Chapter Nineteen
Celine woke gradually—to warmth, to quiet, to the unmistakable sensation of being held.
Elias lay beside her, one arm beneath her pillow, the other curved firmly around her waist as though he had no intention of letting her drift even an inch away.
Morning light slipped through the curtains, softening the angles of his face, catching in his tousled hair.
She watched him for a moment, unable—and unwilling—to look away.
His lashes lifted.
“Good morning,” he murmured, voice low with sleep.
She smiled. “Good morning.”
He studied her as though memorising her anew. His thumb brushed her cheekbone, slow and wondering. “You look different.”
“How so?”
“Peaceful,” he said. “As though something has settled inside you.”
A pause. A shift in his gaze. “As though you’re happy.”
“I am.” Her voice came out soft, honest. “Are you?”
He leaned in, kissing her once—unhurried, certain. “Yes,” he said against her lips. “More than I’ve been in years. Perhaps ever.”
She laughed quietly, brushing her fingers through his hair. “You’re being sentimental.”
“I reserve the right,” he said, kissing her again—this time deeper, slower. “Particularly when I wake with my wife in my arms after… last night.”
Colour warmed her cheeks, but she didn’t look away. “Does it feel strange? Waking together like this?”
“No,” he said simply. “It feels right.”
Another kiss—a lingering one. “And I intend for it to continue feeling right. Repeatedly.”
His mouth curved in a wicked half-smile. “We have a great deal left to discover.”
Her breath hitched as he shifted, trailing kisses along her jaw, then lower, following the path her pulse fluttered beneath his lips. His hand slid to her waist, drawing her closer as he began to explore her with the same reverent hunger that had undone her the night before.
“Elias…” she whispered, fingers curling in his hair.
“Let me,” he murmured against her skin. “We barely began.”
He was lowering himself, slow and purposeful, when—
A sharp knock rattled the door.
Celine froze.
Elias went very still.
“My lady?” came Sally’s voice, carefully neutral. “I have your morning tea. And there’s a letter that arrived by special messenger. From your mother.”
Celine closed her eyes briefly. Of course.
“My lady… shall I come in?” Sally added—very gently, as if treading upon uncertain ground.
Elias met Celine’s gaze. She nodded once.
“Enter,” she called, trying to sound composed.
The door opened.
Sally stepped inside—and stopped dead.
Her eyes flew to the unmistakably masculine form half-sitting against the pillows, bare from the waist up, the duvet barely preserving anyone’s dignity. Celine sat beside him in rumpled sheets and warm skin and unmistakable intimacy.
Sally’s mouth opened. Closed. It opened again.
“Your Grace.” She attempted a curtsey, which turned into something between a bow and a collapse. “I—good morning. I—oh dear.”
Elias cleared his throat, the sound both dignified and completely undone. “Good morning, Sally.”
“Tea?” she squeaked.
“Yes,” he said gravely. “Though I believe I shall take mine in my study. After I am… presentable.”
“Of course, Your Grace.” Sally nodded rapidly—far too rapidly. “Naturally. Quite right. Presentable is—well—yes. Naturally.”
He swung his legs out of the bed and snatched up his shirt with the desperation of a man fleeing battlefield fire.
“Lady Rothwest,” he said, bowing with impressive solemnity for someone only half-buttoned, “I shall see you shortly.”
He all but fled the room, fumbling with his cuffs as he went.
The moment he vanished, Sally slowly turned back to Celine.
“My lady,” she said, returning to her usual calm now that the naked Duke was no longer in the room, “what shall we choose for today’s attire?”
Celine swallowed laughter—and mortification. “Something respectable.”
“After this morning, everything will look respectable,” Sally muttered under her breath, then straightened. “Your family is paying a visit. They sent word they’ll arrive before noon.”
Celine blinked. “My entire family?”
“Yes, my lady. Your mother’s letter said she hoped to spend the day.”
“Of course she did,” Celine murmured.
Sally helped her wash, dress, and fix her hair—though Celine caught the maid biting her lip several times as though restraining questions, commentary, or perhaps applause.
A discreet knock sounded at the door.
Morrison entered, his expression politely blank.
“My lady,” he said, “His Grace requests your presence in his study. He wishes to speak with you regarding your family’s arrival.”
Celine took a steadying breath. “He knows?”
“I took the liberty of informing him, my lady, given the need for household preparations.”
“Of course. Thank you, Morrison. Tell him I’ll be there directly.”
