Chapter 6 #2
No small wonder, Lucien thought, when she bent over him, once again baring her décolletage.
He tried not to look at the bounty set before him.
No Christmas feast had ever tempted him more.
Dressed in deep rose, the color only enhanced the flush of her skin, and he couldn’t help but think she’d never looked so ravishing.
Her hair had been lifted artfully and fell in gentle ringlets about her face, framing it perfectly.
Her lush lips appeared the same color as that of her too provocative gown and he wondered what they would look like after being thoroughly kissed.
The monster beneath the covers stirred feverishly.
Damn.
She took in his disheveled appearance, the flush of his skin, and shook her head with obvious concern.
“In fact, you look quite dreadful!” she announced.
“You should be thankful the children were playing outside your door and heard you,” she added.
“Were it not for them, I would never have known to come.”
He cocked a brow. “Really?”
“Truly,” she said, lifting her chin. “You should thank them profusely.”
“At the first opportunity,” he agreed.
Thank them, indeed.
At the instant, he was torn between spanking their rotten hides and giving them the finest, grandest gifts they had ever beheld in all their lives—whatever that may be.
Were it not for the children, he would have been long gone by now, and he wouldn’t have the slightest clue how his fiancé had blossomed.
In fact, she was exquisite, and any doubt that he might not be attracted to her was gone. If the beast between his legs had any say in the matter, he would be begging her forgiveness and rushing her away to the altar.
But he wasn’t simply the sum of his parts, he told himself. He was a rationale man with good reason to wish to protect her… except that his resolve had gone missing along with his clothes.
Lucien simply stared at her, knowing she couldn’t possibly discern the imminent danger her virtue was in at the moment.
“I think you should go,” he said without much conviction.
Her brows knit. “Tell me where it hurts?”
Lucien was quite certain she didn’t wish to know.
Neither of his pains were quite suitable for tender ears to hear.
He was on the verge of telling her that he was perfectly fine, that he could only be better if they would simply give him back his infernal clothes and his blasted carriage wheels, and then she knelt beside the bed and took his breath away.
The scent of lavender drifted over the sheets, heady and sweet.
She blinked and her deep brown eyes peered at him with such distress that it made him feel strangely warm.
He held his breath so long that his lungs began to ache and his eyes locked upon her luscious cleavage, now taunting him at eye level. “I… well,” he stammered. It was all Lucien could do not to roll toward her and bury his lips into the delectable mounds.
Dear God, but he wanted to draw her into his bed and suckle each nipple, first through the cloth of her dress.
.. and then when she didn’t protest, he would bare them fully to his hungry eyes and feast upon them.
He wanted to make her moan with ecstasy, wanted to show her the pleasures of womanhood.
He wanted to cherish her with his hands and his body.
He glanced up, into her face, with a sudden, dangerous revelation...
He wanted to be the one.
Never had he been so affected by a woman in all his days—and it helped not at all that he was butt-naked beneath the sheets.
If she only knew—if only her brother knew.
Christ, he couldn’t believe they had actually sent the girl into his bedchamber unattended. It was likely they thought him dressed to the teeth in night rail and cap like any other respectful chap might be. But they had completely misjudged him.
Certainly, he would never have given her leave to enter the room of a wicked man, and he couldn’t believe how lax her brother seemed to be—with his own children, for that matter—never mind that Emma was obviously no longer a child herself.
He frowned, not liking it one bit that she seemed so at ease in his presence, considering that most women would have died of fright at the mere sight of a man clad merely in his nightclothes.
“What, for the love of God, is wrong?” she asked, her face white as she waited for him to speak.
“I-I fell,” he yielded, his voice faltering, betraying him.
“You fell?” she repeated a little dubiously. But he couldn’t precisely tell if that was what he heard in her voice, for he’d yet to be able to rent his gaze from her bodice in order to gauge her expression.
He swallowed convulsively.
“Your Grace,” she whispered impatiently. “Are you quite all right?” Once again she placed her hand to his cheek, and the monster under the covers quivered at her gentle caress.
“Oh, God,” he said.
