One last crescendo of sound from Reginald and Annie, then gasps and a single shivery laugh. “Have to go,” murmured Annie. “The ices.”
“Jesus, Annie—”
She laughed again. “Pennywhistle will kill me if I miss the ices!”
“I might already be dead. My heart’s beating out of my chest—”
The voices trailed off.
Winnie didn’t move. Neither did Spencer—his hand had gone still, motionless and hot in its place high on her thigh.
They were alone.
They were alone, and she wanted him to flip her over and have her right there on the floor. She wanted his fingers on her skin.
She didn’t want this to end, not now. Not yet.
She spoke first, a bare whisper in the dark room. “I don’t… wish to stop.”
Spencer groaned, low and deep, into her ear. “Winnie. I want—I want—”
“So do I.”
He pressed his fingers hard into her thigh and then seemed to come to a decision. He stood, dragging her to her feet.
She felt a moment of crushing disappointment—this was it thenanddon’t you dare cry—before he locked his hand beneath her elbow and towed her in the direction of the closed door.
“Let’s go.” His deep voice was a rasp.
“I—what?”
“I want to take you home. I want anything—everything—anything I can get. Jesus, Winnie, I just want my mouth on you again.”
“But… the dinner…” They had stopped before the door.
“Fuck the dinner.”
A horrified laugh escaped her lips, and then he was kissing her again, leaning back against the heavy oak door and pulling her into him. “Want you,” he murmured against her mouth. “Just you.”
It was impossible not to kiss him back. Sweetness was rising in her, a tenderness that felt far more terrifying than the desire he’d kindled. But still she let him kiss her, and she kissed him back. Slowly.
“We have to go back,” she said finally, and the sweetness was in her voice, honey and a laugh. “They’ll think it peculiar if we vanish without a word. And on the same night the necklace reappears—”
“Oh hell.” He dropped his forehead to hers. “I forgot. You’re right.”
“Shall I”—her fingers were on his shoulders, the gravitational pull—“go back first?”
“You’d better. I’m going to need a minute. Or ten.”
Her gaze dropped to his falls, where his erection pressed against the buttons of his trousers.
“Yes,” he said, “precisely.”
His hand roamed up her back, then down, a long glide that felt like a wick catching fire, her whole body lighting beneath his touch. She licked her lips.
His gaze flickered to her mouth, then to the still-open seam of her bodice. “This is going to be the longest dinner of my life.”
“Fortunately, I think we’ve missed at least three courses.”
