Completion hovered too near. She bit her lip and struggled not to move, to extend the searing prelude.

He arched and she clenched, wanting him to stay with her. The effort of holding back became too much. She muffled a sob and at last rose. The glide inside her set off wild bolts of reaction. When she lowered, that immediate feeling of wholeness gripped her.

Dear God, after this, would she ever feel whole again?

No, she wouldn't think of the future. Not now. Now she wanted sensation and the knowledge that Nicholas was completely hers. If only for this moment.

She set an agitated rhythm. He seemed to understand her sudden need for sensual oblivion. His hands tightened on her breasts, driving her ever closer.

It couldn't last. She ascended toward heaven with dizzying velocity. Too soon, the world exploded and she tumbled into flame. Her bones dissolved with rapture just as Nicholas gave a guttural groan and spilled himself. She flailed in vermillion darkness where the only reality was the powerful body claiming hers and her own shuddering reaction.

When she returned trembling to earth, she slumped over Nicholas's chest and her cheeks were wet with tears she hadn't known she shed. Outside the windows, the sky lightened with morning's approach. She snatched a choked breath and told herself her brief folly ended in spectacular style.

The thought offered no consolation.

Chapter Twenty-three.

Ranelaw lay beneath Antonia and let his heart steady from its wild race. Exhilaration, power, hope rushed through his veins. He felt strong enough to fight demons, battle monsters, ride the gale on a winged horse.

Early light filtered through the window and the candles guttered into puddles of wax. The night was almost over.

This night of miracles.

Antonia stirred. Already he knew what she meant to say. He didn't want to listen. In mute denial, his hands tightened on her back.

"It's morning," she whispered, turning her head and resting her damp cheek on his chest. It seemed a gesture of trust, as though she felt safe in his arms, as though she wanted to stay there. Damn it, he wanted her to stay there too. He was too exhausted for the insidious thought to perturb him as it should.

"The servants are away until tonight. Let's see what they left us for breakfast." What he really meant was Stay with me.

"You know I can't." She moved again, her hair a soft caress on his skin. He held her against his body. After brief resistance, she subsided.

"Yes, you can," he said implacably.

She didn't answer. He sucked in a relieved breath and tasted air sharp with sexual satisfaction and the chill of dawn. The fire needed stoking, but he was too contented where he was.

How the mighty had fallen. This beautiful dragon had trampled his pride to dust. The terrifying truth was that in his ramshackle life, he'd never been as happy as he was right now.

She shifted again, and this time managed to roll away and prop herself against the headboard. She drew the sheet over her breasts. He loathed that sheet.

He lifted himself beside her and raised one hand to her soft cheek. "You've been crying."

She gave a choked laugh. "How embarrassing."

Poignant tenderness flooded him. "No."

"Yes."

She brushed back the tumble of silvery hair. When her expression hardened, a grim weight settled in his gut. Her voice even sounded different. Not his willing lover's soft, husky murmurs. She sounded like the martinet who shepherded Cassandra Demarest. He didn't want her to sound like that woman. That woman wouldn't have anything to do with him.

"The household are used to my morning walk. If I'm back before breakfast, nobody will be curious. Any later, questions will arise."

"Let them ask." His hand trailed down the valley between her breasts, pushing the despised sheet down as he went. "Don't go, Antonia."

"I have to."

"Why?"

She frowned. "For a thousand reasons. Mostly because scandal will harm Cassie and her father. I owe them better than that."

How he abhorred hearing her speak of Demarest with gratitude. How he abhorred remembering that his quest for revenge wouldn't just devastate Demarest and Cassie, but Antonia as well.

He shoved the uncomfortable thought away. His revenge upon Godfrey Demarest was important, but less urgent right now than his need to keep Antonia. He ignored the taunting voice that insisted his two goals were mutually incompatible. The Marquess of Ranelaw lived to reconcile the incompatible. Hadn't he managed to coax the fearsome chaperone Miss Smith into his bed? As a reward, hadn't he just experienced the best sex of his entire worthless life?

He cupped one breast and gently kissed her nipple, feeling it bead under his lips. She was so lusciously sensitive. He raised his head and stared into eyes darkening with arousal. "When can I see you again? Tonight?"

To his dismay, she stiffened and the dazed expression seeped from her beautiful eyes. A twinge of foreboding pierced his physical well-being. Something wasn't right. Something apart from her plans to sneak away from his bed like a criminal.

"I thought you understood," she said in a low voice.

He drew his hand from her breast. He had a bleak premonition he needed to concentrate. "Understand what?"

She swallowed and looked down, plucking at the sheet again. He'd long ago recognized this as a sign of nerves. What in Hades made her so nervous?

"This is all we can have."

Abruptly he sat up and glared at her. "What the blazes does that mean?"

"I can't stay in London. Not if Johnny is back." Her blue eyes swam with tears. At least she didn't look happy about this nonsense. "I'm returning to Somerset. At least in the short term. Mr. Demarest may not continue to employ me now I'm no use as chaperone."

"After last night, do you think I'll let you go?" Ranelaw straddled her, staring into her troubled expression. He caught her shoulders in an implacable grip. "Your wits have gone a-begging."

She met his gaze bravely although he knew his face must be vivid with anger. "Anyone who sees me here would say my wits have indeed gone a-begging."

His hands tensed as something that felt suspiciously like hurt pierced him. "Tell me you don't regret what we did."

She bit her lip. "Why do you care? I'm just one more woman."

After the glories of the night just passed, her bitterness jarred. "You're more than that. Tell me you're not sorry you came to me yesterday."

His heart faltered to a halt when she didn't immediately answer. This turned into a damned nightmare. How was it that only ten minutes ago he'd basked in contentment? Now she ripped him in half.

