Free Twin Willows: A Novel by Kay Cornelius Page B

remembered.”
    Her heart thudded to a stop. He thought she was beautiful? Her heart resumed beating, with a vengeance. “Oh, Stuart—”
    “Shh.” He put his fingers to her lips and kissed her forehead, then her cheeks and chin. Finally he returned his lips to hers in a long, tender kiss, which she returned with growing passion.
    He nuzzled her neck, and a delicious thrill coursed through her body and awakened strange new sensations deep in the core of her being. They were even more intense than the feelings she had had that night in the parlor when they had been interrupted. Time seemed to stop now as their lips met again and again and then once more, until Anna’s head swam dizzily. She sagged against him, was grateful for his strong encircling arms.
    “Let’s sit down,” Stuart said. Keeping one arm around her waist, he opened the door to Miss Martin’s boxlike cabriolet and helped her climb inside. “No one will see us here.”
    I wouldn’t care if they did
. Anna almost said the words, but they weren’t quite true. For Stuart’s sake, Miss Martin mustn’t know that he had come back just to be with Anna.
    Stuart closed the carriage’s side curtains, creating a dark, private place, then turned back to take Anna into his arms. She drew a long, shuddering sigh and rested her head on Stuart’s shoulder.
    “How did you manage to get away?”
    “I said I had pressing business in Philadelphia.” He suited action to his words and pressed her body to his, and Anna shivered in delight. He kissed her once again, at first gently, and then with a rising urgency that she felt herself matching. She had dreamed of the moment when Stuart would once more hold her so close, she could feel his heart beating. Now he was here, and being with him was even more wonderful than she had imagined.
    As they embraced, Anna’s body yearned toward him. She couldn’t get close enough to Stuart, couldn’t get enough of his mouth moving on hers, of his hands caressing her face, her neck, then pressing against the swell of her bodice. She moaned with pleasure, enjoying each new sensation. She felt herself sliding sideways on the carriage seat, until finally she and Stuart lay side by side, close together in a way that Anna hadn’t known to be possible. Nothing else mattered but that she was here in this place and at this time with this man she loved, moving together with him toward some new emotional and physical intimacy that she was breathlessly eager to explore.
    Suddenly Stuart pulled away from her and sat up. “No, Anna,” he said.
    With difficulty, Anna struggled to a sitting position beside him and tried to comprehend what he was telling her. Both were breathing hard, and Anna’s carefully dressed hair had fallen loose. Absently she brushed it from her face.
    “Did I do something wrong?”
    Stuart touched her face with a tender hand and sighed. “No, my darling, but I was about to.”
    “But I—” Anna began; then she realized what he had called her, and repeated it uncertainly. “Darling? No one has ever said that to me before.”
    “I am glad of it. But as much as I care for you, I have no right to claim all your love now.”
    “Why not, when I am more than ready to give it?” Anna lifted her chin and strained in the dimness to see Stuart’s face, hoping that his expression might belie his words.
    Stuart raised Anna’s hands to his lips and kissed each finger in turn before he spoke again. “Your father is my friend, but apart from that, I love you too much to take advantage of your youth and innocence.”
    Even as tears of joy gathered behind her eyelids, Anna sought confirmation for what she had heard. “You do love me?”
    Stuart put a hand on each of her shoulders and lightly brushed her lips with his. “What has passed between us should prove it.”
    “Why do you pull away from me, then?”
    “Because I have no right to claim your love yet. At the moment, I have neither prospects nor money.”
    “I