Page 15 of Sir Hugo Seeks a Wife (Cinderellas of Mayfair #1)

What’s right? What’s wrong?

I cannot say.

You make me long.

Don’t go away.

“You look like I feel,” Sir Hugo said from the doorway to her office.

Athene shoved away from the desk and lurched to her feet. Her heart crashed against her ribs, and the breath punched out of her lungs. Elation and alarm collided inside her.

“Sir…Sir Hugo, what are you doing here?” she stammered, placing a trembling hand over her chest like a heroine in some bedamned play.

“You know why I’ve come.”

She did. “Sylvie!” she called out in fury.

Her friend appeared behind Sir Hugo and gave her a wave, the insouciance of which made Athene want to pelt her with the shop’s famous sugared almonds. “I couldn’t keep him out.”

“You didn’t try,” Athene said through her teeth.

“Not too hard. Can you blame me? I’m sick of you moping around like a rainy day in January. It’s putting the customers off.”

Athene narrowed her eyes on her friend – former friend – but couldn’t help noticing how that piece of information interested Sir Hugo. “I never go into the shop when you’ve got customers.”

“Well, you’re putting me off,” Sylvie retorted.

The bell over the door tinkled and Sylvie turned. “Sort yourselves out. But for heaven’s sake, do it quietly,” she hissed. Then more loudly and with a French accent. “Lady Bassenthwaite, how lovely to see you. How may I serve you today?”

Athene’s fists clenched at her sides as Sylvie shut the door behind her.

She was stuck with the last person she wanted to see.

Mainly because she’d done nothing but thirst for his presence since they’d parted.

Now it would be twice as hard to accept that there could never be anything between them. “I’ll kill her.”

“She’s trying to help.” Sir Hugo moved forward and laid his stylish gray hat and gloves on the desk. “Don’t be angry with her.”

“She’s interfering,” Athene snapped without meeting his eyes.

“If you really want me to go, I’ll go,” he said softly. “I never want to cause you pain.”

Her gaze snapped up to his face. Because he had caused her pain.

Oceans of it. She hadn’t seen him in over two weeks.

She hadn’t seen him that much before then.

His absence shouldn’t stab at her like a thousand knives.

His absence shouldn’t stop her eating and sleeping and taking charge of her wayward thoughts. But somehow it did.

She’d assumed that she’d passed the age when she obsessed over a man. Especially given what her last infatuation had cost her. Had she learned nothing from the George debacle?

It seemed that she hadn’t. Sir Hugo gave her an opening to send him on his way, but instead of leaping on the opportunity, she sucked in an unsteady breath and lowered her shoulders.

Her attention, no longer clouded by shock and the wish to throttle her best friend, sharpened on his face. “You look terrible, too.”

He’d always seemed as invincible as a force of nature. His energy and purpose once made the very atmosphere vibrate. He didn’t look like that now. He was pale and drawn. Dark circles lay beneath sunken eyes. Deep lines ran between his nose and mouth. He looked like he’d aged ten years.

The self-confident hero could never have given her the bitter smile that now contorted his mouth. “I know.”

Athene waited for him to say something more about her lackluster appearance. His greeting proved that she had no chance of pretending that she wasn’t pining for him.

“What are you doing here, Sir Hugo?” She tried to sound calm and authoritative, but the question emerged husky and uncertain.

“I’ve come to see you. Obviously.” He glanced around the office, cluttered and untidy with papers and pens and notebooks. “Poetry not thriving?”

“I’ve lacked inspiration,” she admitted.

Despite the demands of self-preservation, she couldn’t help devouring him with her eyes. He looked tired and fed up and heartsick. He looked big and strong and gorgeous, and she itched to touch him. Her fingers twitched, as she fought the urge to rush up and grab him and never let him go.

“I’m surprised. I hear a broken heart is the perfect spur to creation.”

How easily he spoke of hearts. If she had an ounce of sense, she’d scoff at his claim, but the words died unspoken on her lips when his attention dropped to the betraying mess on her desk. The betraying mess on her desk…

She surged forward, but not to throw herself into his arms. With shaking hands, she scrabbled to collect the loose pages scattered across the blotter. “Don’t.”

But it was too late. Sir Hugo raised stunned blue eyes. “Were you going to send any of them?”

“I was only—”

“Writing to me.”

“It doesn’t mean anything.” It was a lie, and he’d know it.

With an unsteady hand, he picked up a sheet of paper that she’d missed. “‘Dear Sir Hugo, can you call at Sylvie’s shop? I must see you. I find…’”

Stinging heat invaded her cheeks. Overmastering embarrassment made her queasy.

“What did you find?” Without waiting for a reply, he dropped the page and picked up another. “‘Dear sir, If you…’” He winced. “Sir? Harsh. You can call me Hugo, you know, Athene. We’re hardly strangers.”

“Yes, we are.” Which was an inane thing to say. She wouldn’t waste all this ink and paper on a stranger.

He didn’t grace her answer with a response. Instead he began to read. “‘If you are at leisure today, perhaps you could call at Sweet Little Nothings. I have a matter of urgent importance to discuss. If you…’” He arched one eyebrow at her. “Very businesslike.”

She scrunched the unfinished letters she’d rescued and wished the floor would open up beneath her feet. “Don’t mock.”

He dropped that page on top of its predecessor and picked up another. “‘Hugo—’”

“Oh, God,” she moaned, closing her eyes. Of all the letters, he had to find this one.

