He arched a brow at the modesty. “A bit late for that, isn’t it?”
She pursed her lips. “You don’t want it, so you don’t get to see it. Turn around.” She swallowed hard. “Please.”
He did what she asked, mostly because he recognized that it wasn’t her body she didn’t want him to see—it was her vulnerability. In her mind, he had rejected her. It was better that way, no matter how wrong she was.
Because all he was capable of doing was compromising her. And tonight was a glorious, blazing, erotic mistake he had to ensure was never repeated. The first step to that was to stop thinking of all the ways to put her on her back.
If that was possible.
Juliana leaned forward, trying to stay as far away from the warm hands that were buttoning her gown. It was to no avail. Ellis brushed her skin with his fingertips every time he fastened her and her entire treacherous body lit on fire when he did it.
She stepped away from him when she was covered, wishing her hands weren’t shaking quite so obviously, and pivoted. He was staring at her with a tight smile. It wasn’t real, that was obvious. Nothing about the way he was looking at her was real now. This was all the act, all the show that was Handsome Ellis Maitland, seducer of women and expert player of the game.
She hated to think she’d been just another piece on his chessboard tonight. But then, perhaps she hadn’t been. After all, he had pleasured her, given her what she wanted…almost. And hadn’t taken anything in return.
“And what thought is creeping through that pretty head of yours?” he asked as she picked up pins from the floor around them and carelessly fixed her hair.
She shrugged. “I’m only trying to determine what part of you is the real man and what part of you is the act.”
He stilled and the expression in his eyes darkened. He bent his head. “If I ever figure that out, I’ll be certain you are the first to know. Now come. This room will be required by others and it’s late.”
He held out a hand as he spoke, and she stared at it. Those lean, strong fingers had moved over her body so intimately. They had traced every curve of her, coaxed pleasure from her unlike anything she’d ever experienced.
She blushed as she took the offered hand and let him lead her from the chamber where she had been forever changed, even if it wasn’t in the way she had wished to be. He said nothing as he guided her down the dim hallway toward the larger, brighter main hall. Already the laughter from the bigger room echoed toward them. Mixed with moans.
She understood the moans a great deal more now, and her body twitched with reaction.
Damn him for half-waking this thing inside of her. It was almost worse than knowing those desires were there sleeping but being unaware of how to fully unlock them. Perhaps if she said the right thing…perhaps then he would understand and do the rest.
She stopped as they reached the end of the hall and tugged on his hand. “Ellis.”
He stopped. His back was still toward her and she watched him drag in a long breath before he faced her. The brighter light behind him outlined his broad-shouldered body but partly obscured his handsome face. A perfect metaphor for the man of shadow and light that he was.
“Yes?” he whispered, and she heard the strain in his voice.
She recognized that he still longed for the same thing she did. That he was holding back, perhaps out of some twisted sense of honor that a thief might not typically exhibit. And that meant there was a chance for her, forthem.
She swallowed, uncertain how to proceed. She hadn’t exactly seduced a man before. Certainly not one with so much experience in the world and in the bedroom as Ellis Maitland.
She searched for the words, but before she could find them, she caught a glimpse of a man in the crowd just past Ellis’s shoulder. Her lips parted at the profile of him. A profile she’d seen before, studied even though she hadn’t wanted to do so.
Winston Leonard. The man who had kidnapped her thinking she was her sister just a few weeks prior. He had terrorized her, then slashed her face in the struggle that ensued. He was the one who had shot Ellis in the shoulder.
But that couldn’t be right. The bastard had been hiding since the attack. She was seeing things, that was all. Brought on by the intensity of her feelings tonight. By the fear that still haunted her dreams.
As if he sensed someone’s eyes on him, the man turned his head. He scanned the room, then glanced toward her. God, did he see her? No, it didn’t seem so. They were in the darkness of the hall, which protected them from his seeking gaze. But she knew then that she wasn’t dreaming. She wasn’t wrong.
“Ellis,” she hissed, clinging to his hand tighter.
His expression softened, filling with concern. “What is it?”
She struggled for breath. “It’s…it’s…it’s him! It’s Winston Leonard.”
Chapter 9
Ellis pivoted and dragged Juliana behind him as he looked through the crowd for his quarry. The one he had been distracted from finding thanks to the woman shaking behind him, clinging to his hand so hard that her nails pressed into the skin.
He was almost ready to dismiss her words as imaginings brought on by the strain of the past few weeks when his own gaze found Winston Leonard in the crowd. Everything slowed to half-time when he did and the boisterous sounds of the room around them faded.
