"Thank you for your honesty!"
Marissa crossed her arms and glared at him. "What woman would ever think you pretty? You're big and wide, with legs and arms like tree limbs."
Jude growled. "Perfect."
She moved closer to touch a finger to his jaw. "You've a face like an ancient warrior, as if it's seen far more battles than waltzes. And hands better suited for battering opponents than playing the piano."
He turned his face away. "Touché."
"You are not pretty, Jude. And I want you more than I've ever wanted any pretty man. You are strong, and looking at you makes me feel
weak.
For you." She tried to spread her fingers over his cheek, but he stepped away.
"Weakness is nothing to build a life on, Marissa. This was all a mistake. I wanted you, and I thought being wanted in return would be enough."
"It's not?"
"No, it's not! I've been satisfied with being accepted for too long. I would ask more than that from my
wife."
Marissa almost gave an easy answer. Reassurance was a simple thing, because she felt so much for him, but just as she was taking a deep breath, the torment on his face stole her words.
His eyes glinted with an impossible mixture of regret and pride. "For a dozen years, it's been enough for me to be my father's bastard. To be welcomed as an exotic diversion. To be
accepted.
And I tried to win your love in the same way. Do you see that? To slip in beneath your defenses and lull you into
accepting
me." He snarled the word, rage curling his lip. "But I am not a bastard child anymore. I am a
man,
and I ask for more than that.
His anger should have frightened her, but she found that she needed to touch him. His words didn't scare her, because she had his answer. She could give him what he demanded. She already had.
Marissa stepped close, one last time. If he stepped away again, he'd find his back to the wall. "Would you ask for love?" she whispered.
"Yes."
She put her hand to his chest, amazed that it could already feel familiar. "And admiration? And respect?"
Jude closed his eyes, his chest expanding under her hand as he drew in a deep breath.
"And would you want lust too, I hope?"
"You're saying foolish things."
She slid her hand around to his back and laid her cheek to the spot she'd touched. His heart raged beneath her ear. "I love you, Jude."
"Don't say that,
mon coeur.
Don't."
"I love you, and I'm weak with wanting you."
"That is lust," he insisted, his words hoarse at the edges. "It's only lust."
"And my yearning to talk with you, to be alone and hear your thoughts? Is that lust as well? I underestimated you, Jude. I dismissed you. And now you're doing the same to me. I love you as a man, and I want you as a husband."
"Marissa," he said. His hands settled on her shoulders, poised to pull her tighter or push her away. She didn't know, and she suspected Jude had no idea himself.
"I want this betrothal to be real, Jude. I want you to take me as your wife. And out of all the pretty men I've danced with and all the lust that's burned in my heart, I never wanted that from any of them."
He drew a sharp breath as if he'd speak, but no words passed his lips.
"Do you still like me?" she asked, squeezing her eyes shut in preparation. There was every chance he'd seen her true self and changed his mind. What an irony that would be, for Jude to decide, in the end, that she was too ugly for him.
But perhaps she could turn his own techniques against him.
Marissa rubbed her cheek against the thin linen of his shirt. He was so warm beneath the material, and she wanted to feel that warmth on her. In her. And perhaps his lust would keep him near long enough for him to see that she had changed and grown wiser. Become more than just a girl who loved dancing.
His hands tightened on her shoulders, and she pressed her mouth to his collarbone and her belly to his hips. "Do you still like me a little, Jude?" His strong jaw Hexed, and Marissa put her mouth to that hard edge and gently bit down.
His body jerked against hers.
Marissa hummed sympathetically against his skin. "You reap what you sow. You teased me, Haunting your body in front of me, and now I want to have it."
"Stop," he barked, setting her back from him. "I don't need to be teased into wanting you, damn it. I take myself in hand every night out of lust for you."
Her sex tightened with sharp need. She knew what he was saying. She could
picture
it. "So take me."
"I won't. You'll change your mind, and then where will we be? You never wanted me for a husband, and I refuse to live fifty years looking at regret in your eyes."
"Bah! That's nonsense. When have you ever known me to regret anything?"
His scowl softened, as if he were actually considering her question. "You regret Peter White."
"Well, that's true. But to be specific, I regretted Peter White's failures." Marissa could've sworn she saw his mouth twitch into a momentary smile. "You wouldn't give me any cause for regret, would you, Jude?"
"I would disappoint you in countless ways."
Shaking her head, Marissa reached for the ties at the shoulders of her gown. "I'm shallow. If you keep me happy in a few small ways, what more would I ask?"
"Don't do that," he growled.
Marissa backed away from his advance and pulled the tics loose. "You did it to me."
When she slipped her shoulders free of the flowing arms, Jude froze. "Don't. Please."
"Don't be a coward," she said, to him or to herself.
And then she dropped the gown.
For the first time in her life, Marissa was completely naked in front of a man. He hadn't admitted any lingering affection, and that vulnerability left her with the urge to hide behind her hands. But she didn't.
She could make him like her again. She'd use her body as he'd once planned to use his.
Jude's gaze slipped over her nakedness. He swallowed hard. And then he stalked toward the door.
He was only two feet from escape when Marissa darted past him and barricaded the door with her body. Her nude body.
Jude could feel his face twist with anxious shock. "What are you doing?"
"Seducing you," she answered. It seemed an odd choice of words for sprawling naked against a door. All the same, he
was
being seduced. Her small breasts and slim waist, and my Clod, the golden curls that hid her sex ...
