“Uncivilized again, am I?” He caught up to her and reached out to keep her from tumbling backward with his long, strong fingers around her elbows. “Shall I show you uncivilized, Miss Fairchild?”
Yes, please. Thank heavens her breath had escaped her and kept her from uttering such embarrassing words. Not that he gave her time to speak. His hands jerked her close, one sliding around her waist and the other moving to tip up her head.
Her heart galloped when her gaze clashed with his. Amber eyes molten, sparking like a flame tossed by the wind. Terrifying and alluring and invigorating all at once, so intense she had to close her own to take it in. And then his lips were on hers.
Civility indeed had no place in his kiss. ’Twas more the embrace of an adventurer, one who was seeking, hungering, demanding…yet not demanding more than she yearned to give. She wrapped her arms around his neck and surged up onto her toes.
How could something feel both familiar and new? Never had a man kissed her like this—never, in truth, had she wanted one to. Yet as Thad’s lips caressed hers, she had the sensation of waking from a dream and finding it real, part misty wonder and part warm reality. And his arms…they felt like home around her.
Her smile took her mouth from his, and she opened her eyes to find Thad smiling too.
His fingers wove through her hair, making her wonder what happened to her pins this time—she had never had such trouble keeping track of them in England. He pressed a gentler, quicker kiss to her lips. “That will teach you what you get for calling me uncivilized.”
Laughter bubbled up and spilled forth. “It will indeed, you uncouth, uncivilized brute.”
Another brush of lips on lips. “You are an astoundingly slow pupil.”
“Perhaps you are a bad teacher.” She tightened her arms around his neck. “You ought to try that lesson again.”
“Well.” One more kiss, feather soft, tempting as a cup of chocolate. “If I must.”
He deepened it again, and this time was even more consuming than the first, making her imagine a thousand futures she could have in his arms. Tossing seas and galloping horses, exotic mountains and untamed wilds. Bustling streets and familiar faces, nights by the fire and days side-by-side.
So long as she could feel forever this certainty in her heart, that wherever he was, that was where she should be. As her fingers moved through his hair and onto his cheek, her heart beat in time to his.
A blistering French exclamation from the doorway made them both jump. Her feet firmly on the ground again, Gwyneth’s vision blurred from the rush of blood to her face. She leaped away from Thad and pressed her hands to her burning cheeks.
He dragged in a breath and turned leisurely toward the door, where Captain Arnaud stood glowering. “Thunder and turf, Alain. You startled a year off my life.”
Gwyneth slid to the side to keep Thad between her and Captain Arnaud, though she wasn’t sure why she felt the need to do so.
Arnaud swept his hat from his head and dashed it to the floor. “Is that what you call treading carefully, Thad? Taking matters slowly?”
Gwyneth drew in a long breath. They had spoken of her? Or rather, of Thad’s feelings for her? The thought made her insides turn to mush…until she realized that his best friend obviously did not approve. The mush hardened to lead and sank into the pit of her stomach.
Thad’s head came up. “Yes, that is exactly what I call it, given how long I have wanted to kiss her and held myself in check.”
Her breath caught. How long had he wanted to do so? Since she first started imagining it?
Arnaud muttered something too low for Gwyneth to make out, though the intonation was unmistakably French once more. He shook his head. “You are too blind to see the dangers. She is a guest under your roof, yet there you stand taking liberties—”
“Liberties! ’Twas only a kiss, and my parents are directly across the hall. I am hardly—”
“You are.” He stooped, scooped up his hat, but then he tossed it down again with even more fury as soon as he straightened. “Blast it, Thad, look at yourself. You have not courted her. You have only known her eight weeks. She is still distraught over her loss, and you swoop in and take advantage.”
Ridiculous. He would never… Joke as they may about him being uncivilized, Gwyneth had not a single doubt that he was a gentleman. She slid to her left, willing to risk being within Arnaud’s line of sight so that she might see Thad at least in profile. She found a muscle in his jaw ticking.
“Watch yourself, Alain. I have granted you many a jab over the last two years, but I will not suffer another now.”