Married By Midnight(42)

“My word,” Anne said, leaning back in her chair. “Did the duke know the truth?”

Garrett nodded. “Yes, and he accepted us as his own only to avoid a scandal. As for Dr. Thomas, he was quite devastated when she returned to Pembroke, determined to be a faithful wife. Consequently he never married. Since he couldn’t be with the woman he loved, he devoted his life to the study of medicine and the human brain. At one time, she needed his help when I was very ill as a child, and he managed my care. I vaguely remember certain details about his kindness. Then last spring—to help the very man who stole her away from him—he was steadfast in his duties to help the duke. Mother said he has been a godsend, and I confess, I must agree.”

Anne closed her eyes, raised Garrett’s hand to her lips and kissed it. “Oh, my darling. What will you do? Have you told Dr. Thomas that you know the truth?”

Silence. No response.

When she opened her eyes, Garrett was watching her mouth. Her heart began to race as he slowly, gently stroked his thumb across her chin and along the line of her jaw. His eyes glimmered with desire.

She wanted so badly to be practical about this man, but every time he touched her, or simply looked at her as he was looking at her now, she melted into a puddle of intense yearning.

Garrett sat forward on the edge of his chair and cupped her face in his hands. His lips touched hers in a soft, brush-like stroke of teasing allure. The sizzling heat of his lips caused a spark of electricity to explode in her veins and shoot all the way down to her toes. She was easily enticed out of her chair and before she realized it, Garrett was easing her down onto the soft mattress and covering her body with his own.

“Garrett,” she whispered as she wrapped her legs around him and tore his jacket off his shoulders. “How do you do this to me? I cannot think straight when you touch me.”

With a husky groan of exertion, he tugged her skirts up around her hips and wrestled with the fastenings of his trousers.

Now, she didn’t care about foreplay. All she wanted was the swift, immediate sensation of his body entering her own.

When their clothing was out of the way he rose up on both arms and looked into her eyes while he shifted his hips to position himself at the entrance to her womanhood.

Already slick with desire, she welcomed him when he thrust slowly forward with tantalizing ease.

“It feels good,” she whispered in a mindless haze of rapture.

He moved inside her smoothly, in and out, for a long while as passion built...until at last, the orgasm came. She could not fathom the intensity of it, the searing pleasure of the friction and heat—nor could she understand how he made her experience such feelings of love when they barely knew each other...when she had accepted that he did not want her beyond these two brief weeks of engagement.

She lifted her hips to meet the fierce thrust of his passions and cried out in ecstasy as their lovemaking reached a fevered pitch.

God, how she’d wanted him.

Worse yet, she wanted to tell him how she felt, but she could not. She had to bite back the words that nearly spilled from her lips while she was pulsing in the throes of that incomprehensible rapture. I love you, she wanted to say. I love you...

His orgasm followed hers almost instantly—as if he were pushed over the brink by the sounds of her panting moans and the violent tensing of her body all around him.

His seed spilled into her vigorously. She felt the hot gush of it reach her womb and was only half-conscious of the risk they had taken—because it felt so blissfully perfect.

She wasn’t worried that a child might result.

She would have her own money.

She would raise it on her own...

“God in heaven.” Garrett groaned as he collapsed heavily upon her.

They were still dressed in their everyday clothes, and though it was the dead of winter, she felt hotter than the sun as she lay beneath him. His body heat was contagious.

As they lay in the afternoon light, weak and satiated, the fire crackled heartily in the grate.

Anne didn’t know what to say. She was too busy wrestling with her guilt—for, though she knew she shouldn’t have, she had given herself to this man, yet again, willingly and wantonly. Surely he must think her deserving of her scandalous reputation?

But what did he expect? Coming here to tell her the tragic tale of his mother and the great love of her life, and how they were torn apart by circumstances beyond their control...

It was not unlike what Anne was feeling at the moment and what she would likely experience when they parted after their wedding day. Yet their situation was not beyond their control. If Garrett loved her, there was no reason why they could not be together. They could be man and wife and everyone, surely, would applaud their decision. What a dream come true that would be.