Page 6 of The Spinster's Seduction(The Lover's Arch #4)

Evelyn’s expectation, based on very little experience, was that kissing involved tongue and teeth and forceful lips. When Julian had kissed her, he had done so with very little consideration for whether she wanted to be kissed. Everything had felt distinctly wet. An unpleasant sensation she had been in no way eager to repeat.

Yet Charles’s mouth felt pleasantly dry against her own. It pressed against her with such gentle insistence that she forgot about her expectations. Or, indeed, anything but Charles’s exhalation, as though he had been waiting for a long time, and finally had the luxury of coming home.

He was kissing her .

Not only that, but she was enjoying it.

His thumb swept up to her jaw, sliding until he turned her head, and at this new angle, she found her face slotted against his far more neatly.

Well . This had been remarkably easy. She’d expected to have to argue the point for far longer, perhaps even threatening to hire a male courtesan, as Lady Durham had suggested. Not that she had the slightest idea of where to do such a thing, but that hardly seemed to matter. Charles had not required her to do more than ask, and—well, now hardly seemed the moment to quibble about his reasoning.

She reached up to lock her arms around his neck, and his hand came to rest on her hip, drawing her closer. His mouth opened against hers, and her entire body felt as though he had set it alight, yet instead of pain, all she felt was warmth. It sank lazily through her body, down through her stomach to settle in her lower belly.

He raised his head, mouth grim even as heat flared in the back of his eyes, the expression akin to the sensation flooding through her.

“There,” he said with unsettling finality. “Now you can consider yourself to have been thoroughly kissed.”

She touched her lips in wonder. Yes, she could hardly argue with that. And yet . . . “There was not any tongue at all,” she said in surprise.

The worst of his grimness fled, and he barked a laugh. “Were you expecting it?”

“Well, there was the last time.”

“With Julian? You didn’t enjoy it, you said so yourself.”

“I’ve heard the act is enjoyable,” she said primly. “I had hoped you would prove to me how enjoyable it could be.”

“Damn it all, Evie.” He placed her hand in the crook of his arm and led her through the arch and beyond, into what might once have been a flower garden, and now housed nothing more than snow-covered stubble above bare earth. “We should not even be discussing this.”

“Why?”

“It’s hardly proper.”

“And are you proper?” she asked, looking up at the hard line of his jaw. “I have heard plenty of things to insinuate quite the opposite.”

“That is neither here nor there. The loss of your innocence is no small thing.”

She tilted her head. “Did you think so when you were at the point of losing yours?”

“For God’s sake, Evie!” he exploded. “They are not the same.”

“I hardly see why not. I’m not expecting you to marry me.” She adjusted her skirts without looking at him, hoping the air would cool the blush on her cheeks and the lingering sensation of heat elsewhere. “In fact, I wouldn’t allow it even if you were not engaged. I’m not doing this to win a husband. ”

“Then why?” When he looked at her, there was something a little anguished about his expression, rubbed raw by the cold north wind. “Why ask me, if you were not wanting me as a husband? You might have had me, you know, any time these past twenty years or so, and without the necessity of seduction.”

Her stomach lurched at the thought. But at nineteen, he would not have been a comfortable husband, nor she a comfortable wife. They had been better suited as friends, even if sometimes it hurt to watch him leave her behind for the pleasures of London and his life—far more exciting than the childhood they had shared together.

She would never have wished to partake, anyway. Her joy in life did not come from excess. Over time, she had come to realise that it would be better to love him from a distance, to have known all the happiness of being with him without suffering him as an unwilling husband. And although he would have married her, that was not the same as wanting to marry her. He would have married her for her sake more than his, and that would have been unbearable.

“I wish to understand the pleasures of the flesh,” she said steadily, even as the blood heated her cheeks once more. “That is all. The question is, Charles, will you oblige me in this? It is the last thing I will ask of you before you marry.”

Charles wished she would stop referring to his future wife. He wished she would stop demanding that he not offer for her, as though there could be nothing more repugnant than the prospect of spending her life with him.

He wished for a lot of things, but most of all, he wished he had not kissed her. Doing so had smashed the door on his desires into smithereens.

Still, he attempted to conceal his feelings by placing a hand on his heart and offering her a wry smile. “I will have you know that in certain circles, I am considered quite the catch. ”

“Many people consider you London’s most eligible bachelor,” she said, and it irked him more than it should that she evidently did not count herself amongst those people. “But I—” She caught at her lip, and the sight of her distress did something quite unacceptable to his chest. “I would not have you offer for me out of obligation, Charles. I’m not trying to trap you. You must see that. This is for curiosity’s sake alone.” She caught her breath, and out of habit, he took her hand, squeezing it to offer her silent comfort. “But if you do deny me again, if you decide you would rather not . . . Please do not think the worse of me for wanting to know. I—I do not think there is anything wrong with an unmarried lady lying with a man who is not her husband, particularly when she has no prospect of marriage herself. It is a cruel thing, I think, to expect women to remain chaste all their days if they are not fortunate enough to fall mutually in love, but . . .” Her breath bloomed like a veil in the space between them, the tiny droplets of water crystallising in mid-air. “I could not bear it if you thought badly of me,” she finished, a very slight wobble in her voice.

It was that wobble that undid him.

He brushed a stray lock of hair from her forehead, one that always escaped her bun in any breeze. No pin could hold it in place, and he had formed an unaccountable fondness for that single curl. “Ah, Evie,” he said, keeping his voice gentle. “I could never think badly of you for your choices, no matter what they are. I am far from perfect, but I am not, I think, a hypocrite.”

She swallowed hard. “Thank you. I knew I could trust you.”

And with that, she unmanned him. There was nothing, he discovered, more intoxicating to male pride than being trusted by a woman whom he respected so fiercely.

He cupped her face, unable to stop himself from touching her, knowing he teetered on the edge of something ruinous and unable to stop himself. “Listen to me, Evie. If we do this—and heaven help me for even considering it—then I will think of you differently. I will never be able to look at you the same way again once I know things only a lover would know. You, too, will look at me differently. We cannot, under any circumstance, change these things.” He searched her expression—her pursed lips, the wrinkle on her brow as she followed his words and digested them. “Can you live with that?”

“Yes,” she whispered. “Can you?”

He didn’t know, so instead he asked another question of his own. “Are you certain you want to do this? With me?”

“Yes,” she answered immediately, hope flaring in her eyes like a match to a flame. “Will you, Charles?”

“It seems I can deny you nothing,” he said, having to try very hard not to kiss her again. “Now tell me, how would you like me to begin?”