Firelight (Darkest London, #1)

by Kristen Callihan

Mud-thick fog hung low on the ground, refusing to drift off despite the crisp night breeze. It never truly went away, ever present in London, like death, taxes, and monarchy.

“I suppose I had better think of something more suitable.” She worried her lip considering. She ought to call him Benjamin. But it was too intimate, too soft. “My lord?” she ventured, only half serious. “Good God, no.” She bit back a smile. “Husband?” She took a sip of wine. He grunted. “Are we to become Quakers?”

She fit within her skin when she was with him. The novelty of such a feeling was seductive.

Archer’s finger grazed hers. “I feel you. As if you were connected to me by an invisible string.” He touched his chest. “I feel you here. In my heart.” She couldn’t think past the mad pounding of her blood. She swallowed painfully. “I feel you too.”

“I am consumed,” he whispered against her ear, and she shivered. “By you.”

“You’re wet.” Awe and desire darkened his voice to something almost unrecognizable. A faceless stranger touching her in the black night. “Wet for me.”

You are the only man I’ve ever known who has looked beyond my face and wanted to know me for me. And I find myself wanting you to know the whole of me.” I love you. For one agonized moment, he feared he had said it aloud. His soul fairly shouted it. Three long years and not a day had passed when he hadn’t thought about her.

“Know this,” she said in harsh tones, “if anyone should find my husband”—she swallowed past a lump of nausea—“appetizing, should one hair on Archer’s head be harmed, I shall leave little more than ash of that unfortunate fellow.”

“Because today I truly realized that I could lose you in an instant.” He took a small step toward her. “That life was not a long road that stretched before me, but here and now. And the thought of spending one more day, one more breath without knowing the feel of you in my arms has become too much to bear.”

Poor Archer, he didn’t stand a chance. “Think of England, darling.” A choked laugh burst from his lips. “Witch.” His eyes opened, and the pained expression broke into something so tender and hot her heart kicked. “God, I love you,” he whispered, then thrust in with a deep glide that made her moan.

“I lied. I lied when I said your beauty does not affect me. I look at you, and I’m breathless, dizzy from it. I want to kneel at your feet and worship you. While the baser part of me wants to fling up your skirts and stick my cock in you until we forget our names.” His nostrils flared as he glared at her, accusation and pain mingling within his eyes. “But none of that matters,” he said, trembling before her, “because every day that I am with you, I am more convinced that God made you just for me. For in ninety years on this earth, no one has made me feel the way you do, as if every day is an adventure. You make me laugh. And I never laugh. I go around smiling like a witless fool. So yes, I kept it from you, because I am so desperately in love with you that the knowledge that you might love me too was irresistible. And I was afraid it would turn to dust should I take off that mask.”