Page 119 of The Paid Companion

All of the oxygen seemed to have evaporated from the room. The world and time itself stopped.

“You love me?” she repeated. “Arthur, do you mean it?”

“Have you ever known me to say anything I did not mean?”

“Well, no, it is just that...” She narrowed her eyes. “Arthur, are you certain that you are not offering marriage because you feel you must?”

“If you will recall my history in such matters, my dear, you may remember that the last time I found myself trapped in an engagement that I wished to escape, I showed myself quite capable of getting out of the entanglement.”

“Oh. Yes. Yes, you did.” She frowned. “But this is not the same sort of thing at all. I do not want you to feel that you must marry me just because of what happened between us here.” She paused. “And downstairs in the library.”

“I shall let you in on a little secret.” He closed the remaining distance between them. “I made love to you on both occasions because I had already decided that I wanted to marry you.”

She was too stunned to summon up anything resembling a coherent response.

She swallowed. “Really?”

“I wanted you from that first moment when you came crashing through the doorway of the offices of Goodhew and Willis. I knew then that you were the woman I had been waiting for all of my life.”

“You did?”

“My love, let me remind you that I am famous for my intuition when it comes to making investments. I took one look at you and I knew that you would be the best investment I could ever possibly make.”

She smiled tremulously. “Oh, Arthur, that is the most romantic thing anyone has ever said to me.”

“Thank you. I was rather pleased with it, myself. I practiced it during the carriage ride here today.”

“But you know that a gentleman of your rank and wealth is expected to marry a young lady right out of the schoolroom. One with excellent social connections and a plump inheritance.”

“Allow me to remind you that I am considered to be something of an eccentric. Society will be dreadfully disappointed unless I wed a lady who is equally unusual.”

“I do not know what to say.”

He tipped up her chin with one hand. “You could tell me whether or not you think it might be possible for you to love me enough to want to marry me.”

The most delicious sense of joy unfurled within her. She moved her hands up around his neck. “I am so desperately in love with you that when I packed my trunk today in preparation for leaving, I thought my heart might break.”

“You’re certain?”

“Absolutely.” She touched her fingertips to his jaw. “And, as you know, sir, I am a woman of very decisive temperament.”

He laughed and scooped her up into his arms. “When it comes to that trait, we are well-matched indeed. No wonder you have swept me off my feet.”

She realized that he was carrying her toward the bed. “Good heavens, the servants, sir. Ned will be coming up here to fetch my trunk, and the hackney is waiting.”

“No one will disturb us.” He dropped her lightly on the bed and peeled off his coat. “I sent the hackney and the entire household away when I got home a few minutes ago. I made it clear that no one was to return for at least two hours.”

She smiled slowly. “Did you, indeed, sir? Were you that sure of yourself?”

“No, I was that desperate.” He sat down on the side of the bed and pried off his boots. “I knew that if I could not convince you to marry me using logic, my only remaining hope was to make love to you until you could no longer think clearly.”

“What a clever notion. That is one of the things that I love about you, Arthur. I have never met another man who manages to combine logic and passion with such amazing skill.”

He laughed again, the sound low and husky and warmed by happiness.

When he came to her a short time later, she opened her arms to him. He undressed her almost as swiftly as he had undressed himself, tossing her gown into a careless heap beside the bed.

He rolled onto his back and pulled her down onto his chest. She framed his face with her hands and kissed him with an urgency that made him groan. She could feel him pressed against her thigh, heavy and rigid with desire.