“I want to be pushed,” he interrupted her.
She spun around and found that he had taken two steps toward her. He wasn’t yet touching her, but if he reached out his hand, he could. And now she truly could feel his body heat.
“What?”
“I needed to be pushed,” he said. “And I don’t want you to go.”
That sentence was like a gunshot to her chest, and Gemma staggered. Everything in her told her to launch herself into his arms and make love to him. If she touched him, she knew he would let her. And they could pretend this hadn’t happened, perhaps. Go back to how it was.
But there was one thing she’d learned in the past few hours while she waited for him. The way it was…wasn’t enough.
“You told me that when Alice offered to be your lover, you told her you couldn’t.”
He jolted. “This isn’t about her.”
“But I can’t do the same with you,” she finished.
He shook his head. “What do you mean?”
“I can’t be your lover, Crispin.”
He reached for her and she shivered as his fingers brushed her cheek. “You are my wife,” he reminded her.
“I am not your wife because you chose me,” she said. “We were forced into this circumstance, and the most you have been able to do is make me your mistress. I am your mistress with your name, Crispin. And I can’t be that.”
“Then don’t.”
She tilted her head, uncertain if he meant that she could be more or that she was right to end things between them. But before she could ask, he shocked her by falling to his knees.
“Let me love you, Gemma Flynn. Let me start over.”
Her lips parted and she could hardly breathe as he reached to take her hand and drew her closer. She stared down at him. “What?”
“I love you,” he said, his voice shaking with emotion. “I have tried to pretend it wasn’t happening, out of guilt and self-loathing. But you broke the lock I’ve tried to keep around myself, Gemma. You were the key. And not just today when you gave me my freedom from my guilt over Alice. But before that. Since I found you in my bed and discovered you were my wife, you have been setting me free bit by bit. I love you.”
She was dreaming. That was all there was to it. She’d fallen asleep and now this very vivid dream was offering her everything she’d ever wanted.
“You are shaking your head,” he said, still not rising from his place before her. “Does that mean you don’t love me anymore? Did I wait too long?”
She made a pained sound from the very pit of her soul and clasped his hand with both of hers. “I do, I do love you,” she said.
His face lit up with happiness. True happiness. Real happiness. Something she’d never seen in his eyes before. And he looked younger and even more handsome than he had ever been. So handsome she nearly dropped down to the floor with him to kiss him.
“Please be my wife,” he asked.
She blinked. “I am your wife,” she said with a laugh.
He shook his head. “No, you misunderstand. Be my wife. Let me be your husband. In truth. By choice. In every way. For now and for always. Please, please, Gemma. Say that you’ll stay with me.”
She stared at him. “You—you mean it,” she whispered.
He nodded. “I mean it, Gemma. I truly do.”
She slid down to her knees with him and cupped his face. Here was this man. This beautiful, complicated, everything man. And he loved her. Wanted her. Despite their beginning, despite all that had kept them apart since it. He loved her. And she so desperately loved him.
“Yes,” she whispered as she stroked a tear from his cheek with a smile. “Yes, I’ll stay with you. And build our life with you. And I will love you until the day I die.”
He let out a cry of happiness and dragged her against him, joining their lips with the same hunger that every kiss contained. But this one was different. This one connected them as they had never allowed themselves to be connected before. And as he lowered her back on the carpet, his kisses growing deeper and more purposeful, she knew for the first time that her future was going to be everything she’d ever dreamed of.
Epilogue
“Little Crispin is already picking up bad habits from Big Crispin,” Serafina teased as she entered the room, and Crispin stopped kissing his wife.
All heads swiveled to the baby, who was now sitting up by himself at the table. As if on cue, Little Crispin laughed and the table erupted with more of the same.
“I think it’s a good thing if he sees such love in his midst,” Rafe said, catching his wife and dragging her into his lap before he dipped her back and kissed her just as passionately as Crispin had kissed Gemma.
Marcus and Annabelle looked at each other, shrugged and also joined in before their mother waved her napkin at them all. “Stop it now! Not only are you embarrassing poor Mary, but the food is getting cold.”
Once again the table filled with laughter and talking as the rest fell into raucous conversation. Gemma leaned forward to join in the talk, but Crispin caught her arm before she could and drew her attention back where he liked it best. On him. Her gray eyes lit up with love, just as they had been for three months.
“Do you know my secret?”
She smiled. “I know all your secrets, don’t I?”
He shook his head. “Mama would say not. So would Rafe. Though you know most. But this is a new secret.”
She was laughing now and leaned in, her soft scent filling his nostrils, her warm touch tangling through every cold part of him. “What is your new secret?”
“I love you more each and every day,” he whispered, close to her ear.
She swatted his leg gently. “It is a secret we share, then,” she murmured. “For I feel the same way. But I have one of my own.”
He tilted his head. “Do you? And what is that?”
She leaned closer and said, “The baby is coming in May of next year.”
He drew back, his heart leaping. “Baby? What baby?”
She didn’t answer, but just smiled and drew a hand across her belly. He stared into the eyes of this woman, his wife. He had never expected to find her, certainly never expected to want her and love her as deeply as he now did. What was equally shocking was how much he wanted the baby she had just revealed was coming. A child created from their love. A child who would carry his name and perhaps her eyes.
“Crispin?” she asked, her tone filled with concern. “Are you happy about this?”
“Happy?” he repeated on a laugh. Then he let out a bark of joy that shocked the entire table into silence. It was an amazing thing to realize his heart had never been so full. “I have never been so excited to meet another person in my life.”
