Chapter Twenty-Three #2
His hand skipped down her body until his fingers found where he’d stretched her open.
He groaned, the sound raw and ragged, and flicked a fingertip over her in a barely there touch.
She cried out, the sound sharp and desperate in the still of the night.
The pressure inside coiled tighter, heavier, and she squirmed as the pleasure evolved into pain—a sweet unbearable ache that had her thighs shaking.
Again and again, his featherlight touch danced across her swollen flesh, until she could bear it no more.
“It hurts!” The words fell out on a broken sob. “Please!”
He crushed his mouth to hers, swallowing her plea with a husky growl. “Let it hurt. Let it hurt so good you break.”
His finger pressed harder, faster, circling in time with each deep plunge of his hips.
His rhythm no longer asked permission—tender turned urgent, worship turned wildfire.
The agony twisted tighter with the pleasure, braided so completely she couldn’t tell where one ended and the other began.
Tears slipped from the corners of her eyes, hot against her temples.
“Now!”
His hoarse command sent her shattering like glass.
The incredible pressure detonated, crashing over her in a blinding, breathless wave, her body clenching around him in pulses that tore a shameless scream from her throat. The world dissolved at the edges, spinning out into nothing, as though she were falling and being caught at the very same time.
He followed her over the edge, giving one last possessing thrust before yanking free.
A guttural groan shuddered through him. Another.
His muscles rippled as his release claimed him, back bowed as he spilled himself into his hand.
She could not look away, transfixed by the raw beauty of his surrender.
A final, helpless sound escaped him as the last shudder left him.
He collapsed over her, his frame going limp.
They clung to each other, shaking, hearts hammering in tandem.
His face buried into the damp curve of her neck, lips moving against her in silent devotion.
The swamp went silent save for the ragged harmony of their breathing.
She had never felt so whole.
“Lucien.” His name tumbled past swollen lips, pulled from the depths of her heart.
He went still, the muscles in his arms straining as he lifted himself onto his elbows.
One thumb swept along her jaw, hooking beneath it to tilt her face toward his.
The storm in his eyes threatened to spill over, stripping her bare again.
He leaned down, achingly slow and claimed her mouth with his.
Not the hungry kiss from moments ago, but something more reverent, a vow pressed lip to lip.
“Lucien?” His tongue muffled her question.
“Mmm…?” He pulled his head back, his hooded gaze meeting hers, holding her captive.
In that single moment the world righted itself, the blurred lines suddenly coming into sharp focus.
She would sell her soul for this man.
Had already sold it, gladly.
She loved him.
The reality crashed into her, so clear and absolute it sucked the breath from her lungs.
Her throat worked soundlessly, the hot press of tears stinging beneath her eyelids.
“I love you.” The declaration spilled out, trembling and fierce and sure.
The swamp’s mist closed tighter around them, and silence pressed in, broken only by the thunder of her bared heart. She waited, searching his eyes for his answer.
“I…” He trailed off, the warmth in his gaze faltering, the devotion she thought she’d been so sure of slipping like water through her fingers. “Thank you.”
She blinked. His voice cracked with tenderness, but the words themselves were a blade slipped gently between her ribs.
Thank you. As if she had offered him a cup of tea instead of her heart.
“Lucien…” Her voice caught on a thread of panic.
“I’m not ready to say it.” He pressed his eyes shut, the strong column of his throat moving as he swallowed. “I want to. Christ, I do. I just can’t. Not yet.”
Not yet.
The two small syllables hung between them like a promise and a wound all at once.
Shame flooded her, scalding as every inch of exposed skin suddenly burned.
The ruin of her gown, the slick evidence of their joining cooling between rumpled folds of muslin, her still trembling thighs—all of it screamed wanton.
She’d begged him, sobbed for more, given him everything, and he had… thanked her.
A vise-like pressure clamped around her heart.
“I-I’m sorry.” The apology scraped her throat raw. “I shouldn’t have…”
Her hands flew to the crumpled skirts still bunched at her waist. She yanked them down, then clawed at her sagging neckline, only then realizing one breast had spilled free, cool moonlight illuminating the dusky pink nipple in merciless detail.
The fabric caught, resisted, mocked her, and tears blurred everything into a silver blur.
A choked sob escaped as she finally managed to drag the bodice higher, clutching it to her chest like a shield that had come too late.
She lurched to her feet and blood rushed in her ears.
“Abigail—” His voice cracked on her name, raw with something that might have been anguish, but she was already turning, already fleeing.
She stumbled from the dock, her feet sinking into the soft earth.
And ran.
*
The wagon lurched over a bump, and Abigail’s fingers dug into the rough wooden seat, anchoring herself so not even the sleeve of her dress would graze Lucien’s arm.
His warmth still managed to seep across the narrow space between them, taunting her with the memory of his body pressed to hers.
She swallowed, her gaze pinned on her knees.
Silence had followed them from the bayou, thick and suffocating in its weight.
They hadn’t spoken since leaving the house, not even a polite word.
Eloise didn’t seem to notice, or if she did, she hadn’t voiced it. Abigail didn’t blame her. Red-rimmed eyes stared out into the curling mist as if it spoke to her. She’d sat that way since the three of them had climbed in, her thoughts clearly still on her husband’s arrival yesterday.
Yesterday.
Abigail’s breath sucked in as a fresh wave of pain sliced through her, flaying at her soft, foolish heart. She had given her body in the moonlight, then her whispered confession in the darkness that followed.
All for a thank you.
The words still burned behind her eyes, gentle and grateful and utterly devastating.
Her breath hitched. Heat flooded her face, then drained away, leaving an empty coldness that seeped into her bones.
She had mistaken lust for devotion, tenderness for love.
He’d held her as if she were precious, looked at her as if she were the only star in the sky. And she’d fallen for it.
Stupid, romantic fool.
She hiccupped, the sound escaping before she could trap it, and Lucien flinched.
The reins tightened in his fists, the horse flicking its ears at the sudden tension.
His jaw, carved in stone since sunrise, looked sharp enough to cut glass.
But he did not speak. Did not even turn his head.
Jerking her face away, she clenched her hands into fists, nails biting into her palms.
The mist thinned and blessed outlines of rooftops rose against the pale sky, church spires and chimneys with pale lines of smoke.
Eloise sat up straighter next to her, fingers twisting in her skirt.
A wild look entered her eyes, and she shifted, her knees twisting together as though trying to make her smaller.
Abigail reached over and squeezed her cold hand, a forced smile of reassurance painted on her face. “It will all work out.”
But would it?
Perhaps for Eloise and the Thompsons, it would eventually happen.
But for her?
Never.