Chapter Twenty-Two
Dom remained at the Prince town house on his first night in London. He’d slept in the rarely used bedchamber set aside for
him because he loathed parting from Allie and Benedict.
Not only were they a heartwarming example of a thriving marriage, they were eager to hear more about the dig, the challenging
Van Arsdales, and, of course, Tess. And he could never tire of talking about her.
Allie was half convinced she should accompany him back to Norfolk just to meet her, but he vowed that if all went as he hoped,
she and Tess would be more than acquaintances. They’d be sisters.
The following day, he made his way back to The Metropole to speak with another journalist the Van Arsdales had contacted.
The bespectacled young man awaited him in the elegant, high-ceilinged lobby of the lavish hotel. He was accompanied by a sketch
artist, and the young lady sketched him as he answered questions about the Norfolk dig.
It all felt familiar. Dom knew what to tell them, how to phrase it for maximum dramatic effect, and made sure to mention Tess
as the one who’d found the buckle. To his shock, the lady sketch artist had already produced a drawing of it, having met with
the Van Arsdales the day before.
He wasn’t aware they’d transported the find with them to London.
“Thank you for your time, Mr. Prince,” the young man said after nearly an hour. “May I call on you again when you make more progress on the dig?”
“Certainly.” Dom took the man’s card and slid it into his pocket.
After the two had departed, Dom approached the wide stairwell to head up to his room and prepare for his departure back to
Norfolk in the morning.
“Mr. Prince.” One of the young men who worked at the hotel’s front desk approached. “There’s a note for you from Mr. Harcourt.
A messenger delivered it not an hour ago.”
Dom took the envelope from the young man. “Thank you.”
“And there is also the matter of the lady, Mr. Prince.”
“The lady?”
“I advised her to wait in the lounge until you concluded your meeting, but when I checked, she’d departed again.” The young
man’s gaze flickered over Dom’s shoulder. “Oh, there she is now.”
Dom knew before he turned. He felt her like a sweet breeze across his skin, even though it made no sense. Then he turned toward
The Metropole’s front doors, and she was there.
Tess looked wind-blown and magnificent. A few strands of hair tumbled to her shoulders, and her cheeks were flushed as if
she’d been walking in the sun.
Dom smiled so wide his cheeks ached.
He barely registered the hotel employee retreating. All his attention was focused on Tess, standing just inside the hotel’s
grand entrance.
“Tess,” he breathed, closing the distance between them a few long strides. “How—”
“I came to find you.” She swallowed hard. “I took the train from Norwich.” She clutched her gloved hands together in way that told him she was nervous. “I had to see you. Tell you—”
“Let’s sit,” he said, offering her his arm.
She didn’t hesitate to loop her hand around his arm.
He led her toward a quiet corner of the lounge, past potted palms, velvet settees, and well-dressed guests sipping cocktails.
Late afternoon light poured in from the tall windows, casting a buttery glow over the gilt moldings. None of it shone like
the gleam of Tess’s sun-kissed hair.
They took seats facing each other. Dom leaned forward, forearms on his knees.
“Tell me,” he said softly.
She exhaled. “Priscilla Walcott came to see me.”
His brows lifted. It wasn’t at all what he’d expect her to travel a hundred miles to tell him.
“She . . . gave me some advice.” Her eyes lit with amusement and something he dared not name until she did. “Very wise advice.”
A hotel staff member approached, no doubt to offer them refreshment, but Dom kept the young man away with a slight shake of
his head.
Tess took the moment to slip her gloves off, then clenched them tightly in her lap.
“She reminded me that fear keeps us from joy.” Tess nodded as if speaking the words aloud solidified something in her mind.
Then she reached for him.
Dom stroked his thumb across her palm, savored her softness and how her touch always felt so right.
“I don’t want to let it keep me from what’s between us anymore.”
A warm pressure built in his chest—like a fire that burned bright.
“Then don’t.” He barely resisted pulling her into his arms right then and there, in front all of the well-heeled guests.
She let out a soft laugh. “You make it sound simple.”
“Isn’t it?” He searched her gaze. “You’re here. You came to me. Whatever caused you to board that train, it brought us to
this moment. Together.”
“I don’t want to be a coward.”
“Tess, you never were.” He reached out and stroked a finger along the satiny curve of her cheek. “You’re the siren who led
me into an apple orchard and had her way with me,” he whispered so no one but her would hear. “That took courage.”
