Page 21 of Angel of Mine (Most Imprudent Matches #4)

Twenty-One

CADIEUX HOUSE, LONDON - JUNE 14, 1816

WILLIAM

There was something unbearably vulnerable that came with crying in front of someone—with someone. It left both of us a bit stilted at supper that night.

Supper.

At Celine’s house.

Where I would be staying overnight.

Across the hall from where I remembered her dressing room to be.

The damned guest room was nearly as large as my entire apartment. Aptly named the blue room, it overlooked a little terrace that opened out onto the second floor. Perfect for making my escape when her proximity drove me out of my mind. There was even a helpful trellis running up the wall beside my window.

The entire house smelled of her—vanilla and spice and some ridiculous flower I couldn’t name to save my life. How was a man to think of anything else when all he could breathe was her?

I hadn’t the time to thoroughly examine my feelings about this morning either, my livelihood tossed about like trash. Kit had been kind, but word of the break-in would certainly impact our clients. After all, privacy was of the utmost concern to them.

And then there had been Celine in her sheer nightgown like a female being out of mythology—a nymph, a goddess, Aphrodite herself. All golden skin and loose curls.

She made a joke in the hall before slipping into her boudoir that evening, promising to be fully dressed at breakfast tomorrow. It was a miracle I managed to refrain from begging her to change her mind. To wear that slip of purple silk and lace—it and nothing else. Always. To burn the rest of her clothing. I could help her. There was space on the terrace for a bonfire.

I was going to wear a hole in the carpet, pacing between window and door as I was. It was a tetchy combination of exhaustion, anxiety, anger, and arousal, and with no other way to release it, I paced.

Phantom curls trailed through my fingers, and my lips longed for the ghostly brush of her skin. And the knowledge that I carried all day, of exactly how many layers of fabric stood between me and miles of sun-kissed skin, was a kind of torture I had never known.

The whisper of a door moving against carpet came from the hall. Certainly a figment of my imagination. Or, I was certain until a breath of candlelight seeped under the crack between my door and the floor. Light and shadow.

Unwittingly, I found myself in front of the door, my hand hovering above the brass knob. Waiting for a nock, a sound, a sign.

A minute passed. Two. I stared at the rich wood inlaid with delicate florals. The shadow never moved. If I closed my eyes, I could almost hear the soft breaths of my visitor. My hand slid to the door, gliding up to press against it.

I had a vision of Celine’s hand pressed against mine through carved, stained mahogany, separated by nothing more than wood and nerves. Each of us waiting for the other to gather courage.

With a fortifying breath, I broke first. “Are you going to knock, love?”

“I don’t know yet.” Her answer was softly delivered and muffled through the wood.

“Your decision, what is it based on?” Slowly, she set the candle down on the floor, just visible through the crack. It cast a clean semicircle on the carpet beneath my feet. Then came the brush of silk against wood. I could picture it, her back pressed to the door as she slid to settle on the floor. Her chin would be propped on her knees.

I had no way of knowing how accurate the image in my mind was, but her shadow offered no counter. I found myself mimicking her presumed position, back against the door. One leg sprawled into the room, the other bent and serving as an armrest.

“The way I see it, there are three possibilities if I knock. I’m not certain whether I can live with all of them. And, of course, the fourth, where I don’t knock at all.”

“Tell me?” I begged.

“If I step away, door unknocked, we continue as we have been. We dance around whatever it is between us until one of us breaks.”

“I don’t particularly fancy that option.”

“I don’t either.”

“What’s behind the door then?”

I caught the ghost of her sigh. “I could knock. You could open the door, laugh in my face, send me away.”

I felt the laugh bubbling up. Fortunately the sincerity in her tone stopped me before it could escape. The idea was so absurd…

“You really think there’s a situation in which you knock on my door, that you come to me, for anything, and I would send you away?”

She was quiet for an overlong moment. I held my breath, waiting desperately for her response. She was silent long enough for me to feel an impassioned declaration bubbling up inside, struggling to break free.

“It was the least likely of the options. Still, it’s a possibility to be considered.”

“It’s not.” I insisted. “What are your other possibilities?”

“If I knocked, and you invited me in, one of two things would happen. We could kiss, and kiss, and kiss until the world fell away. Until your coat and shirt and trousers fell too. Then my night rail. One thing would lead to another, and we would fall together.”

Christ … My breathing was heavy and quick, and if the sounds through the door were at all accurate, it matched her own.

Swallowing some of the lust, I answered through the door. “That sounds like an excellent option.”

“Oh, it is. For now. You would certainly fall in love with me. But what would happen tomorrow?”

“You seem very sure of yourself.”

“Tell me I’m lying.”

She wasn’t. And I couldn’t. I was half in love with her already. If I were with her, inside her, I would be lost.

“Oh, you’re not. I’m a little disappointed in how transparent I’ve been.”

“You saved me, that night when those men attacked. And you came for me, when your entire professional life had been ransacked, you worried after me . And you held me this morning, while I cried over another man.”

“So entirely obvious…” I lamented.

“Yes.”

“And the third option?”

“You invite me in. And we fall into bed, same as before. Except this time, you wrap me in your arms. You hold me, and run your fingers through my hair, and watch me sleep until you can’t stay awake any longer. In the morning, I wake before you and do the same. And I fall in love with you as the sun rises.”

It was, apparently, possible to be reduced to trembling desperation by mere words whispered through a door. I didn’t need any help falling in love with her, the possibilities she offered were more than enough.

“Also an exceptional choice.” My voice was rusted, broken, and it was all her fault.

“Except for the problem of tomorrow again.”

“What happens tomorrow?” I begged.

“I don’t know how to be loved any longer, or be in love. I— It nearly destroyed me. Losing him. Every single breath was a white-hot knife in my chest. For years. I don’t know how to risk that again. And… if I don’t risk it, how could I possibly be what you deserve?” Her voice was strung tight as a bow, anguished tension in every word.

But she was there with me. She may not know it yet, but the fact that she was considering it, contemplating it, she was there.

I choked back the whispers of love and reassurance. Those would only ensure she left without a knock. “Why don’t you let me worry about what I deserve?”

“Would you? Really? Because I don’t know everything about your relationship with Adriane, but I don’t think she loved you as she ought.”

In one sentence, she summed up years of my life.

“It’s still my cross to bear. What do you want, Celine?”

Behind the door, I heard the gentle rustle of fabric. The candlelight dimmed. I, too, rose to face the rich mahogany. My hand slid along the frame, waiting as I held my breath.

And then, there was a knock.