Eighteen

With Lilith gone, the other guests wandered off after a few hands. George, stuck in the role of host, had to listen to Lord Harrowsby’s diatribe on patent medicine and healers for hours over whist. At one in the morning, the last guest mercifully went to bed. George headed to his study for quiet and a glass of brandy.

A low fire burned in the grate, folded blankets rested on chairs, fluffed pillows lay on the sofa. A refreshed decanter and clean glass waited by a lamp that was recently filled and lit. These attentive touches did little to combat George’s hollow listlessness.

Even after the horrible episode before luncheon, he couldn’t deny the red-hot anticipation he felt when he thought she was signaling with her spoon and knife to meet her. Then she disappeared, sinking him into a dingy brown despondency.

He reached for a letter from an elderly female relation, forcing himself to get Lilith out of his mind. He heard the quiet grind of a turning knob and lifted his eyes, expecting a servant, but instead Lilith stood in the doorway.

She wore a black coat decorated with glass beads, black lace boots, and a blue hat dominated by a brilliant ostrich feather. She concealed her hands behind her back.

Whatever misadventure she was proposing, he should adamantly refuse. But he couldn’t deny her anything, especially after this afternoon’s embarrassing episode. He rose, launching into his apology. “Miss Dahlgren, I want to apologize for my ungentlemanly behavior with regards to the, um, inappropriate sketch.”

She said nothing, only watched him, an odd glitter in her eye. She uncharacteristically chewed the edge of her lip.

“As your trustee, I have broken a bond of trust between us,” he continued. “But…but dammit, Lilith—” He flung up his arms. “After all we’ve done, you have to know that…that…” He couldn’t finish.

She remained annoyingly quiet, swaying slightly on her feet.

He smoothed his waistcoat and straightened his tie in an effort to compose himself again. “You’re a beautiful woman and I’m a man of natural lusty needs. Yes, I admit, I desire you.” He raised a finger in check. “But I will not act upon these desires in any capacity. You can trust me.”

Finally she spoke. “So I’m safe around you?”

“Yes. Please forgive any dishonorable behavior toward you. I am humbly sorry.”

“Oh.” She gazed down, continuing to chew on her lips. “I’m afraid I cannot easily forgive.” He could scarcely hear her quiet words. “I’m quite upset and it will take a great deal more than mere words to make amends.”

“I’m sorry. What can I do? Tell me.”

“You can draw.” She brought forward the paper and sharpened pencils she had hidden behind her back.

He closed his eyes and squeezed the bridge of his nose. “Please,” he said. “Ask me something else. Just not that. Not now.”

“You don’t understand.” She set the paper and pencil on the table beside the chair. “You…”

She didn’t finish, but stared at him with beseeching eyes. What did she want? What was she trying to say?

Her hand slowly rose, past her bosom to her top coat button. She undid it. No gown or that familiar blue robe waited beneath, only luscious skin.

“Don’t!” he cried, realizing her game too late. But the second button had been undone and the garment fell away, exposing her bare body.

Her loveliness hit him like a punch to his chest. He couldn’t breathe but only stare as the firelight danced on her lush curves. “Good God, Lilith,” he finally managed.

He had envisioned her all incorrectly. Her breasts were far rounder than he had drawn them and tipped with pale rose nipples. Her stomach tapered, further accenting her breasts and the generous swell of her thighs. The fire drew out the coppery tones in the auburn curls about her sex.

Her chest rose and fell with nervous breaths as she watched him studying her. Her arms edged up instinctively to cover herself, but she forced them down again. “Draw me.” Her voice quaked.

“Please don’t do this.” He reached for her coat, offering it to her. “Please.”

“But you said I could trust you.”

He gave a rueful chuckle. “I might have lied to myself and you on that account,” he admitted. “I didn’t realize you were going to be the most ravishing lady I have ever beheld. Foolish of me, I know.”

She drew the coat from his hands, only to let it fall to the floor once more. Stepping closer, her nipples grazed his chest. Her vanilla scent exploded in his mind, burning away any rational thoughts.

“Please have mercy, woman,” he cried through his clenched teeth. He tried not to glance at her body, but good God, she was magnificent.

“I’ve never been truly naked before a man,” she said quietly. “You are the first one. I’ve come this far. Don’t turn me away. Draw me. Please.”

He was unable to muster even a weak “no” to the raw vulnerability and longing in her eyes. Words like “duty,” “trust,” “responsibility,” “inappropriate” shouted in his mind. He knew what he was doing was wrong. But he was going to do it anyway.

