s here, that she’s living with me, that we’re dating… it’s falling away. Crumbling.

She pushes back her chair and walks around the table to me. I open my arms, but she doesn’t sit in my lap. She reaches for my hand instead. “Come with me. I want to try something.”

That’s how I find myself being pushed into one of the armchairs in the library, the door shut behind us, with Nora kissing her way down the column of my throat. She’s told me to keep my hands on the armrests, and I dig my fingers in to keep from touching her.

“I want to try,” she says, unbuttoning my shirt, sliding down my body, “what a real girlfriend would do. We just had dinner together. It was a date.”

“Nora…”

She drops to her knees in front of me. The rush of want that floods me takes all the air with it, and I harden so fast it makes my head spin.

She reaches for the buckle of my belt. “I know we don’t have much time left now. We know who the stalker is, you’re heading for a loveless deal of a marriage, and I have my own deadline.”

No,I think. That’s not where I’m heading. That’s not whereshe’sheading, but I can’t say that, so I grit my teeth to keep the words locked inside. “Let me make you feel good instead,” I tell her.

It’s not right, none of this is, but then her hand reaches inside, andfuck, it’s good. Her touching me like that. I’ve been aching for weeks, with no release other than my own right hand, and feeling her fingers…

“You are bigger than that vibrator. I was right.” She sounds delighted, and I can’t look away from her pretty face so close to my cock. Nora leans forward and licks a tentative stripe along the underside of my head.

“You want to do this?” I ask her. My hands are tight along the edges of the armchair.