“Hold on to me,” he said, feeling the tingle at the base of his spine that told him the crisis was close. “Hold me tight, with everything.”
She tightened her arms around his shoulders and locked her legs at the small of his back. And when he came inside her, it was heart-stopping. Brain-blanking. Bone-melting.
And sweet.
So damned sweet.
In the aftermath, he pressed kisses to her lips, trying to savor every last bit of that sweetness.
He knew it couldn’t last.
This was his life, after all. And he knew from twenty-eight years of experience being Rafe Brandon . . .
It didn’t matter what promises he made to her, or to himself. When his emotions flared, his good intentions burned to ash. His brother’s intended bride somehow became his own. A waltz turned into a fistfight. Be patient translated to Faster, harder, now.
Someday, he would hurt her. He would follow the wrong impulse, say words he didn’t mean. He’d find a way to cock this up in some stupid, irretrievable manner. Rafe felt sickly certain of it.
All the more reason to treasure this closeness now.
He would let her hold him just as long and as tight as she dared.
Chapter Twenty-two
Morning brought an ironic realization. One Clio was oddly unprepared to face.
“You do realize what this means.” In the early light of dawn, Rafe pulled his shirt over his head and pushed his arms through the sleeves. “Now we actually have to plan a wedding.”
“Oh.” She paused in buttoning her chemise. “Must we?”
“Unless I dreamed all that?” He shot a meaningful look at the bed. “I’m fairly certain we must.”
She gave him a reassuring kiss. “You didn’t dream one moment of that.”
And neither had she. Their night together had been wonderful, and wonderfully real.
After making love the first time, they’d risen to bathe and take some dinner. Then talked until they fell sleep in each other’s arms. But not for long. Twice more in the night, he’d woken her with kisses that quickly became something more. They repeated the cycle as long as the night lasted—making love, falling asleep, then waking to make love again. As though they could make the one night feel like several.
“It’s not the idea of marriage I’m balking at,” she said. “Just the wedding plans. You’ve already carried me up the grand staircase in a white lace gown. We’ve fed each other cake. We’ve spent our night in the honeymoon suite. Can’t we just dispense with all the ceremony? I would be happy to get married in the middle of a field, in a dress I’ve worn twenty times before, so long as I loved the man I was marrying.”
“Simple suits me. I am not going to complain about a lack of bunting.”
Smiling to herself, she reached for her stays. “Of course, I would like to have my sisters there. Frustrating as they can sometimes be, my wedding wouldn’t be the same without them.”
He busied himself with his trouser fastenings and didn’t reply.
She cringed, instantly regretting her thoughtless words. Yes, she could have her sisters. When they married, there was no chance Rafe would have his brother in attendance. Piers might never speak to either one of them again.
Rafe was giving up a great deal for her. She wasn’t in the habit of believing that she could be worth that, to anyone. He was worth everything to her, too. She vowed to love him so fiercely and so well, he would never feel the deprivation.
As she untangled the tapes of her corset, an idea formed in her mind.
She wet her lips and gathered her nerve. “Remember what you told me the other day? That when we were younger, you couldn’t bear to look at me sometimes because in your mind you’d been making me do such wicked things?”
One of his dark eyebrows rose. “I remember.”
She let the corset fall to the side, standing before him in her chemise and stockings. “Make me do wicked things.”
He regarded her for a moment, as if trying to gauge her sincerity. Or perhaps her courage.