more than what she was. Because Gabriella D’Oro had never transfixed anyone. Not her parents. Not a man.
But he was looking at her like she mattered. She didn’t feel like shrinking into a wall, or melting into the scenery. She wanted him to keep looking.
She didn’t want to hide from this. She wanted all of it.
Slowly, so slowly, so that she could savor the feel of him, relish the sensations of his body beneath her touch, she slid her hand up his throat, feeling the heat of his skin, the faint scratch of whiskers.
Then she moved to cup his jaw, his cheek.
“I’ve never touched a man like this before,” she confessed.
And she wasn’t even embarrassed by the confession, because he was still looking at her like he wanted her.
He moved closer, covering her hand with his. She could feel his heart pounding heavily, could sense the tension running through his frame. “I’ve touched a great many women,” he said, his tone grave. “But at the moment it doesn’t seem to matter.”
That was when she kissed him.
She closed her eyes and leaned forward, pressing her lips to his, her heart thudding against her chest so wildly she could hardly breathe. She felt dizzy. She felt restless. She felt...everything.
It was the most natural and comfortable thing in the world to be in his arms. And also the most frightening. The most torturous.
She felt as though she’d come home, as though she’d finally found a place to rest. One that was hers and hers alone. But it wasn’t enough. And it never would be. His suit and her gown put too many layers between them.
Her title and his lack of one.
His age and experience coupled with her relative youth and inexperience.
Thirteen years. Thousands of miles. Lord knew how many women.
An unbridgeable divide, but one that was reduced to nothing as she stood here, tasting him. Savoring him. Holding him.
There was no space between them now. None at all. They were both shaking, both needing, both wanting.
She curled her fingers into a fist, holding him tightly as she angled her head. Then she jolted when he parted his lips, his tongue tracing the seam of her mouth, requesting entry.
She couldn’t deny him. Not now. Possibly not ever.
He wrapped his arms around her, enveloping her, holding her close. One hand pressed between her shoulder blades, the other sliding low, just low enough to tease the curve of her buttocks without actually going past the line of impropriety.
Her world was reduced to this. To his hands, his lips, his scent. His every breath. If they had come into this room for anything other than the kiss she didn’t remember it.
If there was anything beyond this room, this moment, this man, she didn’t remember it, either.
They parted slowly, so different from that kiss in the garden. This felt natural, even though she regretted the end. They were both breathing hard, both unsteady. She lifted her hand and touched his cheek, felt the rasp of his whiskers beneath her palms, drank in the sight of him. What she could see of him that wasn’t covered by the mask, anyway.
“We should look for the painting,” she said, knowing she sounded dazed.
Her lips felt hot. Swollen. She wondered if they looked different, too. She couldn’t possibly have any lipstick left on them—that was certain.
“Painting?” he asked, the corners of his mouth turning up.
“Yes,” she said, her tone dry. She cleared her throat and started to walk toward the back wall. “She said there was a painting in one of the rooms, and only I could open it...”
“The key,” he said.
“Yes. I’m good at keeping secrets, it turns out. All those years of not having very many people to talk to, I guess.”
She reached beneath the neckline of her gown and fished the necklace out, holding it up in front of her.
“The key,” he said, his tone slightly different than it had been a moment earlier.
“Yes. It fits into a frame. She said it was scenery. Of a farm.”
“There’s a lot of that here.”
“I know,” she said, moving closer to the far wall and examining the different scenes in front of her. “They really do like their geese,” she muttered as she moved down the row, examining the frames, looking for any evidence that one might not be a typical picture. “There are some farm scenes in here, but nothing quite like what my grandmother described. I feel like this is the wrong room. The sorts of farmhouses my grandmother described were from a slightly different era. They predate these more modern houses.”
“Do they predate the geese?”
“There were always geese, Alex,” she said, enjoying the way his words played off her own. A thrill the way their lips worked together, even when they weren’t touching.
“Then let’s keep looking,” he said.
He took hold of her hand and another thrill shot through her as he led her from the room and back down the hall. He opened another door.
“What sorts of paintings are those?” he asked.
She looked in, her heart pounding hard due to the excitement. Sort of. Mostly it was the proximity of Alex.
“Cityscapes,” she said, “it won’t be here.”
They continued through a room filled with the portraits of royals, and one with scenes of the beach. Finally, they opened up a door to a room with a wall lined with paintings of farms. Pale, rosy cheeked children with animals, thatched roof homes and, well, more geese.
“It would be here,” she said, “I’m sure. So now...we just have to figure out which. Which painting looks different? Which one might be a false front?”
Alex squinted looking around the room. Then his posture went straight as though a realization had shot through him like a lightning bolt. “Here,” he said.
She turned to look at him. He’d stopped in front of a painting with a farmhouse, and a young girl in front of it. His fingertip was pressed into the corner of the frame.
“What is it?” she asked.
“There’s a small...a notch here in the corner. Look.”
She moved over to where he was and her mouth fell open, her fingers trembling as she held the charm on the necklace out in front of her. “I think... I think this is it,” she said.
He moved aside and she stepped forward, pressing the back of the necklace into the notch and pushing it in. The frame popped away from the wall about two inches and Gabriella stood back, bringing her necklace with her.
