“Your brother…?”

“Was legitimate. But I had the better circumstances. I was happy in the vil age. He was miserable in the manse. Our pater was half mad and viciously tempered. I think he raped my mother for the power of the act, not so much the physical release. Stil , she loved me. The only affection Nigel ever knew was mine and his wife’s.”

“I am sorry.” Maria brushed the hair back from his forehead and then kissed him in the space between his brows.

“So you see, my love”—he caught up her hand and set it over his heart—“I wish to have children within wedlock. I wish to share a home and a life with you. I wish to share a façade of normalcy with you.”

“A façade?” She smiled.

“Will we ever be normal?”

“God forbid,” she said with mock graveness.

“You wound me,” he retorted. “Jesting at a time like this. I am laying my heart at your feet and you tease me.”

Maria lifted their joined hands and set them over her own heart. “Your heart is not at my feet, it is here, beating within my breast.”

Christopher kissed her fingertips, his dark blue eyes alight with love. “We can manage, I promise you that. My steward and Philip are capable of seeing to my affairs while we are away. Philip is the most recent addition to my lieutenants. There are several, and together they can effectively rub along without me.”

“Good heavens,” she breathed, blinking down at him. “Whatever will you do with yourself surrounded by an increasing wife and her soon-to-be-marriageable sister?”

“An increasing wife…” His voice was even raspier than usual. His hand cupped her nape and pulled her down, his lips pressing hard to hers. “I want that, damn it. I want it now. With you. I never thought I would. But I do, and I need you to give it to me. No other woman would be able to tame me.

After all, how many notorious suspected murderesses are there?”

“I am not certain. I could investigate—”

He rolled again, pinning her beneath him and thrusting deep. She gasped in surprise, and he reared back and thrust harder.

“Have I mentioned lately,” she said with laughter in her voice and heart, “that aggressive behavior only makes me more obstinate?”

“Maddening, contrary wench!” he growled, punctuating each word with a lunge of his hips. Reaching down, he anchored her leg on his hip and fucked her with passionate, fervent abandon.

He moved with the precision of a man who not only knew how to give a woman pleasure, but who wanted to especial y. Who made it the goal of the entire sexual encounter to please his partner. To please her. He watched her closely, picking up on all the ways she responded to him, and adjusted his exertions accordingly.

“You like that?” he murmured when she whimpered in pleasure. He repeated the movement exactly. “You know as well as I that you crave me. Crave the feel of me inside you, stretching that tight, delicious cunt. Imagine days and nights spent like this, your ripe little body fucked so well it is nearly too much to bear.”

“Ha! I can wear you into exhaustion.” She meant to scoff, but her voice sounded slurred by lust instead.

“Prove it,” he whispered darkly, pumping deep and true, fil ing the room with the liquid sounds of their sexual congress. “Marry me.”

Lost to the feel of him inside her, Maria writhed and whispered hot sex words in his ear, her nails digging into his clenching buttocks. He was wild, untamed despite his claims to the contrary, his desperation for her evident in the way he made love to her, as if he would never have enough. Would never get deep enough.

“Are you certain you wish to experience this level of agitation every day of your life?” she whispered before she bit his earlobe.

In retaliation, he plunged bal s-deep into her and circled his hips, rubbing her clitoris with his pelvic bone, throwing her headlong into a pulsating climax.

“Christopher!” She shivered violently, her cunt milking his cock until he groaned and came, spurting inside her.

“I love you,” he gasped, clutching her so tightly she found it hard to breathe. “I love you.”

Maria wrapped him with her body, her heart pounding with her returning depth of affection for him. “I suppose I should marry you,” she breathed.

“Who else would drive you insane?”

“No one else would dare. You are the only one.”

“And certainly no one could love you as much as I do.”

“Certainly not.” He nuzzled his damp head into her cheek, imprinting her with his scent. “I used to wonder why my pater had to be who he was, why my brother had to inherit destitution, why the only recourse I knew of led me to this life.”

“My love…” She knew well how he felt. Had she not asked herself similar questions every day?

