She had wanted him to kiss her.
Dream Cassie turned to him, beckoning him with a smile and the crook of her finger. He floated to her, and she stepped into his arms, their mouths fusing, their bodies drifting together as one. Clothes disappeared, and suddenly, they were on a bed, and he was inside her. She moaned his name over and over. He thrust, sweat beading on his back, his heart pounding, but he couldn’t take his eyes off her, couldn’t bear to look away as release rocked through him, and she threw her head back, in sync with him, crying out in ecstasy. They lay together, panting, surrounded by silk sheets and plump pillows. She looked at him and cupped his cheek, and in her eyes, he could see his whole future.
He was home, he was warm and whole.
At last.
Sidney woke up with a start, fully dressed, alone, his hand in his breeches, and his spent member in his grip. He’d spilled in his pants like a green boy, lusting over the woman he thought he would never hold.
But one day, once he returned with the special license, she would be his in truth. So why did he feel so terrible about it? Why did he feel as if he had betrayed the very people who had accepted him as one of their own?
The memory of her face in the dark hall as he told her they’d marry.
Tragic. She’d been stunned, pale, and then she’d bolted away.
He’d never felt more puzzled or worthless. She wanted to kiss him but nothing more?
Would he be able to make her happy, or would he drag her into his loneliness? Would she resent him, come to hate him? There was a time when he thought she might harbor a girlish infatuation, but then she’d gone to London and dazzled the masses. She grew sophisticated and alluring but still managed to remind him of the spirited girl she was before.
She was incomparable.
She was his.
Did he deserve her? He’d never considered that. But it didn’t matter—no it did. To him. He had a respectable reputation, wealth, a title, but this had happened the wrong way.
He needed his cousin’s direction more than ever. Calvin would know what to do, what Sidney should say to ease Cassie into this new future. But until then, Sidney would have to try. He’d tread carefully, secure the license, and return in due haste.
He didn’t want to take her from her family, but perhaps going to Star Frost might offer them a fresh perspective. A place to begin again as they should go on. Together. He hoped in time, she’d forgive him, and then maybe he could forgive himself.
He still couldn’t figure out how he didn’t recognize her. Much like Tristan, he’d put her on a pedestal. He’d made her out of his reach, but then she was right in front of him, as if plucked from his very fantasies.
He’d lost control. Something he’d never done. But with Cassie, his self-restraint had been eroding. That was why he’d needed Star Frost. He needed to get away from the temptation before he did something stupid and wholly unlike himself. But it was too late. The moment had come upon him without warning, and he was powerless to stop himself. Now he’d tarnished the trust of the people he cared most about, including Cassie.
He didn’t know how to forgive himself for letting his baser needs get the better of him and ruining her. He hadn’t deflowered her, but she didn’t deserve to be reduced to a nameless tryst at a ball.
He cared more for her than that, much more. But she didn’t know it. He’d kept his feelings to himself for the purpose of protecting her, but instead, he’d only hurt her. Somehow, he had to make it up to her, and to her family. To prove that he was good enough to make her happy for the rest of her days, to show her that he wasn’t just some rake who took advantage of an easy target.
He would have to bear his true feelings to her and hope he didn’t make a difficult situation worse. Though…she had wanted to kiss him. He remembered her begging for it. What had that meant?
She’d sent a note, arranging the whole encounter…for a kiss? Christ, he was confused. What had the kiss meant to her? He knew her to be an adventurous, impulsive girl who wanted to prove herself just as capable as her older brother. She took any challenge thrown her way.
So, what was the kiss to her? Was he just a…means to an end? The subject of an experiment?
When put that way, her reaction to their marriage made sense. His stomach knotted. He rose from the bed and summoned for his bath. Unlike Lady Delilah, who had resorted to trickery to bind him in marriage, Cassie had simply concocted a crazy plan for a kiss. No doubt with him because she thought she could trust him.
And here they were, now bound together. He, the rogue who couldn’t control his desires, and she, a curious naïve girl who thought she knew him. He was right back where he started when he set out this morning.
The bastard who ruined his best friend’s sister. It no longer mattered how he felt about her, secretly or not.
In the morning, he’d collect the special license and return to her. How she’d receive him, how she’d stand there beside him as the vows bound them, he had no idea. But he would do everything in his power to change her heart and her mind about him. It was too late to change the past, but the future still waited.
Chapter 8
It was raining the day he returned, soaked to the bone, purple bruises under his eyes. Cassie’s heart leapt to her throat, but she did not move from the window as she watched the groom take the horse, and Sidney trudge up the portico steps. She heard the door open, the voice of the butler welcome him, and take his coat and hat. And then nothing. Her ears felt thick on the inside. She pinched her lobe and shook her ear as if she’d find cotton in there or something else obstructing her hearing.
She stealthily moved toward the open drawing-room door, but when she peeked in the hall, Sidney was not there. A footman remained, sopping up water from the tile floor.
Cassie swallowed. “Has Lord Reardon returned?”
“He has, ma’am. He went straight to his room to change and warm up.”
Cassie nodded. “He must have been riding all morning in this weather,” she murmured. She went to her own room and sat on the bench before her window, watching the rivulets of water stream down. The rain had started at first light. She remembered hearing the taps on her window. He shouldn’t have ridden in such weather, but he was being true to his word. These past several days, she’d thought a lot about that night in the hall outside her father’s study.
His resolve was clear. He was not the type of man to try to slip out of a responsibility. She didn’t want to be a responsibility. Somehow, even with the intimacies they shared that night, she felt further from him than ever before. Like she didn’t know him at all.
Had she imagined the man she had come to love? Was she foolishly blind? But he was doing exactly as she would have predicted.
Being honorable, being the perfect gentleman, even if his kisses could steal her wits.
She didn’t want to marry a stranger. She wanted Sidney. She wanted the truth, to know what was real and what was not, even if it hurt her. She’d thought a lot about what her mother had said. If he cared for someone else, she could never allow him to marry her. She didn’t care how much it hurt her or her reputation.
She cared too much for him to take that away from him. Love was so rare. Most of the couples she knew married for practical reasons. She didn’t want that. She knew love existed, she felt it inside herself. It was the greatest emotion she’d ever felt, greater than any physical pain she’d ever endured.