He reached up and removed her hat, letting her luscious tresses tumble down, down, down around her breasts as she watched his face. “Every day I secretly watch you, trying to capture your picture in my head,” he whispered. “The essence of you. But you are never still long enough. You keep changing, like light striking an exquisite diamond, sparking the different facets.”

“I shall be still for you, then.”

His fingers trembled as he combed the glossy fibers of her hair. “How shall I pose a goddess? How shall she catch the light?”

The first choice of the sofa was too obvious. The flat, blackened leather would overwhelm her delicate coloring and curves. Then the image arose in his mind. He began violently yanking away pillows from the sofas and chairs, pilling them on the carpet before the fire. He then spilled a crimson blanket over them.

“Come.” He patted a cushion. His hand shook as he lowered her, as if she were the most delicate thing he’d ever held. “Lie along the cushions so the gold light bathes your body.” She tried to follow his dictates, but couldn’t replicate the vision in his head. He wanted the light to illuminate her belly and peaks of her breasts and shine in her chocolate eyes but keep the rest of her body in the shadows. “Please, may I touch you?”

“Of course.” She smiled.

He tried to ignore the hot electricity that ran from where his hand touched her smooth skin, burning a blaze down his arm, through his chest, down to his cock. He drew deep breaths, trying to keep his arousal in check.

He rested her shoulder flat against the cushion, drawing her hand between her breasts, gently curling the fingers as in repose and careful not to accidentally brush her nipples. The other hand he rested beneath her mouth, touching her lips.

“I’m going to remove your boots. I really think their blackness will put too much weight on the right side.”

She laughed. “Of course, I meant to do that.”

His trembling fingers struggled with the simple laces as he forced himself not to glance up to the deep red of her sex. But when he bent her leg to pose it, he caught a flickering glimpse of the peak of her clitoris peeking through her curls. Good God! It was more than he could handle. He had to step away for a moment.

“Are you well?”

“Yes, very. Just having my, uh, usual masculine ailment when I’m around you. I’m as hard as a blacksmith’s hammer.”

Her bubbly laughter was that of a mischievous imp on a wild adventure. It disarmed him, releasing his tension, and he found himself joining in.

He bunched the blanket around her, careful not to touch her intimate places. “Are you warm enough? Shall I stoke the fire?”

“I am fine.” Her tender smile undid him. He could only stare, overcome by the exquisite image she made. The shimmer of wetness on her lips, the light from the fire casting her breasts, belly button, thighs in luscious gold tones as her hypnotic eyes pierced through the darkness.

“Don’t move. Stay like that. Where is that paper?”

She started to point. “It’s over by the—”

“No! Don’t move!” He caught himself. “I mean, please don’t move.”

He snatched up the page and paced about his bookshelves, yanking out a large atlas. He drew up a chair and then studied her. How could he begin? How did he capture that ethereal, lovely energy that enwrapped her? He wasn’t good enough.

“Come, George, don’t be afraid,” she whispered. “Draw.”

He released a stream of breath and drew a single line—the rise to the peak of her breast. Then another line sloping down her rib cage to the gentle concave of her belly. Then another line and another. He felt confined, his clothes constraining him. He feverishly tore off his coat and waistcoat and then yanked away his collar and tie. He grabbed his pencil again and began the extension of her legs. “You are lovely,” he said, not thinking, the words streaming out. “My God, you are more than lovely. I don’t have words to say it. Spirit-lifting gold, mysterious deep red, and the purity of white.”

“You are quite beautiful too.”

“Hush, you are the work of art and I the mere artist who can only capture a shadow of your brilliance.”

“Spoken like a true, anguished artist.”

He didn’t object—how could he—as he struggled to capture the gentle line of her jaw and contours of her hair. He needed to get the preliminary lighter strokes done to make sure he had her dimensions correct before he began shading.

“You look so happy,” she said.

“Shocking how a nude woman can cheer a man,” he quipped dryly. He couldn’t admit how fearful yet elated he felt in his heart, like a child finally freed to run wild outside after watching from the windows for weeks. Or was it years? Perhaps a near lifetime?

“I mean when you’re drawing,” she clarified. “Don’t deny that it makes you feel alive. That this is your passion. Be truthful. I’ve taken off my clothes for you, after all.”

He slowly raised his head. He couldn’t deny her the truth. She deserved it no matter the painful memories of lashings and self-loathing he had to rise above to tell her.

“Yes,” he said quietly, holding her gaze. “Thank you, Lilith. Thank you.”

