Page 20 of My Lady Rake

“You remember that kiss?” He’d been certain it meant nothing to her and she’d forgotten it before the night was over.

“The kiss that haunted me until I married? Levi proposed to me that night, but I made him wait to marry me. Part of me wondered if I was making a mistake, that the mysterious musketeer who’d stolen a kiss would reveal himself as my true love.”

His heart stopped. Would she have fallen for him if he’d found the courage to beg for an introduction?

“Eventually, I realized how silly I was being,” Verity said. “I married Levi and gave myself completely to him.”

He swallowed, then looked into her expressive eyes, hoping the smoldering he saw there meant she knew she’d admitted her desire for more than what they had together now. “Verity, it’s ridiculous to say I’m the luckiest man alive, but that’s how I felt when you approached me at my house. I was given a second chance to show you how I feel. How much you mean to me. I’ve fallen in love with you. You probably hated me back then, believing me to be a rake after stealing that kiss. Do you think you can love me now?”

She lay so still for a moment, then lowered her gaze and shook her head. “No, I don’t think I can.”

His heart dropped down to his knees.

The slightest smile turned up the corners of her mouth and she looked him in the eyes again. “It’s too late. I think I’ve loved you for a quite a while.”

Once he could breathe again, he chuckled. “Then say you’ll marry me.”

“I… My promise to Levi, though. But realizing I almost didn’t marry him because of a single kiss from you tells me I wasn’t the wife he deserved, perhaps.”

“I refuse to believe you were anything but the best wife to him, Verity.”

She studied him in silence and he wished he could hear her thoughts. What a fool he’d been all those years ago. Nothing he’d done in all that time made him a better man than he could have been with her at his side.

Verity eventually sighed, then smiled. “If I agree to marry you, will you promise me one thing?”

“Anything. If it’s in my power, it is yours.”

“Promise you’ll never stop kissing me the way you do, that makes me forget everything else in my life.”

Oliver growled, then laughed. “I shall kiss you and love you like no other man can, sweet Verity.”

He vowed as long as his strength lasted, he’d do just that.