“I don’t know anything of the kind.” He was really smiling now, like a cat moving in for the kill. “Perhaps you’ll tell me why I should be annoyed with you?”
Admitting she had struck at his pride would be admitting she had done it deliberately. “I haven’t the faintest notion,” she insisted, eyes as innocently wide as she could make them.
“Haven’t you?” The golden brow arched, and she realized she’d missed that affectation of his these last few days. “Come here, George.”
Her eyes widened. “Oh, no,” she said, shaking her head emphatically.
“I’m merely going to prove that I’m not the least bit enraged with you.”
“I will accept your word on it, I assure you.”
“George—”
“No!”
“Then I’ll come to you.”
She leaped up and ludicrously held out her glass as if it might ward him off. “Captain, I must protest.”
“So must I,” he said on his way around the desk, while she started around the other side to keep it between them. “Don’t you trust me, George?”
This was no time to be diplomatic. “No.”
His chuckle kept her from elaborating. “Smart girl. They do tell me, after all, that I’m a most reprehensible rake, but I prefer Regan’s more discerning ‘connoisseur of women.’ It has a much nicer ring to it, don’t you think?”
“I think you’re drunk.”
“My brother would take exception to that word.”
“Blast your brother and you, too!” she snapped. “This is absurd, Captain.”
She stopped moving around the desk only when he did. She’d kept her glass in hand and somehow managed not to spill a drop. She set it down now and glared at him. He looked back with a grin.
“I quite agree, George. You’re not really going to make me chase you around this thing, are you? This is the sport of doddering old fools and parlormaids.”
“If the shoe fits,” she retorted automatically, then gasped, realizing her mistake.
All traces of humor left him. “I’ll make you eat the bloody shoe this time,” he growled low just before he leaped over the desk.
Georgina was too stunned to flee, but she wouldn’t have gotten far in the mere seconds it took James to land in front of her. The next thing she knew, those big, muscular arms were wrapping around her, gathering her in to press close, closer, until she could feel every inch of his hard frame along hers. She should have been stiff, outraged, at least flattened. Instead her body seemed to sigh into his, yielding where it shouldn’t, fitting so perfectly it felt like home.
Her mind, working under delayed reaction, began gathering wits to protest, but too late. She fell victim to a leisurely kiss so enticingly sweet and sensual, it wrapped her in a spell of wonder impossible to break. It went on and on, working on her in degrees, until she couldn’t say exactly when contentment turned to burgeoning desire.
He was nibbling gently at her lips when she knew for certain she didn’t want to be let go. Her hands twisting in his thick mane of hair told him. Her body pressing for closer contact told him. Finally she told him in the soft whisper of his name, which got her that heartwarming smile of his that could turn her to mush.
“Has prim little George actually retired for the night?” he inquired huskily.
“He’s fast asleep.”
“And here I thought I was losing my touch…in my old age.”
“Ouch.” She winced, to give him his due.
“Sorry, love,” he said, but he was grinning unrepentently just the same.
“That’s quite all right. I’m used to men who simply can’t resist a little gloating.”
“In that case, does it taste good?”