* * *

The truth in his voice undid her more than the way his eyes studied her body. She could hide nothing from him, but let his eyes have their way with her, teasing her breasts, caressing her thighs, and examining her face. Could he tell she was throbbing inside, that her folds had swollen with aching yearning? Her heart swelled with a sweet, pure love for him.

As she watched him sketch with feverish joy, she realized that this drawing wasn’t enough. He may capture her on paper, but she had not captured him. The artist remained elusive to her. She wanted to know the passion and vision that drove him, not with her mind and eyes, but with her body. She wanted that beauty inside of her.

She wanted him inside of her.

The realization frightened and exhilarated her. Did she come here tonight to let him draw her or make love to her? Somehow these didn’t feel like two disparate questions, but the same. She came here to know his truth. To love all aspects of him.

She had never loved a man so profoundly. Even though he could never love her with equivalent depth and dimension, even though her love had no future but pain, could she leave Tyburn without fully experiencing it?

She eyed her coat lying on the floor. Should she slink away before she completely destroyed her heart? Or was this her only chance to know such an ethereal love?

“Are you cold?” he asked. She realized he knew every twitch of her body and motion of her eye. He rose only to kneel before her. “I’ve finished your chest and hips, as best I can. You are too magnificent for my meager talent.”

“Hush.” She pressed her fingers to his lips. He kissed them.

“Lilith,” he whispered. He closed his eyes and rubbed his cheek against her fingers. “We must be careful.” The pleasure on his face and the bristle and silk of his skin drove her desire higher.

She didn’t want to be careful but reckless. To love him so fully and purely in this one night that it would justify all the pain of parting.

And they would part.

He edged away as if afraid to touch her again, and carefully nestled the blanket to cover most of her body, except her calves and feet. “There, are you warm enough now, dearest?”

Her throat tightened as if she might cry. There was nothing sad about the moment except something in his caring voice that hurt her deeply. Suddenly she didn’t want him to draw now but to hold her and whisper things such as not to be afraid of the dark and to tell her that he would stay beside her until she fell asleep.

He returned to his page. She didn’t like being covered. She liked being bared before him. “I’m a little too warm now,” she said and flung off the blanket.

He continued to sketch, his handsome face drawn in concentration, until he finally threw down his pencil. “Enough!” He raked his fingers through his hair. “You’re stunning and I can only create rubbish. You defeat me.”

“No!” She came to her feet, not bothering to cover herself. What had she to hide from him now?

He bowed his head, refusing to look at his creation. She peered at herself staring back from the paper. He had posed her so that her breasts formed peaks illuminated by the firelight; her leg, slightly raised and resting on the other, drew the viewer’s eye into the valley of her sex. His desire bled through in lights and shadows contouring her body. Yet her eyes carried none of the sensuality evident in the rest of the image. Large and black with points of light, they dominated the drawing. Tenderness imbued them. And love. Did he see it too? Was she that transparent?

Tears rolled down her face. “You are brilliant. See the primal and sensual juxtaposing with the gentle compassion? She’s a nurturing lover. But…is she me?”

“She is how I see you tonight.” He wiped away her tears with the pads of his thumbs.

“I wish I could look inside your beautiful mind. I wish I could view the world the way you do.”

“You overestimate the contents of my poor m—”

She placed her mouth on his. He couldn’t destroy the lovely moment with deprecating words that weren’t true. She released the sketch, letting it float safely away as her tongue slid along his and she felt his body harden with yearning. Her hand drifted down, exploring the rise of his chest to the firm plane of his belly and then to where his sex pushed against his trousers. “Let me recompense you,” she said. “For your art.” He groaned through their kiss. She let her fingers gingerly trace the bulge before sliding them into his waistband to find the buttons.

He tore away from their kiss, clamping his strong hand atop hers. His chest heaved with labored breath. “Please, woman,” he said, low and hoarse. “I’m too weak to deny you as I should. You owe me nothing. ”

But she’d made her choice. Other women wanted a ring, husband, wedding night; she wanted pure beauty and truth—these rare things trembling between them. They might never come again.

“‘O! let me have thee whole,—all—all—be mine!’” she quoted Keats.“‘Withhold no atom’s atom or I die.’”

“You don’t know what you’re asking of me. You’re not…ahhh.” His trousers fell away and his cock thrust up, rigid and wide. For a moment, she just took him in, letting her fingers gingerly explore, learning his contours. Slowly she caressed him, all the while watching his face. His eyes were closed, mouth opened in pleasure. “What we’re doing is wrong,” he said in a low rush of breath.

