“Is it possible?” He could have sworn she was teasing. She shouldn’t have the energy for that.“What?” He lay next to her on his stomach, wrung out. Completely and utterly sated and yet thinking of the things he yet wanted to do to her.“You did.” Her voice was light, teasing even.“What?”“You begged, my lord.”He laughed softly. “To have you make love to me like that, I’ll beg you every night of my life, Lady Banallt.”

“Sophie.” He said her name softly. If her life depended on it, she could not have looked anywhere but into the flat, silver depths of his eyes. She didn’t think it was possible to be more aware of him than she already was, but the next moment proved her wrong. “Darling. I must turn down your offer. I am as astonished as you. But this is a subject upon which I’ve had months to think.You’re intelligent. You suspected my first offer of marriage was based upon my conviction that you would never consent to an affair with me and that it was desperation only for your personthat drove me to offer for you.”“And the second upon a need to rescue me.”He nodded. “Far more straightforward, darling, yet hopelessly complex.”She ignored the shiver in her belly. “Meaning?”“I love you.” He reached for the wine and filled the two glasses, though he left them on the table.“I’ve become like you. A hopeless fool who cannot break his vows. And I did make vows to you today.”

“What do you want most in life, Miss Willow?""For my mother to be well.""Imagine you had that." His fingers rested on the nape of her neck. "What do you want for yourself?""Peace on earth?""Come, Miss Willow. I want a serious answer from you. Better yet, a selfish one." Though she stood inches from him, she seemed not to notice their proximity. As a grown man, he could control his base urges. He'd done so for years. He would do better by her than his father and brothers. Slowly, he lifted his fingers from the back of her neck. His palm took their place.Head tilted, she considered him. "You'll laugh.""Try me.""A family. Children.""What? Not thousands of pounds at your disposal? A mansion? Jewels to dazzle you? Servants at your beck and call?"She rested the side of her head against the doorway and looked at him from beneath her thick red lashes. "I always thought I'd be married one day with half a dozen children at my knees." Her eyes danced again, and for a moment, the space of a breath, he was caught like a fly in a web. "I was right about the children at least, though I was sure they'd be mine.""Are you sorry?" What soft skin she had, such a tender nape."That I'm not a wife and mother?""Mm." He imagined her with a husband, with children. His children. He saw her gravid by his doing, and him cradling an infant in his arms, the one he'd made in her. He could give her what she wanted, and, of course, he could imagine the act of making her so.”

“One of her arms was around his waist as her eyes fluttered open. He found himself lost in limpid blue green. She wasn’t his. Not legally. He could as yet lay no claim to her heart. He wanted the ceremony that would make her indisputably his. He wanted Sophie to be the mother of his children. He wanted Sophie. He wouldn’t ever be whole without her. If he rushed her, he stood to lose everything.”

“He's not here. The Black Earl.""I know.""So, for the moment, we are safe from that madness.""I am always safe with you. No matter what happens, no matter what, I am safe with you and not with anyone else."He inhaled. "How long have you been seeing the Black Earl?""A few days now." She bit her lower lip. "You?""Since I came to Pennhyll." He walked to the fireplace. She turned sideways on her chair, but all he did was stare at the fire, hands clasped and pressed against the small of his back. The fingers of one hand clenched and unclenched. He turned. "What of me? How long have I been in your head?""Before the Black Earl, I think. Only I didn't know they weren't just dreams.""More and more intimate." His mouth thinned. "I confess to once or twice in my life imagining making love to a woman I admire. God knows you're a pretty woman, but I don't just imagine being with you. When I make love to you, you're not thoughts and images in my head, you're in my arms, real and warm. I can taste you and breathe in the scent of you, feel your skin against mine. We've never made love, but I've been inside you. Jesus, Olivia, you know I have."She nodded."Hell, for all we know it's possible I've made a child in you." His eyes pinned her. "Did anything like that happen between you and Andrew?""No.""You sound certain.""I am.""You never saw the Black Earl until I was at Pennhyll?""Never.""Andrew never came to you in—as I have. As we have together?""No. I never thought of him that way.""You do me, though."She nodded.”

“The tide will turn, Miss Willow." A smile lurked around his mouth, but no, that was not possible, that the earl of Tiern-Cope should smile, and at her."It hasn't yet.""You may find the sea casts you onto the shores of paradise." His voice was low and soft, and Olivia felt her heart stir at the sound. "Or through the very gates of hell.""So it might." She gave herself a mental shake. Lord Tiern-Cope could not possibly be flirting with her. Impossible. "But that won't stop me from embracing this moment in all its beautiful perfection.""With but one flaw, Miss Willow.""Whatever could that be?""Don't even try to tell me I don't spoil the present perfection of your moment." The corner of his lip twitched and then gave up. He smiled, and she, perverse creature that she was, felt like she'd been tossed off a cliff with him standing at the bottom to catch her.”

“Their eyes met and locked. If Cumbria were to take the form of a man, here he stood. Half-tamed, and that half much in doubt, forbiddingly beautiful and dangerous to the unwary. A voice in the back of her head warned that she ought to keep her silence, but she plowed on."You belong here." Without thought, she stepped toward him and touched his cheek, following the line back to his temple. His skin felt warm, the heat of him filled her. Inside her, in her heart and in her soul, she knew him. She knew everything about him that mattered. All of him was inside her right now, complete and right and heartbreaking because he was lost. He turned his head and for a moment, she felt the warmth of his breath against her gloved palm."My poor, dear Captain Alexander. You are too young to feel such desolation. You think you've lost your heart, but you haven't. It's here at Pennhyll. It's in the ground and the air, the trees and the stone, everywhere you look. You have only to take it. Take what is yours.”