“Oh, my!” she exclaimed. “You are blistering hot!”
She placed her hand to his chin and lifted his face until his eyes met hers, the gesture such a tender one that Lucien could scarcely bear it.
And then she slipped her fingers lower, curling them about his neck, as though to measure the heat of his body there.
“What can I do to ease your pain?” she asked fretfully.
Lucien felt dizzy.
The pain in his arse was completely forgotten at the moment, overshadowed by the one in his groin. If she lifted her skirts and straddled him, easing his unyielding erection into the silky warmth of her body, he would die with joy.
Caught in the moment, Lucien couldn’t quite help himself.
If it meant she would stay for awhile longer, then he would pretend to be at death’s door, if need be.
Anything, anything, to keep her from moving those long, graceful fingers away from his burning flesh.
He wanted them desperately wrapped about his shaft, her thumb caressing the head, where the droplet of moisture would bead.
In his head, he saw her bring her damp thumb to her lips, painting them with the moisture, her smile glistening and full of promise.
He smiled ruefully when she started to withdraw, and brought his arm from under the covers to seize her arm and halt its retreat. It felt so right to have her touch him so. More right than anything had ever felt in all his life.
“My neck,” he said gruffly, lying easily as he met her gaze. “It feels… stiff.” He lifted her other hand and placed it, too, upon his feverish face. “And my head,” he said huskily, his eyes heavy-lidded with desire, “it aches terribly.”
“It does?” Emma asked, eyeing him dubiously. She was suddenly staring at his bare arm that had only just come from beneath the covers with something akin to horror.
“Oh, God—very much so!”
Her brow furrowed. “I-it must be the fever,” she assured him. But her gaze never left his arm. And she stared, as though transfixed at that naked appendage while yet another appendage grew more insistent yet.
“Definitely—definitely the fever.”
He was burning and beginning to babble, stroking her hand against his cheek, relishing the feel of her soft flesh against his whiskers.
At the same moment, though he doubted she knew it, her fingers began moving within the disorderly curls at his nape, gliding over his hot skin and through his mane, caressing ever so softly, and the feel of her fingers quickened his body.
Lucien’s skin twitched like a cat arching in pleasure.
Suddenly, her eyes widened. “Your Grace,” she ventured.
“Emma,” he whispered. His heart hammered fiercely.
“I can’t feel your shirt collar!”
She closed her eyes but didn’t remove her hand from his nape, and Lucien thought he would go mad if he couldn’t make love to her right here and now.
“Yes, Emma,” he whispered, and his breathing quickened with the knowledge that she was equally as affected by him as he was by her.
Proof was in the way she bent forward slightly, drawn to him even without her awareness.
He guided her closer and lifted his face to meet hers, his lips touching hers gently, fully intending to seize the moment.
Bloody hell, the initial contact was like nothing Lucien anticipated. Lightning heat sizzled through him. His body quickened when she didn’t resist, and he sent his tongue on a gentle foray of her lips, lapping, savoring them fully, restraining himself so as not to frighten her.
Devil take him, but if her brother was stupid enough to allow her into his clutches... he was only a man, after all. He had never claimed to be a gentleman... and God only knew, no one had ever accused him of being one.
“Your Grace,” she protested weakly.
“Emma,” he whispered, and she trembled at the sound of her name, but didn’t withdraw.
With a groan of pleasure and another of victory, Lucien pressed his tongue between her lips, relishing the soft, sweet warmth of her mouth. Cinnamon, he thought vaguely. Her mouth tasted of cinnamon. He savored the sensation as she accepted his tongue and met it tentatively with her own.
“Emma, Emma, Emma…” He whispered her name and groaned, thinking that he’d surely been rewarded, when she allowed him draw her into his hungry embrace.
He couldn’t believe Andrew Peters could be so insanely stupid as to cast his sister into the wolf’s den.
God’s blood, but he thought he’d died and gone to Heaven.
Although Heaven, he knew, would never be his in the end, and there would be a price to pay for even this.
And yet, for this incredible moment, he would gladly pay. ..
Only later...
Much, much later.