“Hush, my handsome lover.”

He leaned forward, his mouth roughly taking her breast, letting his tongue flick across the top. The surge of pleasure caused her to halt in her work, his magic paralyzing her body. She felt another hand slide between her wet, swollen folds and a finger slide inside of her. She released a high whimper.

“Dear God, Lilith,” he whispered over her breast.

What had been a dull, aching throb turned acute. She pushed against him, thrusting her nipple deeper into his mouth, pleading for more of his magic. Her entire body seemed to balance on his finger as it delved into her. She arched her back and made a strangled cry. “I want to feel you inside me.”

She toppled him to the floor beside his sketch. Now he lay before her. He was too powerful, too big. She didn’t know what to do.

Her only knowledge came from silly illicit books circulating at school and from what Frances had told her. But nothing could prepare her for this.

She tentatively, cautiously straddled her legs over his sex. “I want you to show me how to love you.”

“I can’t resist you. Don’t do this. I beg you.”

She leaned down, letting her lips hover over his, her hair falling around his face. “Let me love you.”

He closed his eyes. She could see the conflict on his stricken face. Proper, old-fashioned George trying to protect her virtue. She kissed around the edges of his mouth. “Let me.”

“You’re a virgin,” he hissed, his jaw tight. “This isn’t the best way.” He drew her onto his body, running his fingers lightly up and down her sides. Then, in an easy motion, he rolled until he was on top. He rose to his knees, letting them push her legs apart. She had managed to cede her power. Now he could walk away.

Yet he continued to stare at her, her face, her belly, and her open, exposed sex.

“Please,” she whispered.

He released a hard, anguished cry and threw off his shirt. The dim light and shadows contoured his taut, powerful muscles. He gently lowered himself onto her, sheltering her.

His tongue stroked and soothed hers as his cock progressed along her swollen folds, finding her core. He pressed gently, seeking entrance. For several long moments nothing happened, even as his pressure increased.

What was wrong?

He withdrew from their kiss to whisper “Try to relax” in her ear. She obeyed, letting go into his embrace, feeling the protection of his powerful body over hers.

A twinge of pain shook her. He caught her gasp in his mouth, his fingers tightening around hers. She stayed in his kiss, letting his caresses chase away the sting.

Gently he slid into her, letting her adjust his weight and heat until inch by inch he was snugly inside.

“My beautiful lady.” He studied her, not with the hard concentration of the drawing but with dark want. Then he smiled tenderly, letting her know she was safe in this new sensuous landscape.

He began to move with gentle strokes, leaving tiny explosions of pleasure in his wake.

“Oh my, ohh…” Her words drowned in a high, soft cry.

“Does this please you?” he asked.

She wasn’t capable of words and pulled him back into a kiss, letting her tongue answer.

His pace quickened, his strokes deepened. Her body moved in unison with his, rising in welcome with each thrust, and then writhing, grinding against him, trying to sate the hunger he elicited. Pleasure yearned for more pleasure, like air to fire. She began to rebel against his controlled and gentle motions, pushing harder, greedy for the sensation. Her body needed no guidance, instinctively knowing to shift her thighs and arch her back, allowing him to penetrate more fully.

He clenched his teeth and closed his eyes as if pain.

“What’s wrong?” she cried, trying to rise up to hold him.

“I’m— I’m trying to control myself,” he choked. “Dear God! I can’t.” His motion turned wild and savage. He thrust and thrust and thrust. She met every one, squeezing his cock, trying to relieve the mounting pressure within her walls else she would burn to death from the inside out.

She was so close to something she didn’t understand. She dug her nails into his skin, her thighs quaking.

He drove deep inside her with a teeth-gnashing grunt, raising her thighs off the floor. Wet heat filled her womb as he shuddered. Then his frantic energy subsided like a storm passing. Yet she continued to move, rocking against his now quiet body, pleading for the same relief. All his tension was gone, but it remained in her, burning and painful. She whimpered in frustration, turning her head and biting down on her fingernail.

“My poor beauty,” he said. “I was too excited. I was…” He didn’t finish, but slid off her.

“No,” she cried. He couldn’t leave her in this torment.

But he hadn’t left her; instead he stationed himself between her legs. He drew up her knee and opened her folds with his fingers.

“What are—” She gasped as his tongue brushed across her peak. He lapped, licked, played, toyed, letting her body grow rigid and her legs quake again, until she could almost reach a pinnacle of something. What was it?