"I—" he started, then lost the words in his study of her body.
"I love you," Marissa said. "I want to marry you. And I'm willing to use my body to trick you into feeling some affection." His heart twisted to hear her say those words. He fell true pain when he took a deep breath.
"I don't want to be tricked," he finally managed to say, darting a quick look at the doorknob next to her hip.
Marissa straightened, drawing her feet closer together and sliding her hands down the door.
"Marissa, don't. Just don't." He was begging. He wanted more than this, and yet this was
all
he wanted.
Instead of granting mercy, she stepped away from the door and stopped only a foot from him. He supposed if his body had been more willing, Jude might've been able to retreat, but Marissa's nakedness stole his will and he couldn't move.
She curled her arms slowly around him, her touch blooming from the faint line of her fingertips to the warm bands of her arms going around his ribs. Finally, her whole, hot body took him over, pressing tight to his front. All Jude managed to do was raise his hands high enough to avoid clutching her to him.
"No," he said, shaking his head. "I won't do this. We'll wait. And if we marry ..."
If we marry.
My God, those words cut jagged holes in him. Was that possible, after he'd steeled himself for the loss of her?
"No, Jude," she whispered. "I'll have you. Now. Please? Take off your clothes. I want to feel you against me."
He shook his head, but his cock had long since responded to the sight of her, and it throbbed eagerly at her words.
"Fine." Marissa pulled his shirt free from his trousers and pressed her belly to his.
"Oh, good Christ," he moaned. The feel of her skin, hot on his, became his whole world in that moment.
"You've made me wait too long already," she whispered. "You've reduced me to throwing myself against you. At least case this ache you started."
"Hush," he ordered, starting to forget why he fought her. Why? She slid her arms around his waist and pressed her breasts tighter to his chest, and Jude finally lowered his hands to her back. He spread his lingers wide over her naked spine.
"I don't want to do this," he murmured.
Marissa shivered beneath his hands. "It feels like you do."
God, he did want to give in. But more than that, he wanted to have her forever. "Let me leave, Marissa. I won't go to Italy. I'll find a house, and I'll court you properly. We can take our time. You can be sure. You
must
be sure."
She stretched like a cat, and his hands slid naturally down her back, shaping the precious lines of waist and hips. She was just so damn
naked.
"Oh, Jude," she purred. "I love that."
Love. The word taunted him, and anger swelled in his chest again. But anger combined with a naked woman to calmed him in a different way. Instead of rage, he felt blind lust.
He kissed her then, tasting her for the first time in so long, dragging his hands down her body with intoxicating freedom. All of her was exposed to him. All of her was
his.
She pressed close, her nails digging into his back, and kissed him with as much hunger as he kissed her. He could just unbutton his trousers and have her. Right now. Slide deep and true and make her his forever. Everything in his body and soul yearned toward that, a force he could feel, pulling every fiber of him toward her.
She wanted this. Wanted
him.
Why couldn't that be enough?
Jude let go of her and pushed her away, running a hand through his hair in violent frustration. "No! We'd have to marry—"
"All this talk of being a man," Marissa snapped, hands flying up in frustration.
She gestured from his head to his toes, but Jude's eyes lost track of her hand and focused on her breasts again. The nipples tight and flushed . . .
"Well, I need a man, Jude! Now.
Tonight."
"Forever, Marissa," he growled. "You understand that? Coming to my bed is the same as marrying me. I won't let you go."
She raised her chin and held his gaze. "You're neither my tutor nor my guardian, so stop treating me like a child. Take me, and damn your caution."
Her eyes blazed with anger and lust. Jude knew his did too. And she was right. She wasn't a child, and she proved that by walking to his bed and laying herself out. Like a sacrifice or a feast. His pulse hammered.
She trembled a bit, like a leaf fluttering, and everything inside him shook as well.
This was a mistake, but she was offering herself and he
ached
for her, had been aching for weeks. Her eyes dared him to refuse. Challenged him.
Jude growled like an animal and pulled off his shirt.
It took him only a few moments to strip, and his lust grew as she watched him with triumph in her smirk. And then he was sliding into bed with Marissa, her skin an impossible beauty against his.
She was right. A man would not run from the love of a woman like her. A man would take his chances, and damn the risks, even if it was the worst mistake he'd ever made.
***
Marissa's body was a strange jumble of heavy pleasure and anticipation that made her feel afloat Jude's body became her world. He was pressed against her and hovering above her, and she could see nothing but his dark eyes as he stared down at her.
The hair of his chest was crisp against her naked skin, and when he slid closer, his manhood pressed against her hip. The fit of their bodies felt natural and fantastically strange at the same time. A thing she'd always known but had never had.
She put her hand to his neck and drew him down to her.
His kiss was no seduction this time. It was a claiming, slow and deep. He was in her body, his tongue exploring her
-
heat, and she dug her nails into his neck to pull him deeper. Everything about him made her yearn for more. His size, his heat, his flexing muscles and scratchy jaw. He was a fascination and a danger all at once. A danger that belonged to her
-
. A fascination she could explore to her heart's content.
She slid a foot along his calf, murmuring with pleasure that she could. When Jude shifted, she insinuated her leg between his and turned toward him.
Now
they were touching. Now they matched. His shaft pressed against her sex. Her breasts rubbed his chest as they kissed. And Jude sighed with the same relief she felt.
He pulled back to look at her. "You are a fantasy," he said as he cupped a gentle hand over her breast. "Here, in my bed, turning to me."