Lily’s gaze narrowed. “How old was she?”
“Old enough to have had a season. Old enough to know what marriage would be for her.” He thought of Lord Rowley, debauched and rich as a king. “She came to me and offered me . . .”
“I can imagine.”
“You can’t, though.” This was the bit he had to say aloud. It was the bit that would convince her that they were not for each other. That he would never be worthy of her. “When it was over, I did what was expected to be done. I told her I would seek out her father. That I would marry her.”
Lily’s attention was rapt, and he loathed it, the way she saw into him. The way she understood him more than anyone ever had. “She refused.”
He turned away. Looked out the window, over the dark London rooftops. “She laughed.” He paused, his own humorless laugh coming on the heels of the words. “Of course she laughed.” He put a hand to his neck, wishing he were anywhere but there, reliving the sordid past. “She was daughter to a viscount. Set to marry an earl. And I was poor and untitled and Scottish. And a fucking fool.”
“No,” Lily whispered.
He did not turn. Could not. Instead, he spoke to the city beyond. “Not poor any longer.” He was lost in the memory. “She paid me ten pounds. It was enough for a month of food.”
“Alec.” She was behind him now. She’d come off the bed, and he could hear the desperation in her voice. He had to turn to her. To look at her. To show her the truth.
And so he did, seeing the tears in her eyes, hating them. Loving them. What a life it would have been if it had been Lily who had found him in the library all those years ago. And instead . . .
“She sent her friends after that. Aristocratic girls who wished for an opportunity to play in the gutter. To quench their thirst for mud. To ride the Scottish Brute.”
He saw the words strike her. Hated himself for doing it even as he forced himself to finish. “They paid my way through school. And I played the whore. I suppose I should be grateful that, as a man, it was never the shame it would have been if I were a woman. I was revered. They whispered my name like I was their favorite toy. A fleeting fancy. Peg used to say that I was the perfect first and the worst possible last.”
“I do not care for her,” Lily said.
Peg was not the point. He pointed to the trunk on the wall. Made the point again. “When I tell you that I am unworthy of you, it is not a game. It is not a falsehood. Those pristine white clothes, the hems you’ve embroidered with love and dedication, the damn boots with their little leather soles . . . they are for another man’s children. The dress. It is for another man to strip from you. A man infinitely better than I.”
He begged her to understand. “Don’t you see, Lily? I am not the man you marry. I am the other. The beast you regret. But now—you can have another. A man you deserve.” He pointed to the painting. “That thing . . . the painting they would have used to destroy you—it is no longer your albatross. And now, you may choose a different path, far from the scandal. Whatever one you wish. Don’t you see? Choice is the only thing I can give to you.”
She opened her mouth to answer and he slashed a hand through the air, begging her to be silent. “Do not. Do not choose me. How are you not able to see the truth? I will never be for you. I could not even—I arrived in London with a single task—to protect you. And I couldn’t. I could not keep you from them. From the gossips. From Hawkins. Dear God, you were nearly run down on Rotten Row. And that’s before I took advantage of you. I should never have touched you.”
He waited for the agreement to come. For the judgment.
He waited for her to leave.
And when she moved, he braced himself to watch her go. Except she did not leave. Instead, she came to him. He stepped back, desperate to avoid her, too broken to touch her. But the room was too small and she was a superior opponent.
She did not touch him.
Worse. She reached up and removed the pins from her hair, letting it fall around her shoulders like auburn silk. His mouth went dry and his gaze narrowed before she said, “I’ve something to say now, if I might.”
As though he could stop her, this warrior princess, dressed like a pickpocket about to thieve his damn heart.
“It is a great fallacy, you know. The idea that first is most meaningful. That second is. That any that follow are. That the circumstances of those early encounters somehow mean more than the one we choose forever. It is the lie the world tells us, but you have taught me to know better.”
She looked to him, the love in her eyes stealing his breath. “I have heard your tale. And now it is time for you to hear mine. When I am old, Alec, and I look back on the faded memories of my life, shall I tell you of what I will think? It will not be him. And when I think on my scandal, I shall be grateful for it, as it will have brought me you. But I will not think much on it, because I will be too busy thinking of you. Of the days we sparred and the nights I wished we might. Of the hours I spent wrapped in your plaid. Wrapped in you. Of the way you look at me, as though there has never been another woman in the world.”
And there hadn’t been. Not for him. She put her hand to his chest, where his heart threatened to beat from it. “Of the way you have held me. And the way I have loved you.
“So tell me, Alec Stuart, self-made man turned duke, strong and kind and brilliant beyond measure.” She was going to destroy him with her words and her gaze. “When you are old, of whom will you think?”
And suddenly, it was the only question that mattered.
“You,” he said, reaching for her. Or perhaps she reached for him. It did not matter, as she was in his arms.
And it was true. He would remember her.
“Always you. Forever you.”
Even if this night was all he had.
“None of it matters,” she said, the words strong against his lips, “Not the past, not the women, not the scandal. None of it matters when we are here, and we have each other.” And then she was kissing him, and he was lifting her in his arms and her legs were wrapped about him as though she belonged there.
And she did.
Without breaking the caress, he returned her to the bed, lowering her to sit on the edge of it, coming to his knees at the bedside. She released his lips and pulled away. “No,” she said. “I do not wish you on your knees.”