“Why don’t you just kiss me?” she blurted. He was so beautiful—from his wide shoulders and muscular chest to the drawers slung low on his hip bones. A man’s body. A beautiful man’s body, and he stood before her threatening her without even touching her. The truth was awful—that she wanted him to demand a kiss so she would not be at fault for being kissed by him. “I know you want to,” she said.

“I have not kissed you because, despite what you believe of me, I am a gentleman and you have not invited me to.” His voice was low. “Invite me now.”

Yes. “No.”

His breaths seemed to come hard, his attention entirely upon her mouth. He bent his head and unkempt locks bronzed by the sun fell over his brow. He whispered across her lips, “Just a kiss.”

She mustn’t.

So close yet not touching her, he inhaled deeply.

“Mm. Roses and lavender. Come now, duchess,” he murmured. “Don’t make me beg.”

“No.” She ached for his mouth on hers. “No.”

Slowly his hands curled into fists at his sides. He stepped back from her, his emerald gaze hot and not entirely focused.

He walked away. Around and past her and toward the inn.

He walked away.

She stared at the footprints he left in the sand. Nearby a man’s coat lay on the beach, and beyond that a waistcoat and trousers, and farther off, a shirt. He was walking away, and the wound-up coil of anticipation inside her screamed in frustration.

She swung around and her throat made a little sound of misery. Men never walked away from her. She walked away from them. More often she ran. She did not know this was an option. She had never met a man who respected her wish to not be touched.

“You have forgotten your clothing,” she called across the wind.

“Keep it,” he threw over his shoulder without breaking stride.

“That is ridiculous. What need have I of a man’s shirt and coat?”

“Give it away. Sell it. Do with it what you will. I have more. Plenty more.”

“You have already given me more money than you should have.” She dug into her pocket for the coins. “You must—”

He halted and pivoted toward her. His brow was remarkably dark with the slash of black kerchief across it. Arabella backed up a step.

“I am not ridiculous.” He came toward her again. “Or absurd. Or even unreasonably arrogant, given all.” His strides were long and certain. “I am merely a man who wants to kiss a woman who wants to be kissed—by me, mind you—yet claims she does not.” He halted before her, tall and nearly naked.

“I—” Everything inside her was tangled. The wind whipped at her cloak, and her lips were cold, and after this day she would never see him again. “I—I do want to be kissed by y—”

He covered her mouth with his.

She had been kissed before. She had been pawed and groped and grabbed and forced. She’d had wine-soaked tongues thrust into her mouth and cold hands shoved beneath her gown.

This was entirely different.

He held her with only the pressure of his mouth upon hers, firmly, intentionally, as though he wished to feel her in this manner only. His kiss was warm, like he was the sunlight himself. She stood perfectly still, his sunlight spreading inside her, twining around her stillness and catching at her belly and her breaths.

Gently, he cupped his hand around her shoulder and captured her lips more securely beneath his. She did not move. In moments he would demand more. He kissed her again, closer it seemed, holding her bound so that she was waiting for more, waiting for the demand so she could throw him off. He slipped his hand to her neck. Fingertips gently upon her throat, he tilted her face up and made her meet his mouth fully for one endless moment of sweet, hot connection.

He released her lips.

She gasped and blinked, and a little sigh of astonishment escaped her.

He scanned her face. His chest rose roughly.

“Again?” he said.

“Again,” she whispered.

His hand cupped the back of her neck and he brought their mouths together. Confidently, completely, he guided her, making her meet his lips for one caress, and a next, then another and another. Now she did not wait for the opportunity to throw him off. Now she let herself be kissed and hoped he would not cease before she had enough of him, enough of his touch, heat, and the aching he was making inside her. She wanted him to kiss her until she forgot what it was to not feel pleasure in a kiss. He was tender and thorough and she imagined he would know every feeling and desire of hers now. He would know that she was frightened and wanting and that for the first time in years she did not feel alone.

Foolishness. Men cared nothing about feelings and loneliness, only lust and satisfaction.

He coaxed her lips apart and she allowed that too, knowing he wanted from her only what any man did: her body, her acquiescence. But she did not wish to resist him. He asked no more of her than she was willing to give, eager to give. He had often looked at her with hunger, and now she was hungry for him.

She pressed onto her toes in the sand, seeking him deeper. Scooping his hand around her head, he bent to her and she opened, letting him use her as he wished, letting him command her. She wanted more—more of the growing ache inside her that sought him with a sort of desperation.

He caressed her tongue with his.

She dropped the pastries.

He did it again and she was wild inside. Her hands jerked beneath her cloak. He sucked on her lower lip and a soft whimper escaped her. He caught the sound with his mouth and stroked her tongue again and she heard sounds from her own throat she did not recognize, sounds of astonishment and need and misery. She mustn’t want this but she ached for more. She wanted to be closer to him. Her arms were pressed to her sides, trying to hold in the need.

His hands came around her face and he took her mouth completely, and she gave it to him, allowing him entrance, allowing him to know her. Their breaths came fast. Her breasts brushed his chest. Heat burst inside her. He groaned.

“Duchess.” It was a sound of frustration and restraint. His hands swept down her back. Upon her moan, he pulled her against him.

He tasted like salt and wind and heat, and he was hard everywhere, his thighs and chest powerful and his arms holding her to him strong. She wanted to touch him. He was hot skin and strength and beauty, and she was penniless and bedraggled yet felt like the most beautiful woman on earth—beautiful and innocent for the first time in years.

The back of her throat tightened and heat prickled behind her eyes. It was a fantasy. She was inventing fantasies.

She wanted to push him away. But he was real and she could not seem to detach herself from him.

His fingers slipped into her hair, dislodging the linen wrap, and for the second time he stripped her of it. But he found only a tightly wound braid beneath, the kind she had learned to make from Eleanor long ago. She had bound it purposefully today.

The braid stopped him. His hands fell and he released her abruptly. But he was breathing roughly and frowning. Wind whipped a lock of her hair over her eyes. She dragged it aside with a shaking hand, and the sunlight danced in the strands as they stared at each other.

“I will escort you to Saint-Reveé-des-Beaux tomorrow.” He did not sound pleased to have kissed her, or even frustrated. He sounded angry.

She shook her head. “I don’t need your help.”

He scowled but his gaze was upon her lips. “Yet you will have it.”

“I don’t want your help. I— Please don’t offer it.”

His chest rose on a harsh inhale. For a moment he looked as though he might speak.

He turned and strode toward the inn.

Arabella ran her fingertips over her damp lips and felt him there. “That was not just a kiss,” she said. Panic sped through her. “That was not just a kiss,” she shouted.