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“The news is dismal.” When Felix returned, he sat beside her, and she nearly cried out with relief that she wasn’t alone any longer.

“There are no candles or matches, and there isn’t a fireplace in this room.

Only furniture and mostly empty shelves.

And a solid door that possesses a very strong lock. ”

Her hope plummeted. “Then we’re well and truly trapped.

” It was all suddenly too much. Her chin trembled and tears welled in her eyes, then she sniffled.

“Pardon me. It’s been quite an arduous day, and I’m frightened about being stuck here as well as the fact that someone is threatening us. Someone we know, in our midst!”

“That is why you have an innate talent at this, Caro, because you aren’t a killer, because you think the best of people.

” He shook his head. “People like me? Men who’ve been in the war, who’ve had to do horrible things to people?

We have seen the gritty part of life, the lowest people go, we understand the whys of how it happens.

Yes, we might be called upon to neutralize a threat, as I’ve done during my Bow Street years, until I lost my leg. ”

“It’s just so sad that someone felt the need to kill. ”

“I know, but when there are people like you out there? People who bring the light back to our lives when all we can see is the darkness? We adore people like you, and we crave you in our lives because it gives us back the hope that we thought was lost long ago.” When he touched her arm, tingles moved to her elbow.

“That light washes away some of the ugliness the hate of life brings, so you have no idea how much you are doing and how important you truly are to this investigation…” He cleared his throat. “To me as we do this.”

“Oh.” Her heart trembled. “You are merely saying this so I won’t cry. Men are quite useless at the sight of tears.”

“Perhaps some, but that is not why I gave you the praise.” Then he scooted closer to her. Seconds later, he wrapped his arms around her, and she went willingly, for it felt lovely to be held. “I meant what I said. You’ve surprised me, and I’m learning new techniques from you.”

“Truly?”

“Very much so.” When she trembled, he buried his nose in her hair. “I know the darkness and the enclosed space discomfits you, so I’ll hold you for as long as you need the comfort.”

“You are the first person who has understood this particular failing,” Caroline said as she laid a hand on his chest. “I appreciate that.”

“It is not a failing. Just like men returning from war have nightmares or children being afraid of storms, it is merely how your brain reacts to certain variables.” His breath warmed her cheek, the shell of her ear. “There is no shame in it.”

“Are you ever afraid, Felix?” The inquiry seemed overly loud in the darkness. “I rather think a man brave enough to work with Bow Street isn’t.”

“Of course. Flying insects, desperate women, losing someone I love.” As he spoke, he moved a hand to frame her face. “We’ll find a way out even if we have to rub our knuckles bloody by pounding on the walls during teatime, scandal be damned.”

Caroline never knew which of them moved first, but there was a tiny portion of her brain that encouraged her to say, “Well, if my parents assumed we have done wicked things together, perhaps we shouldn’t waste the opportunity.

” Then his lips were on hers, and she returned the overture, because that pull was strong.

The strength of him pressed against her and the warmth of him soothed her fears, but his presence also ramped up her desire.

Fire erupted once more into her blood, and the scent of him was intoxicating.

When his hands and lips began to wander, she temporarily froze as her heartbeat accelerated, and fear mixed with fluttering anticipation .

Would she continue to allow it?

As she fumbled with his cravat, she tossed caution to the proverbial winds.

Why shouldn’t she? They were certainly alone, and if her father used this as a catalyst to force her into marriage with either the major or someone else—to quell rumors and scandal that might taint Debra’s chances of landing a titled match—she might as well reap all the benefits.

Especially since she was old enough to know her own mind.

While she tugged the length of the cravat from the knot, she continued to kiss him as if she had a fever and he possessed the only cure. When she uncovered the skin at his throat, she pressed her lips to that spot and reveled in the brief tickle of coarse hair sprouting from his chest.

“Ah, damn, why does something this wrong feel so right?” The whispered words skated across her consciousness in teasing eddies. Yet even though he didn’t return to her mouth for kissing, he eased his lips along the side of her neck to lick and nibble the skin between her collarbones.

When she shoved the jacket from his shoulders, he put enough space between them only to rid himself of the garment.