“I knew the moment I held you in the theater, that you were the reason for everything. Every single turn my life has made led me to you. Were I not the man I am, the agency would never have approached me and I would not have found you, my soul mate. In fact, you are so like me, it is nearly frightening, yet you continue to surprise and astound me.”

“As you continue to surprise and astound me.” She walked her fingers up his spine and laughed when he squirmed. “I never thought you would wish to be married. I cannot picture it.”

“Then we will commission a portrait,” he said dryly. “Say yes, my darling Maria. Say yes.”

“Yes.”

He lifted his head and arched a brow. “Why do I feel as if that was too easily won?”

“Oh?” Maria batted her eyelashes at him. “I recant, then, and will proceed to resist you further.”

Christopher rumbled a warning and twitched inside her.

She grinned. “Do you col ect that the more I frustrate you, the more sexual y focused you become? It is quite delicious.”

“You will be the death of me.”

“I warned you.”

“You will pay.”

“Ooh…When do you intend to col ect?”

“As soon as we can procure a wedding license and a priest.”

“I await your pleasure,” she purred.

As he deliberately flexed inside her, his smile was pure wickedness. “Well, then. You shan’t be waiting long.”

“Simon love.” Maria rose to her feet from her perch on the parlor settee and held out her hands.

Simon approached her with his slow, sultry stride, his smile deeply affectionate. Dressed in soft gray, he was understated, as usual, but dramatical y attractive all the same. He caught up her hands and bent to kiss her cheek. “How are you faring?”

“Not so Well,” she admitted, resuming her seat with him beside her. Christopher had returned to his home to change his garments and make arrangements for the advent of any news of Amelia. Maria waited at her residence, unwil ing to leave in case she missed word sent to her here.

She’d wanted to gather a team and venture out in search, but Christopher had begged her to all ow him to manage that part of the affair and offered several excel ent reasons why. In the end, she had relented, albeit reluctantly. “I cannot help but worry.”

“I know,” he soothed, stroking the back of her hand. “I wish I could be of more help.”

“Your presence alone is of great comfort to me.”

“Ah, but I am slightly de trop, yes?”

“Never. You will always have a place of prominence in my life.” Maria took a deep breath. “St. John has asked me to wed him.”

“Wise man.” Simon smiled. “I wish you great happiness. I know of no one who deserves it more than you.”

“You, too, deserve to be happy.”

“I am content, mhuirnin. Truly. At the present moment, my life is perfect.” Simon grinned and settled more comfortably in the brocade-covered seat.

“So, tel me, how much time do I have before I must leave you?”

“You are not going anywhere. I want you to keep this house. You have happy memories here, yes?”

“The happiest of my life.”

Maria’s eyes stung, and she swal owed past the lump in her throat. “Once I have Amelia, we plan to go away. Travel. See all the places that were kept from me while I was in service to Welton. I hope the adventure will help rebuild the bond Amelia and I once shared.”

“I think that is a fine idea.”

“I will miss you terribly,” she lamented, her lower lip quivering.

Simon lifted her hand to his lips and kissed the back. “I will be here for you always, for whatever you may need. This is not the end. For you and me, there will never be an end.”

“And I will always be here for you,” she whispered.

“I know.”

She blew out her breath. “So you will take the house?”

“No. I will maintain it for you. Fortuitously,” he continued, smiling, “this is the perfect location for my new appointment under Lord Eddington.”

Maria’s mouth fel open. “He lured you into the agency?”

“Not quite. He anticipates some matters of delicacy that would best be handled by someone with less scruples than most.”

“Dear God.” Her hand lifted to brush along his cheek. “Be careful, please. You are a member of my family. I could not bear it if something untoward were to befal you.”

“I request the same level of care from you. Take no risks.”

She held out her hand. “We have an agreement, then.”

He tilted his head in a slight bow, captured her proffered hand, and held it to his heart. “A lifetime pact.”

“So tel me,” her lips curved, “what does Eddington have in mind for you?”

“Well, here are his thoughts…”

Maria paced the length of her lower parlor and cursed under her breath. Unable to resist, she stared at the weary and travel-dusty man in the corner and felt almost as if she would faint.