Page 99 of How to Love a Duke in Ten Days

“P-pardon?” she stammered around a constricting throat.

“I said you’ve ruined me.”

Her brow crimped into a frown. “How is that possible? I’ve done nothing.”

He stepped closer, staring down at her as though she were an aberration of the moon, one strong hand clinging to the railing as though it, alone, tethered him to the earth. “You vanquish my will, Alexandra,” he accused. “You make me want to forget that it is safer to be cold, and alone.”

She drew abreast of him, looking up into his features as they failed to conceal some sort of bitter struggle. “You tempt me to trust you, as well,” she admitted. “To make me forget that we are neither of us safe.”

“Youare safe.” His steely expression melted into something tender as he reached for her hand, pinching at the fingertips of her glove one by one until he’d loosened it enough to draw it off. That done, he discarded it to the railing and brought her palm to his mouth.

The soft brush of his beard gave way to the hot press of his lips. The sensation was so exquisite, she almost lost his reply. “I married you, and no matter what happens at the end of what remains of the ten days, our marriage will not be undone. It only took seeing you in the arms of other men, even for a dance, for me to realize that no matter what, despite myself, I’ve claimed you as my own.”

“Thereisno child, Piers,” she said fervently.

“I wish I could believe you.” His fingers tightened around hers, holding them to his face. “Ifthere is one, and it’s a girl, I’ll claim her as my own. If it’s a boy, I’ll do what I can to give him a life, if not a name. My brother has done remarkably well in a similar situation and—”

“But I’m telling you, there won’t be—”

“I’m tellingyouit doesn’t matter.” He drew her other glove off, before running his rough hands up her chilly arms. “It won’t change the fact that I desire you above all others. My vows are ironclad. What happened before we met will not be held against you. I am your faithful husband from now until the end of my days. My fealty and my body, such as it is, belongs to you. You can rely upon that, Alexandra. You are always safe in that.”

Her breath fluttered in and out of her as she was overcome by a tide of keen and confounding emotion.

He’d said nothing of love. It wasn’t likely they ever would. But such words could threaten even the stoutest of cynics.

He still didn’t understand her fear. He could only see it through the lens of his own.

“‘Safe’ is one of those peculiar words, isn’t it?” She shaped her fingers to his jaw, sliding her hand past his ear and threading through the sleek sable locks at his nape. “It often means something different to those who speak it than those who hear it.”

“What do you mean?” he asked in a voice that belonged to the night.

“Only that I’ve never been afraid that you’d dishonor me. I never doubted you’d keep your word.” Her fear was a physical one. A female one. One he’d nothing and everything to do with. “I meant it when I said no man but you has ever made me feel… made me want…” She couldn’tfinish her sentence as his hand skipped over her shoulders, inching toward her clavicles. His touch was like a balm, smoothing away the scars she’d worn like armor for so many exhausting years. “All I can do is allow for time to prove to you that I can keep my word as well,” she finished.

“God help me if you don’t,” he groaned. “God help us both.”

He drew her to him, wrapped himself around her as though to protect her from the night wind and the sea and the moon, and anything that might tear her from his arms. When he took her lips with his it wasn’t just a kiss.

But a claiming.

Piers would never tire of her taste. Each time he kissed her had been a revelation of sensation and flavor. Tonight she was wine and honey tinged with brine by the scent of the sea.

His tongue dipped past the seam of her lips and she broke the seal with a gasp, covering her mouth with her fingers.

“I know many couples do not kiss thusly.” He grappled his lust down, pulling on a reserve of patience. “But we are husband and wife. There is no desire too scandalous that we are not allowed to indulge. Besides… we are in France, after all.” He pulled her closer. “When in Rome and all that.”

“I… just…”

Piers smiled into the darkness. “Need I remind you of our game? I won, my lady, the night is mine. I intend to enjoy my good fortune.”

Her expression wrinkled with both awareness and alarm. “Should we retire to your bedroom? Or mine?”

He bent back over her, hungry. Famished. Eternally yearning for more of her. “Here will do just fine.”

“What if someone sees us?”

“Come into the shadows with me.” He drew her toward an alcove, resting his thighs against a waist-high ledge protruding from the brick wall. “No one could possibly see us unless they searched to the very edge of the veranda and we’d hear them coming.”

He covered her next words with another searing kiss.