She smiled and then straightened her spine, pulling her shoulders back as if bolstering herself, summoning the courage she’d
spoken of.
Then she tightened her grip on his hand.
“I love you, Dominic.”
The words knocked the air from his lungs, and he edged closer to her.
“Tess.” He whispered her name, infused it with all the awe he felt in that moment.
“I was afraid of admitting it to myself.” Her expression was open, her eyes glistening. “But the truth is that I loved you
even when I couldn’t say it. I think I loved you from the moment you climbed down from that ladder at Lady Goddard’s. I hated
watching you walk out of that room.”
“As soon as you stepped into that room, everything changed. As if my world tilted on its axis.” He lifted her hand and laid
a kiss across her knuckles. “Or maybe it was set aright.”
He stroked his fingers along hers. “What would you say if I told you I thought, even then, that you might have felt it too?”
Her breath hitched. “I did. I knew it was impossible, but I hoped I’d encounter you again. Somehow.” She dipped her head.
“And you found me in the village lockup.”
Dom chuckled. “I was never happier to see anyone in my life.” He licked his lips. “But that’s honestly how I feel every time
I see you.”
“It’s a mutual feeling.”
“Then what would you say if I told you I love you too, Tess Hawthorne?”
Tess’s laugh burst out of her, softening her posture, revealing a dimple in her cheek as she smiled wide. “I was rather hoping
you did.”
Dom couldn’t resist anymore; he stood, still holding her hand, and she did too.
He put an arm around her, drew her close.
“I’m going to make sure you never regret it,” he vowed to her.
“That sounds suspiciously like a promise.” She stroked his hand as she said it, and he wondered if she was debating whether
promises weren’t such awful things after all.
“When you start thinking about forever with someone, they sort of bubble out of you.”
She laughed and the sound wound a ribbon of pleasure through him that settled somewhere in his chest.
“In that case,” she said with an enticing grin, “I shall allow it.”
Dominic’s room in The Metropole was sumptuous and yet not intimidatingly so. The curtains and coverlet on the spacious bed
were a rich, deep yellow, and the walls were a comforting pale green. Fresh flowers sat in vases dotted throughout the room.
“This is beautiful.” Tess turned back to him and found he’d stopped after closing the hotel room door and stood watching her take it all in.
“I suppose it is. I slept the first night at my family home.”
“It must have been nice to be home.”
He strode forward then, and Tess’s pulse kicked up. “Actually, I rarely sleep there. I stay above the family shop.”
“Why?” Tess huffed out a little laugh and then her breath caught as he reached up and began removing the pins in her hair.
“I didn’t want to get too comfortable in any one place. I wanted to force myself to keep moving.”
As soon as he had her hair down, Tess reached up to push his suit coat from his shoulders. Then she reached for his neckcloth,
but he was already removing it.
“Do you still want that?” Tess’s fingers stilled on the second button on the front of his shirt. Her heart seemed to stall
in her chest as she waited for his answer.
“No, not at all,” he told her with a smile. Then he stroked her check, running the backs of his fingers down along her jawline
and then to the buttons of her bodice. “I want a home. I think I always did, but I wouldn’t allow myself to have it.”
“Did stopping for a while frighten you?” Tess had a sense he’d done all he could to keep chasing his father’s reputation.
“Yes.” He worked her buttons deftly, so quick it left her breathless. “I thought I’d lose the chance to be like my father.
He wasn’t a man who ever sat still for long.”
Tess had gotten to the final button of his shirt and even as he worked the last one, she couldn’t resist kissing his chest.
His skin was golden in the dusk light filtering through the curtains.
“And now,” she breathed against his skin before kissing it again, flicking her tongue out to taste him.
He pulled her up and took her mouth in a searing kiss that made her clutch at his shoulders, moan as he cupped her backside and pulled her flush against him.
“Now,” he said when he lifted his head, breathing as hard as she was, “I only want to be where you are.” He reached out to
unfasten the hooks on her skirt and petticoat and slid them from her hips. “I only want to be as close to you as I can be.”
He immediately pulled up her chemise, then found the opening of her drawers. “God, I’ve missed you,” he told her.
