She opened her mouth, but he silenced her with a swift kiss. “Don’t tell me he’s in a better place,” he said, knowing his voice was stony. “Or that I was lucky to have known him as long as I did. Or that he’s an angel. Or that I will meet him again when I cross the Pearly Gates.”
“Is there ever a right thing to say?”
Quin thought about it. “Take me now?”
She laughed, and her laughter smoothed the jagged edges of his grief. “Nice and short. I won’t say anything.” She cupped her hands around his face and pressed a kiss on his lips that was like all the condolences he’d ever received in his life rolled into one.
He couldn’t even speak after.
Her fingers swept up and into his hair, shaking free his ribbon. “Was your hair always white in front, or did it happen from grief?”
“Always there,” he said. “I must have been one of the strangest-looking babies ever born in Kent.”
Her fingers felt possessive of him, stroking through his hair as if she’d owned him. Though that was impossible.
He cleared his throat. “I know that you’re marrying the marquess.” He felt as if his fingers were burning merely because they were touching her back.
She went still. She didn’t move, but he felt as if she was about to step backward, so he tightened his grip. “Olivia! We’re in a tree.”
“We should climb down,” she stated.
“One moment. If you weren’t marrying that marquess,” he whispered into her ear, “I’d change places with you.”
“What?”
“I’d put you against the trunk. I’d—”
“Don’t say it!” she squeaked. “I’m not some sort of acrobat who could . . .”
“Could what?”
“Well. You know.”
“Is this the woman who almost told the entire table a limerick about a young lady who was particularly nimble with a needle?” He could feel laughter in his chest. It was unfamiliar, a bit intoxicating.
“Limericks are just extended jests. I memorize them because they make my mother so very enraged, and that allows me to maintain a small sense of self-possession. Now, could we please get down from this tree? I might as well add that my mother would explode if she could see me now.”
“So would mine,” Quin said comfortably, allowing his hand to drift down her back.
“Don’t!” she ordered.
He stopped, his hand hovering just at the top of a magnificent curve. “Please?” His voice had a husky quality that would have embarrassed him on the ground, but who felt embarrassment up in a tree? He slipped his lips across her cheek, nipped her ear. “Olivia Lytton, I think you will always be my favorite tree-climbing companion.”
“I expect I’m your only tree-climbing companion,” she replied, giving him a mock scowl. “And now I am going to return to terra firma.”
“Wait! I’m going down first.” He swung down to the branch below. Then he looked up, feeling a wicked curl of anticipation in his stomach. When she didn’t move, he bent backwards so he could see her face.
“You’re planning to look at my legs, aren’t you?”
“I love your legs,” he said with perfect truth. “And if I didn’t look at them I would be remiss in my duty, which in this case is to keep you from being injured.”
She snorted, and then—much faster than he could have anticipated—pivoted, swung down, and alit beside him. The branch bounced and he instinctively reached out to steady her, but in so doing he lost his own balance and crashed through two layers of branches, landing hard on the ground.
The wind was knocked clean out of him, and the pain that resulted was spectacular. Black dots swam before his closed eyelids, and he couldn’t seem to get air into his lungs at all.
“Oh, dear Lord!” he heard, before he could even see again. “Oh, Quin, oh, Quin, please don’t be dead. Why did I do that?” Olivia was down from the tree. “Please be breathing . . . You’re breathing!”
He was breathing. He was sure of it because every inhalation hurt like . . . a series of curse words crashed through his mind and only barely avoided escaping his mouth.
He felt Olivia patting him all over his chest. Although pain likely impaired his mental acuity, Quin made an instant decision to keep his eyes closed. No man in his right mind would interrupt a woman on a mission. At least, this mission. He’d rather stop breathing than discourage her.
“I don’t feel any broken ribs,” she muttered to herself, patting even more firmly.
That could be because she had moved down to patting his abdomen, where he was fairly sure there were no ribs, but he wasn’t complaining. Her hands hesitated for a moment, and then she very quickly, very lightly, gave him some pats below his abdomen.
A groan erupted from his lips before he could stop himself, and he grimaced. He wasn’t used to being so undisciplined. He had always been in complete control of all his physical reactions, even with Evangeline, his own wife.
“Oh, Lord,” Olivia cried again. “I’m going to fetch Justin. Please hold on! I’m afraid that you’ve broken something. I hope it isn’t your back. I’ll never forgive myself!”
The ragged sound of her voice made him open his eyes and snatch her arm just before she sprang to her feet. “I’m all right,” he grunted. “Just give me a moment.”
“I’m sorry!” Olivia said, her voice cracking. “It was so stupid of me, Quin. I never thought. That’s how I always get down from the tree outside my bedroom. I just swing down fast and then find my feet.”
“You climb out of your bedroom window?” He was forcing air into his lungs now and realizing that although his body ached, nothing felt as if it was broken.
“The tree is the only way one can leave my house without my mother knowing,” she said. “Can you move your toes? I’ve heard that if a person can’t move his toes, it’s a terrible sign. I can see you moving other places, but . . .”
He raised his head, wincing. She was looking toward his feet, and therefore toward that part of him which was stirring. Damn well leaping out of his breeches. “My toes can move,” he said, sitting up fast to block the view. His head spun.
Olivia didn’t look as if she even recognized what she saw in the area of his breeches. It really wasn’t clear to him whether she was merely skilled at flirtation, or more experienced.
Evangeline had not been a virgin when she came to his bed. He’d been surprised at the time, but when he got to know her better, he understood. Evangeline didn’t have a voracious sexual desire, but she did have a voracious wish to be wanted, a longing so deep that no one man could have satisfied her.
His head was pounding, but even so, he could smell Olivia, some delicate, sweet scent that was hers, and hers alone. The scent was like bottled temptation. Like need.
Just having her kneeling beside him made him feel reckless. Even now, his body bruised and his head seemingly clamped in a vise, he wanted nothing more than to topple her backwards and then crawl on top of her.
And take her.
He groaned again at the thought.
“I’m going to fetch Justin,” Olivia cried, jumping to her feet. “You’re in pain. He can carry you to the pony cart.”