“Better,” he said, then began to read. “‘I can’t forget your kisses. You’ve cast a spell on me.

I dream of you at night. I feel your hands on my body.

But you’re not here. It’s driving me mad.

Please…’” He didn’t toss that letter aside.

Instead he shot her a piercing glance. “Quite a change of tone in this one.”

He sounded cool and uninvolved, but she’d seen his eyes and she knew he was as famished for her company as she was famished for his. His voice was all polite curiosity. His fierce expression told her that he wanted to carry her away this very minute and work off his frustrations on her body.

She bit her lip, but the sting did nothing to rupture the fiery bonds of lust tightening between them. “I…I wouldn’t have sent it. I was just—”

The familiar tilt of his eyebrow. “Going mad?”

She swallowed to shift the agonizing humiliation that blocked her throat. “I’m sure you’re feeling proud of yourself,” she said in a sullen tone.

“Not particularly. I haven’t set pen to paper as you have, but believe me, the torment was entirely mutual. Why are you making us both suffer like this?”

That was a good question, and one whose answer had become more obscure through every miserable day without him. “I wish I’d never met you,” she said with an emphasis that came from her soul.

Hurt darkened his eyes to indigo, and he dropped the last, most revealing letter. “Athene, you don’t mean that.”

“I was content until I met you,” she said, even as her heart cramped at the sight of his pain.

He shook his head. “No, you weren’t. It’s clear you’ve spent all these years suppressing your natural inclinations. You were suffocating to death, settling for a life without hope or joy or freedom.”

She recoiled. “But I was safe.” She didn’t bother arguing with his conclusions. They both knew that he was right. Dear God, if only he’d stop watching her as if she were more precious than the rarest pearl.

“Is safe enough for you, Athene?”

“There was a time in my life when I wasn’t safe at all.” With a disheartened sigh, she let the unfinished letters in her hands drop to the floor. “Safe counts for a lot.”

“It doesn’t count for everything.”

“It’s greedy to want everything.”

“Hell’s bells, woman, be greedy.” He spread his hands in supplication. “Marry me and put us both out of our misery.”

She was already shaking her head. “I can’t.”

He surveyed her with a despair that made her want to cry. “Then what the devil are we to do?”

She squared her shoulders and shot him a direct look. “I can become your mistress.”

***

Hugo stared in torment at this woman he wanted above all others. Who wanted him back, he knew. He hadn’t needed to read those heartbreaking letters. God help him, she was so gallant and so dear and so alone. How could he resist her? “You’re worth more than that. You know you are.”

Her lush mouth flattened. “All I know is that I’m in a fever for you.”

“Athene…” He lunged forward, then stopped.

Despite her provocative confession, she wasn’t ready to touch him.

Which was a pity. The effort of keeping his hands by his sides tested all his restraint.

“There’s no shame in wanting me. I want you, too.

I’m wretched away from you. This last fortnight has been hell on earth. ”

Her dark eyes softened at his confession, before a spark of bleak humor appeared. “How on earth did we get into this mess?”

He didn’t smile. After these last days, he couldn’t make light of how much he needed her.

He stretched his hands out toward her and pleaded.

“I don’t want to lose you. Please be my wife.

I don’t want to lie and sneak around. I don’t want to act as if I’m ashamed of you. I want to grant you every honor.”

Her eyes widened. “What about George?”

He exhaled with impatience. “I don’t give a flying fuck about George, beyond the fact that he wasn’t worthy of you and I’d happily murder him for hurting you.”

She sighed. “You’re still such a knight in shining armor.”

Hugo heard the reluctant affection in her voice. “Then let me rescue you.”

Her expression closed against him. She hefted in a shuddering breath, as if steeling herself for what was to come. “Then who would rescue you?”

“My darling…” How could he stay away any longer? He hurtled around the desk and reached for her. Not touching her had tortured him since he’d entered the room. “I want to be your husband, not your client.”

“Marriage isn’t on the table. I beg you to take what I’m offering. The only thing I can offer.” Athene avoided his grasp and twined shaking hands together at her waist. “But could I…could I call you something else, so I don’t feel like a whore?”

He ran his hand through his hair. “It’s all nitpicking, though, isn’t it? I want you for a lifetime, and you want a temporary affair.”

Her linked hands tightened, until the knuckles shone white. “Perhaps an affair will burn away our interest. Then you can seek a suitable wife and I can continue as I did before we met.”

“Enduring endless punishment for a youthful mistake that you obviously believe is an irredeemable sin.”

She flinched. “That’s how the world sees it.”

“The world is wrong.”

“But we live in the world.” The sadness and the conviction in her voice made him realize that his entreaties had failed. She wouldn’t compromise. The knowledge made him want to punch a hole in the wall.

“So I accept your terms or leave with nothing at all?” he asked with what he considered was justified rancor.

She raised her chin and stared him down like the great lady he knew she was born to be. “Yes.”

“No negotiation?”

Her throat moved as she swallowed. “No.”

His usually well-concealed temper told him to consign her to Hades and go on his way. But these last two weeks had demonstrated that without her, his life was in ruins. And if they were together, he had a chance to change her mind. He wasn’t ready to give up yet, by Jupiter.

Hugo met eyes shadowed with apprehension and doubt. She wasn’t as cool as she strove to appear. He took encouragement from that. Their war wasn’t over, and from here on, he could enlist pleasure and passion to help achieve his ends.

While he hated the answer he gave, it was the only answer possible. Walking away was never an option. “Very well,” he said somberly. “I agree to your terms.”