***
Henrietta drew a breath and balled her hands into fists, braced for Julian’s anger. “I went to see her,” she blurted.
“Excuse me?” He shook his head with a look of confusion.
“Your mistress, Julian. I wanted to meet her.”
He gaped in disbelief. “You did what?”
“There were things I needed to know.”
“Bloody hell!” He glowered. “What kinds of things?”
“I needed to know if you intended to keep her . . . and if you loved her.”
It took all the courage she possessed to make her confession, but she could not enter into this union under false pretenses or harboring futile hopes. It would be far better to live with reality and make the best of it than to pine in silence and die a little each day for what she could never have.
“If you had concerns about that, why the devil didn’t you just ask me?”
“I was afraid you might not be truthful.”
“I would never lie to you, Hen. Don’t you know that?”
“I do now,” she replied softly. “Everything you told me was true.”
He surprised her with a dry chuckle. “I would like to have been a fly on that wall. Is your damnable curiosity satisfied now?”
“Not quite,” she replied. “I asked her other things that she refused to answer.”
His gaze narrowed. “What kind of things?”
“Indelicate things. Things that only your mistress would know.”
“Indeed?” he encouraged, brow cocked.
Henrietta held his gaze, though she trembled inside. “I don’t want a convenient marriage, Julian,” she continued, her throat growing tight with mixed hope and fear. “I know you have always been fond of me, but I want more than that. I want to be a true wife to you . . . in every sense of the word. I wanted to know how to please you, Julian. I wanted to know if I could make you love me.” Her heart leaped into her throat as he moved from his seat to take her into his arms.
“My God, Hen,” he groaned. “How can you say those things and expect me to conduct myself as a gentleman?”
Her gaze held his. “Who says I want you to act like a gentleman?”
She’d barely got the words out before his mouth ravaged hers with a hot, hungry ferocity that made her insides quiver. He pulled her onto his lap. She shut her eyes on a blissful moan and threw herself headlong into the kiss. He really wanted her? The bulge tenting his breeches told her he did. His masterful tongue teased and tangled with hers while she eagerly followed his lead. She felt instantly bereft as his lips broke from hers to draw her down onto the seat. But then they returned to burn a blazing trail of pleasure down her throat. He went lower still, kissing the exposed tops of her breasts. “Tell me to stop, Henrietta,” he said, his breath hot and humid against her skin.
“Don’t stop, Julian,” she whispered. The carriage gave a jolt that nearly knocked them from the seat.
“This is a damnable place to be doing this,” he cursed. “We should wait. You deserve a ring and a bed, Hen.”
“Is that what you want? To wait?” she said, biting her lip in disappointment. She’d waited her entire lifetime for this. She didn’t care where they were as long as she was with him.
“I don’t want you to think I’m a rutting beast,” he said, not quite answering the question.
“Why would I?” she asked. “Do you consider me a wanton for desiring your touch and your kisses?”
“That would not be a bad thing, Hen. I would be most pleased to discover that you are a wanton. Nothing inspires a man’s desire more than a woman who embraces her passion. Indeed, if you truly wish to please me, you will allow me to discover what pleases you.”
“But I don’t even know,” she said breathlessly, shivering as he cupped her breast and caressed the exposed portion with smooth strokes of his thumb. “I’ve never even been properly kissed until now.”
He froze. “Never?”
“No, not unless we count the tavern.”
“Then it wasn’t a dream? I really did accost you?”
“No. The brute in the tavern accosted me. You merely kissed me.”
“And that was your first kiss?”
“Yes.”
“Are you saying Thomas never kissed you?”
“No,” she said. “Not once. Not even good-bye.”
Julian pulled back with an incredulous look. “Let me get this straight, you were going to wed a man who’d never even kissed you?”
“Yes,” she confessed, “but only because the one I really wanted hadn’t kissed me either.”
“The one you wanted?” he repeated blankly. “Not Thomas?”
“No,” she said softly. “Not Thomas. I loved him more like a brother, but I would have wed him anyway because he asked me.”
“You weren’t in love with him?”