Her nose wrinkled, the most adorable expression of befuddlement crossing her features. “You have?”
He nodded. “Of course. It is not common knowledge, you know. But I thought perhaps to give it an attempt.”
“Oh.” She blinked, then the pink tip of her tongue flicked slowly over her ripe bottom lip. “Yes, that would be agreeable. How solicitous of you to offer your aid, my lord.”
Anchoring her to him with one hand at her waist, he drew the other to her face. His thumb passed over her lip. Just once. He was not supposed to be enjoying this. He was supposed to be teaching her a lesson.
Instead, he was teaching himself one.
In desire.
Because now that he had Eugie Winter in his grasp, her head tipped back, her lips his for the taking, need slammed into him, full force. It took his breath. It took his will. And he could do nothing but stand there, astounded.
She was everything he should not want. Being here with her, alone, touching her, about to kiss her once more, was wrong. If they were caught, he would have to wed her. He had lived his life without the tiniest blot of scandal to his name. He was the Prince of Proper. He had never sought an unmarried lady in such a bold manner. He had never wanted to.
What was it about this dark-haired, dark-eyed merchant’s daughter that made him so bloody weak?
“Are you going to do it?” she whispered, her gaze dipping to his mouth.
“Yes,” he said thickly, barely managing the word past another raging wave of pure, unadulterated lust. “I was giving you the chance to acquaint yourself to the notion.”
He had never wanted another woman in the way he wanted her. It was visceral and real, pumping through his veins, warming his blood, hardening his cock even more. It was elemental, the sort of raw desire he had only ever allowed himself to entertain toward ladies of the demimonde. But it was more than that. So much more.
“Lord Hertford,” she said, sounding breathless.
He lowered his head a fraction, unable to resist inhaling her addictive scent once more. “Yes?”
“I am acquainted,” she said. “You may kiss me now.”
Damnation.He was meant to be the one wooing her, and yet she was doing all the wooing. For the first time in his life, he wished he had been a devoted rakehell. But then he forgot to think. Because Miss Eugie Winter rose to her tiptoes and pressed her mouth to his once more.
It was the only spur he required.
The spell she cast over him broke, along with the reins of his control. His fingers plunged into the upsweep of her hair, the place where all her curls were tidily kept trapped. He wanted them free and wild.
His mouth crushed hers. On a groan of pure desire, he swept his tongue over the seam of her lips, and when she opened, he surged inside. She tasted of the sweet desserts of luncheon. Berry custard and cream and something else he could not define.
Something that was specifically, deliciously, Eugie Winter.
Full stop.
Hair pins were raining to the floor in a hail of dull little thumps. He hated the gloves he wore, for the way they inhibited him from feeling the texture of her hair. Spun silk, he was sure. The hand on her waist traveled to her back, coasting up her spine, pressing her closer to him as he ravished her mouth.
Her tongue toyed with his, unabashed. It was the most carnal kiss he had ever shared. Not even his mistresses had kissed him with such wild abandon. No, indeed, theirs had been precise, measured. They had known how to control the pace with the pressure of their lips, the soft, subtle response of their desires.
But not the woman in his arms.
She kissed him as if she wanted to consume him.
And,Lord God, he wanted her to do just that. He could not think of another thought but her. She was all he wanted, all he tasted, all he felt, all he desired. His plan dissipated. Nothing else mattered but the need to claim her, to make her his.
Kissing her still, he moved them as one. Across the floor. He had spied a settee upon their initial entrance, and he instinctively aimed for it now, backing her up, leading the way one step at a time as he plundered her lips. How sweet her response was. How intoxicating her curves, pressed against him.
He thought it was possible she was the most desirable woman he had ever met. Not because of her beauty, but because of the fiery passion within her. The way her body seemed to be made for his. He had never before felt such a connection with a woman as he did with her. He felt it to the marrow of his bones, to the heart of him. There was only one word for it…right.
Perfectly right, even when it was all wrong.
Even when everything about it was wicked. Improper. Even when he was going further than he had intended. He broke their kiss when they reached the settee, gratified to find her cheeks flushed, her brown eyes dark and glazed, her full lips delectably swollen from his kisses.
