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Andrew trembled, moved by her innocence and the intimacy of that act, one of the most powerful ones he’d known.

“Thank you,” she whispered.

He smoothed his palm in a small, soothing circle over the small of her back. “I’m a rake and a scoundrel.” He issued that reminder to himself for why it was wrong to want her as he did. “But one thing I’m not is a liar. I didn’t say anything to you here that isn’t true.”

Marcia angled her head back, her eyes meeting his.

Oh, God. He swallowed hard, or he tried to. This was the time to go. To leave. To flee. “Marcia.” Her name emerged garbled.

“I want you to kiss me,” she said softly, and he froze, certain he’d heard her wrong, that he’d heard only that which he’d wished to hear, because that single thought about the lady had haunted him and tempted him and taunted him for days on end now.

She darted her tongue out, and unlike the bold way in which the women of his acquaintance would have used that flesh to tempt, there was an innocence to the way Marcia trailed that tip along the seam of her lips. “Kiss me?”

And there it was for a second time, a question this time.

Her face fell. “You aren’t saying anything.”

“Because there’s nothing to say, Marcia,” Andrew said. “I’m not—”

“Why not?” she interrupted. “I’m not asking you formore.Just… another kiss.”

Another kiss.Two words that conjured in his mind the other kisses they’d shared, the feel of her mouth, the taste of her.

“Unless you wish for more, too,” she said.

Oh, God, save him. She’d saidtoo. Indicating she yearned for far more than his kiss… and everything he wished to do with her.

“I just wish to forget.”

He understood all too well wanting to lose oneself in another person, just so that, even for a brief moment, one might forget what one was, and had done, and had been, and had seen in life.

A pained-sounding laugh left him, and she bristled. “Do you find this amusing?”

“I find this any number of things, Marcia. Amusing is not one of them. You don’t want this,” he said, his voice strained.

She tightened her hold. “Don’t presume to tell me what I want.”

“You are vulnerable. I’m not going to take advantage of that, Marcia,” he said, more sharply than he’d intended.

“This isn’t about… him or what I’ve shared. This is about me making a choice of what I want, and I would very much like for you to kiss me, Andrew,” she said. And then she drew back, and indecision flashed in her eyes, a different horror. “You don’t want me.”

It would be both easier and the coward’s way to let her believe that. Go figure this should be the moment he found himself capable of some level of honor.

“Oh, I want you, Marcia.” Hooding his lashes, he swept his gaze over her. “I want you far more than is honorable or good.”

And then, cupping a hand at her nape, he angled her head even as she leaned up to meet his mouth.

He made slow love to her mouth at first, teasing her lips, licking the seam, tasting the corner, and her lips parted on a little gasp, a breathless, captivating sound of her desire, and Andrew used that moment to slide his tongue inside, stroking her flesh with his and kissing her as he’d dreamed of since the first time he’d had her in his arms.

And Marcia came alive.

Chapter 13

After Lord Atbrooke had cornered Marcia and threatened her, Marcia had thought she’d never know joy again.

She’d been wrong.

When she was with Andrew, everything felt… right.