Tess pulled his head down and kissed him again as his fingers found her, wet and warm and aching for him. He stroked her until
she was begging, so lost in sensation that she continued kissing him, hungrily, more demanding than she’d ever been, as he
freed her from her corset, chemise, drawers.
Then he broke their kiss and lifted her into his arms.
She made a little sound of protest, and he chuckled in the near darkness.
“My impatient siren.”
He laid her back on the velvet coverlet and then shed the rest of his clothing. Tess’s blood pounded in her ears, and every
part of her body felt as if it was stretched, waiting, desperate for him to touch her again.
Then she felt the bed shift as he climbed atop it. Tess reached for him, wanting him in her arms, but he knelt before her,
stroking lines of heat along her thighs before pushing them gently apart and settling between them.
“Oh,” Tess gasped when his tongue swept against her, then again and again. She reached for him, fingers in his hair, hips
bucking of their own volition.
He murmured against her core. She didn’t catch all of it. Just individual words. Hot gusts of his breath before his tongue
made her tremble. Sweet. Delicious. Mine.
The mine made her shudder. Pulled her toward that peak that he’d taken her to before. He stroked a finger inside her, curling to find
that spot that made her shatter.
She cried out. Sparks flickered behind her eyes, and she wasn’t certain if she was saying his name or if it was simply repeating
over and over in her head.
“I’m here, love,” he whispered as he lifted over her, then settled between her legs. “I’m not going anywhere.”
He bent to take her aching nipple between his lips as he thrust inside her, setting a rhythm that made her gasp with each
stroke. He filled her completely, his body fitting against hers as if they were two pieces of a puzzle finally put back together
again.
Tess grasped at the shifting muscles of his back, gripped his nape to pull him down for a kiss. That’s when his perfect rhythm
faltered and his strokes became more wild, pushing them both to the edge.
“I love you,” she told him against his lips.
Their eyes met, his body straining against hers. “I love you, Tess.”
He let go. His mouth crashed onto hers, his groan of release echoing through her as he lost himself in her.
He held her close as they came down, their breath returning to normal, their heartbeats easing into a steady pace.
Then, to her great shock and dismay, he eased himself away from her and got off the bed.
“Dominic—” She was ready to demand he return and hold her, but then she got caught up watching him move. He was beautifully
muscled, lithe and strong. And he seemed a man on a mission. He lit the lamp near the bed, then found his suit coat and dug
inside a pocket.
Then he shot her one of those breath-stealing Dominic Prince smiles as he strode back to the bed.
Tess lifted her arms, so eager to have him beside her, atop her, below her, or any way she could have him again.
But he just held that maddeningly seductive smile on his lips and knelt beside the bed.
“I suspect propriety would dictate—” he started.
“We’ve trampled propriety almost from the moment we met.”
He chuckled low and deep. “We have, haven’t we?” He drew in a breath. “Very well. Then I can’t wait any longer.”
Tess swallowed against a lump in her throat, suspecting what came next, wanting it so desperately something pinched in the
center of her chest.
He lifted a black velvet box, then sprung the latch and opened the hinged top.
A gorgeous emerald glinted among a rectangle of diamonds.
“Tess, will you do me the very great honor of being my wife?”
Tess licked her lips as she stared into his eyes. There wasn’t an ounce of anything but sincerity, hope, love, in his dark
amber gaze.
“Yes!” She reached out and clasped his shoulders, pulling him up, pulling him into bed again. He settled beside her, and Tess
bent over him to kiss him. “Yes,” she whispered again.
He’d freed the ring from its case and lifted her hand to slide it onto her finger.
“It’s beautiful.”
“Reminded me of your eyes,” he told her, and he lifted her hand for a kiss. Then his gaze met hers, his brow slightly furrowed. “It’s not an antique. I considered selecting something for you from Princes. Something with a grand history.”
He stopped, licked his lips. “But I decided I wanted something that was uniquely ours and with a fresh history that we could
write ourselves.”
“It’s perfect, Dominic.” Tess’s heart felt as if it would burst out free of her ribs. “And I love the idea of writing our
own history.”
“I thought you might.” He bent and took her lips, then his hands were on her hips pulling her closer.
Tess settled over him, her legs on either side of his hips. She braced her hands on his chest, then bent to kiss him slow
and deep.
She felt safe, loved, cherished, and as much as she adored history, her heart thrilled at the fact that their love story had
just begun.