Release? Ecstasy? Incineration? He tortured her with pleasure, seeming never to tire of the game. She was open and at the mercy of his tongue. He let it swirl on her apex until she reached that state again where she could scarcely breathe and her body trembled. A roar filled her ears, she opened her mouth to scream but only the shrillest thin sound escaped. In this place she was suspended. Then his tongue moved a fraction higher and her muscles contracted, waves and waves of tension gushing out of her. His tongue kept moving, milking her until the climax petered away.

He rose up to his knees and studied her spent body. “I think I should draw this—Muse After Rapture.” He lay upon her, letting his cock, now aroused again, rest against the wet curls between her thighs, his arms resting on either side of her, keeping her close. Perspiration gleamed on his muscles.

“That was the most exquisite thing I’ve ever experienced,” she confessed, once she could talk.

He chuckled and kissed each of her hardened nipples.

“No, no, I am wrong,” she corrected. “It’s the second most exquisite.”

“Impossible. What could possibly be better?”

She twined her finger through a strand of his wet hair, drawing it roguishly over his forehead. “When I saw your art in the attic.”

He didn’t say anything. Light from the grate reflected in his deep gray eyes. The scorching heat of desire now cooled, yet there remained inside her the feeling of safety in the embrace of a man she had despised for years. Whom she had penned terrible things about under the guise of fiction. Who created the most stirring, precious art. Tears gathered in her eyes.

“I didn’t mean to hurt you,” he said, distraught. “I tried so hard to be gentle.”

“No.” She traced along the lines cutting down his cheeks. “It’s that I love you,” she said softly. He deserved to know. “I love you with all my heart.”

* * *

She loved him.

The words should have incited fear. He should have been panicking over what had happened.

He felt none of this. Only a deep satisfaction arising from some place deep below his thoughts. Lilith was his.

Finally.

He would like to think he was under some spell of her beauty, as her addle-minded art friends would say, but he knew in a primitive way what he was doing as he entered her body. He knew the entire time. He had recklessly claimed her, driven by desire, with no care for the consequences. He had forced his own hand and there was no going back.

Lilith, the unruly family outcast, was to be the next Marchioness of Marylewick. There was nothing to be done.

He rose to his knees and studied the shadows from the fire dancing on her thighs and breasts.

“What is wrong?” she whispered. “Don’t be upset. Come, let me hold you.”

“I’m not upset.” He chose his words carefully. “Having a wife who loves me is the ideal situation.”

“Wife?” She propped herself on her elbows. “What do you mean, ‘wife’? Are you suggesting that we marry?” She laughed, albeit a bit nervously.

“We must, after what I’ve done.”

“My lover.” She sat up and kissed his forehead. Her warm touch seeped past his flesh into the marrow of his bones. “We did this together. I came here tonight because I wanted to. I love you, but I don’t want to marry.”

He shook his head. “I ruined you. There is no choice in the matter.”

“Ruined me? Did we somehow tumble into the medieval age? Don’t talk such nonsense. You’re turning this beautiful moment ugly.” She kissed his lips.

Her words chafed. How could she say she loved him and then brush him off in the next breath? She had a responsibility to him now.

“This will turn ugly, Lilith, whether you want it to or not.” He rose to his feet and paced to his desk. “I promised your grandfather I would take care of you. You are my duty and I took your maidenhood. There is no other course.”

Anger lit her eyes. “I’m not another duty! I’m someone in your life who only wants to love you and not to make demands on you. I want…I want this pure moment in all its beauty, not polluted by an unpleasant past or a future of demands.”

“You are naïve. You just told me that you loved me. What if I’ve fathered a child?”

“Frances told me about precautions I could take.”

“Those kinds of precautions don’t always work. I know it doesn’t mean much to your wild set, but what respectable man will want to marry a woman already known by another? Some medieval notions carry over. The future will find us regardless.”

She opened her palms. “Why can’t you just let me love you? Why can’t that be enough? Come back. Let me kiss you.”

Her response only enraged him. No, a kiss wouldn’t do. He could not set her free now that he had captured her. Now that he had mentally committed himself to their union.

“Please,” she said.

How could he work on her?

He knelt before her. She came to her knees, pressing her belly against his cock, her breasts against his chest. She gently kissed his chin, his neck, his shoulder, all the while saying, “I love you.” Whatever magic she possessed filled him again. Everything was Lilith, the soft brush of her hair against his skin, her scent of citrus and vanilla mingled with earthy lovemaking, the lilt of her voice, the pressure of her nipples. Her hand found his cock, caressing it until it was hard with want again. He trapped her in a kiss while lowering her to the floor.

