They barely knew one another, and he was too much of a gentleman to pull her close and draw the back of his hand against her cheek as he wished. To feel the softness of her skin. And how her lips would feel against his…
He wished to know her depths. He craved to know more than this masked version of her, running through the woods at Vauxhall Gardens. He wanted more than minutes.
And that is what they possessed between them.
Minutes.
She was borrowed brilliance, and soon she would dash out of the woods to be with the rest of glittering London. Like some jewel. And he would retire home, as he had wished, except now it would no longer be a safe haven. Now it would be a reminder that once he had met something truly remarkable.
If they shared names, it would only make the pain of what was to come more real.
“I suppose if we are not sharing names, then we are not sharing other details, but I do know you are too caught up in your thoughts right now.” She laughed and pressed her thumb against the creases between his pinched brows. “I can tell you have a great mind. That is something to be proud of.”
He didn’t know what to do with a compliment. Most everyone hated him for his mind and the way it obsessed over the smallest of details. Even if he had been proud of his mind, and once he had been, now it mostly felt like a burden. As if he owed everyone an apology for working his way through the world with some unfair advantage.
“I do well, thank you,” he said awkwardly.
Henry spun her, watching her emerald dress fan out around her there in the dark. But her hair was fire, and he was a moth drawn to flame, desperate to burn himself for the pleasure of one more touch.
It didn’t make sense.
None of this did.
The stranger twirled back, bracing one hand against his chest to avoid colliding with him. He was desperate to know what that would feel like. What it would do to him to feel her weight against him, her skin to brush against his? He was never a gambling man. He left that to his brother Rafe, but he would guess her hair was soft as his favorite Savile Row silk vest. And she would taste, well, he couldn’t venture to guess that. Her perfume was altogether alluring, and if she were to taste like honey cakes and tea, he would lose what he understood of the world.
Because until tonight, he hadn’t believed in love.
He hadn’t believed he wished to find it.
“You, poor, silly man,” she cooed, bracing his face between her silk-covered palms.
His heart, that cold, icy organ rumored to be in his chest, beat, blooming into something unrecognizable with each proceeding drum. As if, after all this time, he had been sleepwalking.
“I don’t understand you or this,” he whispered. He shuttered his eyes toward her, melting into her touch. “Can you make this make sense?”
“Life may be this big, sweeping thing, but love is discovered in between the million tiny moments when you learn to live your life. I have lived my life fully, much to the disappointment of many. And I assure you that I have never found someone quite as intriguing as I have found you.”
“You mean knocked unconscious at the base of a sycamore tree?”
She paused, words almost visibly tripping up on her full lips. “Wit can only push you so far in this life. You learn by feeling.” She pressed her hand against his chest. “Here. I promise, if you feel something, then you are living, and nothing is wrong. Madness lies in nothing. I might not enjoy everything I feel, but I have found the courage to embrace the pleasant and unpleasant. That is something to be proud of. That is something so many in this world never reach. Don’t be another. You are far too special to walk around this world stuck in your head, too afraid to open yourself up to what awaits.”
Henry always had a retort. It was his job, after all. But that speech was beautiful.
She was… beautiful.
“I need to know your name,” he whispered instead. “Please.”
She shook her head. For a moment, he thought she would push him away, but instead, she curled her fingers into the lapels of his waistcoat and tethered herself to him. Rooting him there in this existence he never thought possible.
He could not be in love because he hadn’t known this woman for long. Hell, he hadn’t known her one whole night.
“I can see you trying to make sense out of something that doesn’t make sense. Stop.”
He swallowed, his palms suddenly sweating. She was mere inches away, and he couldn’t kiss her.
Henry so desperately wished to kiss this stranger.
“What will you do tomorrow?” he asked instead.
She shrugged. “The same as every other day, except now I will have met you. And I don’t know if I’ll be sorry or glad of it.”
“Glad of it, I’d like to think.”
“Wouldn’t that be lovely?” She closed her eyes, and her long eyelashes fluttered against the holes in her mask.
“You’re lovely.” Henry cleared his throat, instantly wishing he had kept that thought to himself. He hadn’t had a drink earlier, and still, he was walking around uttering the most inefficacious things to a stranger who nearly bashed his head in.
He drew in a steadying breath, pulling his focus to his feet on the earth, the cool September evening breeze that brushed across his face, the silk of her gown in his palms.
And that’s where the center of his world tipped. Henry Davies, barrister extraordinaire and virgin, had a woman wrapped in his arms, and he was more focused on his words than his actions. Which likely accounted for why he was a virgin.
“What if we snuck away?” she whispered. “I am so ready to leave them all behind. Would you take your chance on me and try finding our way out of here?”
“Where would we go?”
“Anywhere.” She laughed. “I realize how that sounds. It sounds like I hit my head and not you. No, no. Then maybe I should return to the party. I won’t keep you any longer.”
“What if I wish to stay? What will you think of me?”