Just by threatening to leave.

He was right. She was dangerous. Fatally dangerous.

"Antonia?" he asked again, and hoped he didn't sound as needy to her as he did in his own ears.

Still she didn't speak. Instead she studied his face, as if he held the answer to every mystery.

At last she answered, her voice shaking. "No, I don't regret it. I've never known such joy." Her lips twisted into a humorless smile. "No wonder you're famous."

Rage surged at her final comment. "Don't belittle what happened."

She regarded him as if he babbled in a foreign language. "It's only two bodies coming together, Nicholas."

He scowled at her. "Don't be a fool, Antonia. And don't pretend that's all you felt. I want you to stay. I've . "

He paused. His profound reaction left him wallowing. Putting what he felt into words tested his limits. He fell back on the safe option. "I want more than you've given me."

Her lips flattened. In disappointment? Or anger or shame? He couldn't say. When his body united with hers, nothing divided them. Communication was perfect. But when they spoke, words only created an unbridgeable abyss between them.

"Well, for once, you're not going to get what you want," she said crisply as though what he said, what he wanted was unimportant. "I have to disappear or there will be an almighty scandal. I can't risk that. For Cassie's sake. And for my brother and Mr. Demarest."

He rarely felt at a loss with a woman. He'd felt at a loss with Antonia over and over again. Never more so than now. She wanted him. He knew that. She was willing to risk her reputation for him, or else why was she here? Surely that indicated her surrender last night was more than a trivial whim.

Yet she was so determined to leave him forever.

He struggled to come up with something to make her reconsider. "What if you're pregnant?"

She arched a cynical eyebrow. "What if I am? What can you do about it?"

With every moment, she moved farther away. He hated it. But apart from slicing open his heart in front of her and letting her trample over the bloody remains, he didn't know what to do.

"I can make provision for the child."

"I'll manage on my own," she said in an uncompromising voice.

He quashed an evocative image of Antonia's beautiful body growing round with his offspring. His childhood had been a nightmare. His parents provided the poorest example of nurture. He'd make the world's worst father. If Antonia bore a baby, her shame would be complete.

Still that image of her glowing and pregnant haunted him.

"Any child wouldn't be just yours, would it?" Hoping he worried unnecessarily, he kept his voice neutral. If he challenged her absurd independence, he risked rousing bitter resistance.

How would she support a baby? Her pride led her wrong.

"Yes, it would." She lifted her chin in a gesture that reminded him of the woman he'd first met. That woman had intrigued him but they'd moved past that now.

Or at least so he'd believed.

He snagged one hand in her hair, holding her face up as he kissed her hard. It was a kiss to compel cooperation, a travesty of the passionate kisses he'd showered on her through the night. She remained stiff and unyielding beneath his lips.

Eventually she wrenched free and glowered at him. "What does that prove, Nicholas? It's over."

She didn't even sound like she minded, blast her. "Don't say that," he growled, tightening his hand in her hair and staring at her reddened lips.

He'd been rough. He deserved a whipping. But how could she be so calm? When he imagined never seeing her again, he wanted to smash every stick of furniture in this room to splinters.

The anger drained from her expression and she studied him as if she saw all the way to his confused heart. Her shuddering breath wasn't far from a sob. He was unjust to accuse her of lacking feeling.

"What else would you have me do?" Her voice was choked. "Stay in London as your mistress?"

"Yes."

He knew it was impossible. He knew before she shook her head that she'd refuse. But he wanted her with him.

God damn it, he wanted . more.

"I won't be your mistress."

He spoke with an urgency that welled from the deepest part of him. "I'll be faithful. I'll treat you like a queen. I swear."

With every word, she looked more distressed. "No . "

"You'll never want for anything. I'll give you money to set up a life afterward. You'll be yourself at last. Tonight's vibrant, sensual creature, not a dour duenna to other people's children."

"And what if we have children?"

He knew she didn't consider his offer seriously. Still he tried. "You can have everything in writing. A house. Allowance. Carriages. Cattle. Support for offspring. My parents' bastards prospered, entered professions."

He'd never offered a woman so much. Never imagined he'd want to stay with a woman long enough to need such arrangements. With Antonia, his interest wasn't the usual fleeting fancy. With Antonia, he plumbed depths he never imagined. He needed more than a few weeks to satisfy this passion.

Perhaps he'd found a woman to hold him for years.

The idea was rash, revolutionary.

His voice lowered into resonant persuasion. The irony was that for once in his misbegotten existence, the desperation was no artifice. She'd opened a new world to him. He couldn't bear to think she slammed that door in his face and threw him back into the cold. Because with grim inevitability he recognized, without her, his existence was deathly cold.

Cold, meaningless, barren.

Her severe expression didn't soften. "They were still bastards."

"We haven't been careful, my darling. You may already carry my bastard."

At the endearment, a shadow crossed her face. He watched her reject it as only another insincere attempt to seduce.

Oh, Antonia, don't you know that with you, these cheap words I've spoken a thousand times are true and not cheap at all?

"Fate couldn't be so cruel," she whispered, then angled her chin as if daring fate to confound her. "I will not have my name bandied across England as another of your conquests. I will not shame my family and friends by becoming a kept woman."

"Is it better to live a lie?" His earlier anger revived. Surely after tonight, she knew what she sacrificed. "Is it better to burn? Because you will burn. You'll yearn night after night in your lonely bed. You'll regret this decision."

"Perhaps." Her gaze remained stony. He wondered where the soft, sensual creature had gone. "But not as much as I'd regret abandoning everything I believe in to become a rake's temporary mistress."