Other Books by Jess Michaels
The Notorious Flynns
The Other Duke (Book 1)
The Scoundrel’s Lover (Book 2)
The Ladies Book of Pleasures
A Matter of Sin
A Moment of Passion
A Measure of Deceit
The Pleasure Wars Series
Taken By the Duke
Pleasuring The Lady
Beauty and the Earl
Beautiful Distraction
Mistress Matchmaker Series
An Introduction to Pleasure
For Desire Alone
Her Perfect Match
Albright Sisters Series
Everything Forbidden
Something Reckless
Taboo
Nothing Denied
Jess Michaels raffles a FREE Kindle or Amazon gift certificate EVERY month to members of her newsletter, so sign up on her website:
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Take a Sneak Peek at No Gentleman for Georgina
Book 4 of the Notorious Flynns:
Chapter One
Paul Abbot had no idea why the Duke and Duchess of Har
tholm continually insisted on inviting him to their balls and soirees. He had no title, little fortune and he was nothing more than the manager at their brother-in-law’s notorious club.
But perhaps that was the answer. His employer’s new family, the Flynns, were welcoming to all comers and for some reason he had been swept up in their wake. But he knew his place even if they pretended not to do the same.
And so he stood as far to the back of the ballroom as he could, watching the attendees to the ball swirl by in their foppery and finery. He sipped his one and only drink for the evening and all but forced himself not to look at the pocket watch tucked in his jacket.
“Counting the moments until you can flee is not good manners,” he murmured to himself as he stifled a yawn. There was nothing here to tempt him.
Nothing but…
The moment his mind began that errant thought, his gaze slid across the room and landed squarely on the one and only temptation London Society had ever held for him.
Miss Georgina Hickson stood on the other side of the room. And she was beautiful, just as she was always beautiful. Her dark blonde hair was fixed just so that it framed her oval face perfectly, accentuating high cheekbones and full, rosy lips. He had wondered, more than once, how those lips would taste.
Her bright blue eyes were expressive as she chatted with her companions.
Companions who were all men.
His heart sank. Georgina never seemed to be short of partners when he was invited to events they mutually attended. Paul held his breath every day when he looked at the notices in the Times, waiting to see an announcement of her impending nuptials to the Earl of Very Important Things or the Duke of So Far Above Paul Abbot.
As if she sensed his stare on her, she suddenly looked across the room. Her gaze locked on him and her smile broadened. His heart stuttered and he forced himself to smile back, to lift a hand in a polite wave.
She returned it, then spoke to her companions once more before she began to come across the room toward him.
Paul held his breath as he watched her approach. He had less than thirty seconds to give himself the same talk he always did when Georgina came near. The talk that reminded him that when they had been introduced at a party to celebrate the shocking marriage of his employer, Marcus Rivers and Georgina’s good friend, Annabelle Flynn, two years ago, that Georgina had only been polite to talk to him. That it was her continued politeness which drove her to carry on their odd friendship all these years later.
She was a nice girl and she had to recognize just how out of place he was at these gatherings. Beyond that, her interest in him was less than nothing.
“Mr. Abbot,” she said, that beautifully melodious voice washing over him like a soothing rain after a too-hot day. “I did not know you were in attendance or I would have sought out your company sooner.”
He swallowed hard and found his voice. “You seemed quite enthralled, I would not have pulled you away from your companions.”
She glanced over her shoulder at her circle of men. “Them? Not enthralled, I assure you, nor they in me. We were discussing the weather, of all things.” She rolled her eyes and laughed. “I cannot tell you how utterly uninterested I am in the Almanac’s predictions for this year’s rainfall.”
He laughed. “That does sound rather dull.”
“So in a way, you saved me,” she said with another of those dazzling smiles. “I am most obliged.”
“At your service,” he said with a stiff bow that brought a twinge of pain to his shoulder. Pain he had been ignoring for well over a decade and intended to continue ignoring now.
“How are you, then?” she asked. “I feel like I have not seen you in an age. I always look forward to your company when I visit Annabelle and Marcus’s home.”
Paul shifted. He wished he could say the same to her, but from his lips those words would be a desperate confession versus her polite over statement.
“With Rivers spending more time at home, we do often conduct our business there.” He smiled.
“It must be rather thrilling, running such a successful establishment.”
His smile slowly faded. Being an innocent, Georgina had no idea the truth about the club he managed. The Donville Masquerade, Rivers’ den of sex and gambling, would horrify her if she ever did discover the reality of it.
“Sometimes I think I should sneak a visit there, perhaps convince Annabelle to allow it,” she said with a light laugh.
Paul stiffened at the idea of Georgina there. Of watching her watch the debauched acts. Despite himself, his cock began to swell at the thought and he fought for the control he always held over himself before he said, “I doubt your father would approve of such a plan, Miss Hickson.”
She shrugged, but the light in her eyes dimmed a little. “My father approves of so little I do anymore, Mr. Abbot. It makes me wonder if I should not try to please myself for a little while since he will not be pleased by any action I do or do not take.”
About the Author
Jess Michaels writes erotic historical romance from her home in Tucson, AZ. She has three assistants: One cat that blocks the screen, one that is very judgmental and her husband that does all the heavy lifting. She has written over 50 books, enjoys long walks in the desert and once wrestled a bear over a piece of pie. One of these things is a lie.
Jess loves to hear from fans! So please feel free to contact her in any of the following ways (or carrier pigeon):
www.AuthorJessMichaels.com
PO Box 814, Cortaro, AZ 85652-0814
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The Widow Wager Page 23