Chapter 10 #3
When he knelt before her, the world seemed to tilt on its axis.
The Duke of Everleigh, a man of power and propriety, was on his knees, not in supplication but in worship.
Eveline’s heart hammered in her chest, her cheeks flaming with embarrassment and anticipation.
His hands grasped her ankles, his touch gentle yet firm, and he slowly lifted her skirts, revealing her to his gaze.
His eyes locked with hers, searching for hesitation, for doubt, but all she saw was trust.
“Trust me,” he whispered again, his voice a command wrapped in a promise.
And she did. Completely. Despite the heat that burned her cheeks and the raggedness of her breaths, she surrendered to him.
His fingers brushed the delicate fabric of her stockings, his touch feather-light, as if he were handling something precious and fragile.
Eveline’s breath hitched as he slowly peeled the material away, exposing her to his gaze.
"Trust me," he whispered, and she did, completely and absolutely, even as her cheeks burned and her breath came in desperate gasps.
What followed was revelation. She'd read the clinical descriptions in those medical texts, had seen the artistic interpretations in the French illustrations, but nothing had prepared her for the reality of it.
The intimacy, the vulnerability, the shocking pleasure that built and built until she was clutching the table edge and calling his name into the storm-filled darkness.
Adrian’s tongue darted between her legs, following the trail of wetness up her thigh.
Thunder drowned her cries as sensation overwhelmed her when his fingers grazed across the back of her calves and along her thighs. She was dimly aware of tears on her cheeks, though whether from pleasure or emotion or the sheer intensity of it all, she couldn't say.
When Adrian rose, pulling her against him and holding her as she trembled in the aftermath, she could feel his own body shaking, though he'd maintained enough control to keep some boundaries intact. A gentleman even in this moment of complete impropriety.
"Eveline," he whispered against her hair, her name sounding like a prayer or possibly a confession. "My goodness, Eveline you taste divine."
She couldn't speak, partially from mortification and partially because she couldn't form coherent thoughts, she could only cling to him as the storm continued its assault on the windows and her heart attempted to find its normal rhythm.
He held her for long moments, his hands stroking her back, her hair, murmuring words she couldn't quite make out but that sounded tender and possibly desperate.
Finally, when she could breathe again, when the world had stopped spinning quite so violently, she pulled back to look at him. His face was flushed, his hair completely disheveled, his eyes dark with lingering desire and something that might have been wonder.
"That was..." she started, then stopped because there were no words for what that was.
"I know," he agreed, pressing his forehead to hers. "Heavens help me, I know."
They stayed like that for a moment, breathing each other's air, existing in this bubble outside of time and propriety and consequence. But then reality began to creep back in, and Adrian straightened, though he didn't step away entirely.
"This cannot happen again," he said, though his voice lacked conviction and his hands were still on her waist.
"You said the same after our first kiss," she pointed out, surprised to find she could still form coherent sentences after what had just occurred.
"This time I mean it." He finally stepped back, running both hands through his already destroyed hair. "What just happened... Eveline, if anyone knew, if anyone even suspected..."
"No one will know." She slid from the table on shaky legs, beginning the futile process of trying to restore her appearance.
Her hair was completely ruined, pins scattered across the carpet, curls tumbling around her shoulders in wild abandon.
Her dress was wrinkled beyond redemption, and she suspected her lips were swollen from his kisses.
"You can't leave like this," he said, gesturing to her general dishevelment and the storm still raging outside. "It's past midnight, the rain is torrential, and you look..."
"Thoroughly debauched?" she suggested with a watery laugh.
"I was going to say 'as though you've been through a storm,' but yes, that too." He moved to the window, peering out at the tempest. "You'll have to stay until it passes. I'll have Mrs. Morrison prepare a guest room..."
"Mrs. Morrison will gossip," Eveline interrupted. "If she knows I stayed the night, it will be all over London by teatime tomorrow."
He turned back to her, and she could see him wrestling with the situation, duty warring with desire, propriety battling with practicality.
"There's a small sitting room adjacent to the library," he said finally. "It has a settee that's quite comfortable, and it locks and unlocks from the inside as well. You could rest there until the storm passes, then leave at first light before the servants are up."
It was madness to stay, but going out into the storm in her current state seemed like greater madness. Her wrist was throbbing, her legs were still unsteady, and the thought of navigating London's dark streets in this weather made her stomach clench with fear.
"All right," she agreed quietly.
He showed her to the sitting room, which was indeed small but comfortable, with a settee that would serve as an adequate bed and a small fire already burning in the grate. He brought her blankets and a pillow, moving with careful efficiency, not quite meeting her eyes.
"Your wrist," he said suddenly. "We should check the bandage."
The binding had indeed loosened during their... activities... and he re-wrapped it with gentle hands, though she noticed his fingers trembled slightly.
"Adrian," she said softly as he prepared to leave. "What happened tonight..."
"Was a mistake," he interrupted, though his expression suggested he didn't entirely believe his own words. "A moment of madness brought on by the storm and your injury and too many weeks of denied attraction. In the morning, we'll pretend it never happened."
"Will we be able to?"
He paused at the door, his hand on the handle, and when he looked back at her, his expression was raw with conflicting emotions. "We'll have to. The alternative is your complete ruin and my... my complete undoing."
"You said I'd already undone you."
"You have," he admitted quietly. "That's precisely the problem."
He left then, closing the door softly behind him, and Eveline heard the click of the lock which was him ensuring her privacy and safety, even now. She sank onto the settee, pulling the blankets around her, and tried to process everything that had happened.
She'd been innocent this morning but now she was... what? Not ruined, not exactly, but certainly changed.
In the main library, unknown to her, Adrian stood at the window watching the storm fade, his hands clenched at his sides.
He could still taste her on his lips, still hear the sounds she'd made, still feel the way she'd trembled in his arms. The proper thing—the only thing—to do was to dismiss her, to end this before it destroyed them both.
But the thought of never seeing her again, never hearing her mangle Cicero just to vex him, never watching her face light up over a particularly fascinating manuscript. ..
It was intolerable. She was intolerable. The whole of it was intolerable beyond bearing. And yet, for the briefest instant, Adrian allowed himself the honesty he denied the world: he was falling in love with Eveline Whitcombe, and no force of will could prevent the descent.