Where it fell, she couldn’t say, for the darkness swallowed everything.

“This tension has bedeviled us since the first.” Heat flew into parts of her body, awakened them and left her gasping, tingling, straining for what was to come.

“Next time you think to spy on a man bathing, run away. Or if it’s me, join me. I’ll make it worth your while.” Then he peppered a line of tiny kisses along her bodice while he loosened the laces at the back of her day dress.

“How naughty you are, Major.” She wasn’t quite ready when he eased the bodice down then bypassed the stays altogether to yank at the tie holding her shift closed. The crackle of the scrap of paper she’d hidden there made itself known. “Drat.”

“What is this?” He fished it out of her clothing.

“It was attached to the brick. Someone is warning us away from the investigation and threatened us.” For whatever reason, she couldn’t keep the excitement from her voice. “It must mean we’re getting close.”

“Mmm, in more ways than one. I shall have a look at the note later.” Desire graveled his voice as he encouraged her backward to lounge on the sofa while he came over her with a knee between her legs.

Barely had he closed his lips around a taut nipple when he spoke again.

“Bid me nay, Caro. I don’t take women by force, and I refuse to have you cry foul later. ”

“I would never.” Frantic to feel his skin against hers, she yanked his shirttails from the waist of his breeches.

“All experiences are my own, even if they prove mistakes later. It’s how we learn.

” As soon as she was able, she touched a hand to his chest. Oh, dear heavens, his skin was so hot with a heavy mat of hair spreading over the upper portion of his chest. Would that she could see it…

or have him naked, for when she’d spied on him at the pond, the lack of lighting had hindered her then as well.

“At least I won’t go to the grave as an unwanted innocent. ”

One hand was at her breast manipulating the nipple—rolling, plucking, stroking—while his other went beneath her skirts to skim the outside of her thigh. “You are hardly unwanted. You’ve nearly driven me out of my mind with desire since I first met you.”

Passion had soaked her mind so much that she could hardly form coherent thoughts. “Yet we’re doing this after only a couple of days. What does that say about me?” Surely, she wasn’t a desperate woman he’d spoken about earlier, and neither did she have the mindset of a courtesan. This just… was.

“It says you are quite discerning when it comes to men.”

“Perhaps.” Caroline held his head between her hands and kissed him. In fact, she couldn’t stop; it was heavenly. The press of his lips to hers, the insistence of his hands on her hips then sliding up her back left her gasping, wanting more.

As tiny fires licked through her veins, she pulled away to try to discern his gaze in the darkness, but without windows, it was nearly impossible. “I am afraid I don’t know what to do next. Outside of kissing a man, I have no knowledge, and it pains me to admit that.”

“We all must start somewhere, but I must remind you that everything will change if we do this. Hell, I can show you different ways a woman can find pleasure that have nothing to do with intercourse.”

“Oh?” Her mind skittered into dark places of the imagination, but she didn’t have the daring to ask.

Instead, she said, “What I do with my body is my decision.” Again, she pressed her lips to his.

“And what I want in this moment is you. Without coercion, without the expectation of anything from you other than what we’ll share right now. ”

It was the truth, and something that was just hers.

For long moments he remained silent, then he put a line of nips beneath her jaw. “You have no idea how much I want you.”

“I have a fair idea.” Already, the hard bulge of his desire pressed against her hip through their clothing.

As her heart beat out a wild rhythm, she clutched at his shoulders, wrapped her legs about his waist, and kissed him again, for there was no reason not to.

It was only them in that room, and she had been frightened out of her wits with the broken window and the brick .

The major apparently wasn’t content to let her have all the fun.

He swiftly took possession of the embrace.

All too soon his tongue was in her mouth bossing hers, and the kiss took a dive into wicked, heated territory.

Friction from the fabric between their bodies rubbed along her sensitive flesh, and she shivered.

A barely audible moan left her throat, and Felix chuckled.

“I understand that sentiment all too much.”

He shifted, covered her body with his once more, treated her to long, drugging kisses that left her heated and floating in a cloud of passion with need zipping through her bloodstream.