She prodded. “Will always what?”
He moved again, pushing her back, stalking her toward the door, which she suddenly regretted closing. “To show me that he will always come first with you, despite the fact that he treats you so poorly.”
“He does not treat me poorly.”
“Except he does. He does not believe in you. He does not see your worth. How very valuable you are. How very precious you are.”
She stilled, and he saw the surprise in her eyes. “You think me precious?”
He met her gaze. Refused to let her look away. “I know you are.”
The conversation was dangerous. It made her think of things that could never be. She shook her head, her heart pounding as she pressed against the door and his hands came to the oak surface on either side of her head. “He knows your secrets. And you know his. And you’ll protect them forever, even as it destroys you.”
He was so close, the words whispered at her ear, sending threat and thrill through her. “It won’t destroy me.”
“Of course it will,” he said. “Your choices are ruining you. This place over freedom. Langley over love. Chase over—”
Me.
She heard the word even as he did not say it.
“I don’t,” she whispered, her hands coming to his chest, sliding up to the bare skin of his neck, to the strong line of his jaw. She might not be able to have it, but her choice was clear. “I don’t.”
He was so close, she thought she might die if he didn’t do something—if he didn’t touch her. If he didn’t kiss her. “What, then?” he asked.
“I told you,” she said, aching for him, loving the warmth and the breath and the strength in him as she confessed, “I choose you.”
“Not forever,” he said.
Did he want her forever?
Was he offering it?
Did she want it?
Even if she did, he could not save Caroline.
She met his gaze, wishing she could hide from him in this too-light room. Wishing the truth weren’t so clear. Wishing that he was less than what he was—handsome, noble, good. Wishing she did not want him so very much.
Wishing she could have him, nonetheless.
If only wishing made it so.
She shook her head. “Not forever.”
He nodded. And she thought she saw something in his eyes, there and gone so quickly that she might not have recognized it if she did not feel it so keenly herself.
Regret.
She rushed to say more, knowing she merely made things worse. “If I could . . . if I were a different woman . . . if this were a different life—”
“If I were a different man,” he offered, the words somehow both hot and cold.
“No,” she said, wanting the truth here. Now. Where it had never been before. “I would never want you a different man.”
His lips twisted in a humorless smile. “You should want that. Because as it is . . . as I am . . . We are impossible.”
“If I did not need the title—”
He cut off her thought. “Where is he?”
She met his gaze. “Nowhere near here.”
“When will he return?”
“Not today.” She didn’t want Chase to return. She wanted this moment, with Duncan, to last forever. Hang the rest of the world.
He slid the fingers of one hand into her hair. “Even if you did not need the title,” he said. “I would not marry you.”
The words were a blow—one she no doubt deserved. He was angry, furious that she’d brought him here, to Chase’s office, but not to Chase. She understood pride well, and he was a man who had more of it than most. But still, the vow echoed through her, and she hated it. Hated that he could so easily resist her. Could so easily discount her.
Hated that he could hurt her so well.
That they could hurt each other.
She could not resist fighting back. “You lie.”
He raised a brow and tilted her head back, leaving her lips open for him. “You lie more.”
He kissed her then, his hand sliding down the wood to throw the lock as he lifted her high, pressing her into the door, letting her legs wrap high around his waist as he took everything she offered and left her desperate to give him more. To give him everything.
She gasped, her arms wrapping around his neck as he held her off the ground, as though she weighed nothing at all, as though she were a puppet on a string. And perhaps she was. Perhaps he was her puppet master. His hands were everywhere, at her bottom, in her hair, between them, palming her breasts as he pressed into her, promising ease to the parts of her that ached, desperate for him.
She’d never wanted anything the way she wanted this man.