He shook his head, his eyes calm, his mouth relaxed. “No, I like it. I wish you’d always call me Tarquin.”
He didn’t need to tell her he extended this invitation to few people. Something cold and hard inside her loosened and unfurled like an opening rose. For the first time since she’d started this affair, she didn’t feel like a whore. Her conscience gave a yelp of protest, but she’d become accustomed to ignoring its complaints.
She didn’t answer his request to use his Christian name, which was answer enough, she supposed. He cast her a perceptive glance as if he knew the battle she waged against her stupid, wayward heart.
She waited for him to persevere, but he merely said. “Will you stay?”
Self-preservation insisted she leave, snap the bond between them, establish some distance to save her sanity. She couldn’t pretend she had any excuse to remain. Sleeping in his arms did nothing to forward her scheme.
Everything went too fast. She was trapped in a hurtling avalanche of feeling. Every time she tried to snatch at a branch or a rock to halt her slide to disaster, it cracked under her hand.
The further she fell, the faster she went. Soon, she wouldn’t have a hope of saving herself.
Don’t lie to yourself, Diana. It’s already too late.
But it was raining outside, and she was snug and cozy in this bed. Ashcroft’s arms curled tight around her. She loved the lingering scent of their joining and the soft sound of his breathing.
She lowered her head to his hair-roughened chest and shut her eyes, shutting her mind to cruel reality as she did so.
“I’ll stay,” she whispered.
Chapter Eighteen
Ashcroft glanced up from the books he’d piled on the desk to see Diana in the library doorway. She carried a candle, and the flickering light turned her into a gorgeous creature of mystery and shadows.
She was a creature of mystery and shadows even in daylight.
“I thought you’d sleep,” he said softly, stepping out of the circle of lamplight around the desk to take her hand.
An hour ago he’d left her curled up in exhausted slumber amidst the rumpled sheets. He was bone weary too, but after the revelations of the day, the evening, the night, he’d been too restless to sleep.
In the hope that sorting through the books would distract him from the woman upstairs, he’d prowled his way into Perry’s library. He’d failed to escape his preoccupation with Diana. He’d known he would even before he made the attempt.
Her fingers curled around his with an immediate trust that pierced him to the heart. “I…missed you.”
Oh, dear God, how was he to resist her? It was impossible.
“I approve of your wardrobe.” He drew her toward the desk, unable to shift his attention from her disheveled beauty.
Her laugh was low and redolent of sin. “Your shirt was the first thing that came to hand.”
“You have my permission to wear it anytime.”
On such a tall woman, the loose white garment fell softly to midthigh. As she walked, her breasts slid against the fine cambric with a gentle rhythm that made every drop of moisture in his mouth evaporate.
Without great conviction, he reminded himself that only a beast would use her again so soon after that marathon session.
Restraint grew more difficult when she ran an assessing and frankly admiring glance over his bare chest. His skin tightened as if she touched him instead of just looked. “I approve of what you’re wearing too.”
He’d tugged his breeches on upstairs and come down barefoot. “It would frighten the ladies in Hyde Park into a riot.”
“I’m not sure ‘frighten’ is the word I’d choose, although a riot is a possibility.”
He released her and edged behind the desk, hoping the barrier might impose control over his unruly arousal. “Stop it.”
Heavy lids fell over her eyes, turning her expression breathtakingly seductive. Without shifting her gaze from him, she blew out her candle, her lips pursed as if in a kiss. Another jolt of desire shook him.
A knowing smile hovered around her mouth as she placed the candle on the desk. “Don’t you like it?”