***
Celine stepped into the study, the door closing softly behind her. Elias stood by the window, hands clasped behind his back in a stance that suggested he had been there for some time—waiting, thinking, bracing.
He did not turn immediately, but she saw the tension ripple through his shoulders.
“Your family,” he said without preamble. “Today.”
“I know,” she replied quietly. “I’m sorry. I had no idea they would...”
“It isn’t your fault.”
He turned then, and the sight of her seemed to unravel something inside him. “Of course they’re concerned. You disappeared into marriage and now London is in a frenzy over us.”
“Over the way we behaved,” she corrected softly.
He exhaled—a slow, barely steadying breath—and reached for her hand. His thumb brushed the inside of her wrist, a touch light enough to be innocent and yet charged with the memory of the night before.
“We need to show them unity,” he murmured. “Calm. Composure. Something resembling ordinary married life.”
Her breath caught when his fingers traced higher, the gentlest inquiry.
“Ordinary,” she echoed, almost laughing. “We have never once managed ordinary.”
He stepped closer.
“No,” he said, his voice dipping, “we never have.”
The distance between them vanished.
He touched her waist—only that—yet heat coiled deep inside her. His gaze lowered to her mouth, then lower still, as though he remembered the shape of her in his hands.
“Elias…”
A warning, or a plea—she wasn’t certain.
He lifted her hand and brushed his lips against her palm. A shock of sensation went straight through her, soft but shattering.
“We must be sensible,” she whispered, though her fingers curled against his cheek.
“We must,” he agreed, but he didn’t step back. His hand glided—slowly, reverently—along her hip, gathering the fabric of her morning dress as if it were the most natural movement in the world.
“My family will be here shortly,” she managed.
“Yes.”
His breath warmed her throat. “Which gives us very little time.”
She let her forehead rest against his. “Elias…”
“Celine, tell me to stop.”
A thin thread of control, just enough for her to cut.
But she didn’t.
She tightened her hand at his neck instead.
That was all it took.
He pulled her to him—not with the wild hunger of last night, but with a reverence that felt even more dangerous. His lips found hers, slow, deep, coaxing rather than claiming, and somehow that gentleness undid her entirely.
Her knees weakened.
He caught her, holding her firmly against him, and the kiss grew—still slow, still careful, but threaded with a promise that made her pulse stutter.
Her fingers slid into his hair.
He made a low sound—half restraint, half surrender—and eased her backwards until the edge of the chaise met the back of her legs. She sank onto it, breath unsteady, heart unguarded.
He followed her down only far enough to keep their lips connected, his hands cradling her waist with a tenderness that belied the heat beneath it.
“Celine,” he murmured against her mouth, “I could worship you.”
“You did,” she whispered back, cheeks flushing at the memory. “And I—”
He kissed her before she could finish, a soft command and a confession in one.
Heat unfurled.
Her fingers dug into his shoulders.
His breath caught against her throat as he bent over her, and the room, the morning, the world contracted into a single point of gravity between them.
The moment teetered—dangerously, beautifully—on the edge of more.
A sound in the corridor brought them both back to earth.
Elias drew in a tight breath, forehead resting against hers, his hands trembling just slightly on her waist.
“We should prepare,” he said hoarsely.
“Yes.”
Her voice was just as unsteady. “I should… compose myself.”
He closed his eyes. “If I touch you again, composition will be impossible.”
“Then we should go,” she whispered.
He rose first, offering his hand. She placed her fingers in his, aware of every lingering spark between them.
“Celine,” he said quietly.
She looked up at him.
His gaze was steady.
Certain.
Utterly unguarded.
“Tonight,” he murmured, the word brushing her skin like a vow. “Tonight, we end the waiting.”
Her breath caught.
“Tonight,” he repeated, his voice low with conviction, “we do not stop. We do not step back.”
She swallowed, heat blooming behind her ribs.
“Elias—”
He lifted her hand and pressed a slow, deliberate kiss to her knuckles.
No haste.
No hunger.
Reverence.
His jaw tightened, his breath unsteady.
“Celine, it has become impossible. And I think—we both know it.”
She did.
She knew it bone-deep.
Her voice was barely a whisper. “Tonight.”
He exhaled, something like relief and need tangled together, and stepped back only because he had to.
“We will endure the day,” he said—half a promise, half a challenge.
“And tonight,” she echoed.
His eyes darkened, the restraint there fraying at the edges—but holding, for now.
“Tonight,” he said, “the door between our rooms unlocks—for good.”