He entwined his fingers with hers and locked them to the floor, to hold her there, and then he slid his thighs between hers, letting his cock wait outside her folds. She writhed, straining to feel him, but he clung to every last shred of his self-control.

“P-please, don’t torture me like this,” she whined.

“If you could behave as you have at this house party,” his words rushed out, “you could make an extremely competent marchioness. I’ve watched how you navigate people and situations. You are brilliant.”

“No, I want you. Now. Not your name, this estate, all the horrible memories. I certainly don’t want to behave. Please love me again. You see how I want you.”

“Do you think I want this estate, this life, these mem—” He faltered. “You can’t give your maidenhood to me and then pretend nothing has changed. That I wouldn’t act honorably afterwards.”

“I’m not another duty in your life. I just want you to draw. I wanted to see you smile, a true smile. I wanted to hold the real George and know his touch. I wanted to be his art.”

He gently entered her again. Her body rose with her sigh, welcoming him. He groaned, feeling her snug around him. He released her hands and came to his elbows. “If I drew for you,” he whispered, kissing her ear as he rocked gently inside her.

“What?”

“When we’re alone, if I drew and painted for you. If I promised you kindness and loyalty.” His voice turned to a labored whisper. “If you behaved like a proper marchioness, as dazzling as you have been these last few days, but when you were alone with me, you could be as wild and high-spirited as you want to be. Would you marry me then?” He pressed deep into her, using pleasure to weaken her resistance.

“This isn’t fair how you are asking me,” she cried.

He altered his tactics, trying to cut closer to her heart.

“You said that all you wanted from a husband was kindness and loyalty and a home. I will give you all. I promise that you will never be lost and wandering again.”

Tears wet her eyes. “But you don’t love me as I love you. You need to love whom you marry. You need to love and be loved. You need it so much.”

The words “I love you too” caught in his throat, burning there. They frightened him. He knew if he uttered them, he would relinquish his control over her.

And himself.

“Say yes,” he urged, moving inside her.

“I can’t—I—”

“Be my wife and I will draw for you.” He kissed her jaw, her cheekbone, her wet eyelids. “Say yes. And I will be a loyal husband.”

She whimpered and squeezed her eyes shut, a tear rolling from the edge. She could not turn him down now that he had finally captured her, like an exotic butterfly, wings spread, pinned beneath him.

“Please, let me give you a home. A family. Come in from the cold, Lilith.”

“Yes,” she said, the word flowing on her breath. “Yes.”

“Lilith.” His mouth covered hers. He moved in rhythm with her, plunging and withdrawing as her body commanded. The words he couldn’t say, the fear and ecstasy that pulled him apart, he put it all into his sex, letting her take it away as her thighs quaked in climax and he released deep inside her.

Afterwards, she laid her head on his chest, her arm across him. His heart filled with a sweet sensation of happiness he hadn’t known for years. And this same joy scared him to his core.

* * *

Lilith felt the warm glow cocooning them begin to crack and she clutched him tighter.

Had she agreed to marrying into the family that had rejected her? Had she promised her life to the very man she had spit such vitriol about in the pages of her story? A man who couldn’t say he loved her but looked at her with raw, vulnerable yearning? Who created art that broke her heart?

How could she say no? His words had shot right into her emotional Achilles’ heel. You will never be lost and wandering again…Let me give you a home. A family. She grabbed for what he offered like a hurt child reaching blindly for comfort. And his body, so powerful and strong, covered hers, blanketing her in safety.

He would draw for her. Let her live in the gardens of his mind.

But now her secret betrayal wormed in her heart.

She couldn’t begin a life with such a wonderful man keeping the dark secret of her authorship. But she couldn’t dare tell him now when everything was so fragile. She would redeem the sultan. She would show the reader how Colette was confused all along. She would make the reader love the sultan as she now did. Only then would Lilith tell George the truth: that forever he could have his own Colette.

“Now, we have to be in agreement about something very serious before we continue this marriage endeavor,” he said.

She lifted her eyes to meet his. The tenderness in them warmed her with the same sensation of being immersed in sun-heated water.

“We must have no disagreement on this point,” he continued.

“It’s too late for more terms,” she teased. “You should have made me agree while we were making love.”

“It is this,” he whispered in her ear. “We will tell our children that I proposed to you in the study with our clothes on.” He kissed her earlobe.

She couldn’t imagine their children or their future. This was what the other young ladies at the party did—daydream of having his title and home. She just wanted to love him and that was all she knew.