“I would draw your skirts up your legs, like so.” He reached down and began to do that very thing, raising her skirts past her knees until she lay exposed up to her thighs, where her silk stockings met her drawers.
“I thought you were going to undress me so I wouldn’t have skirts on,” she pointed out, watching the dark passion on his handsome face, as he stared at her legs.
Ignoring her logic, he said, “I would proceed to touch you where I know you’re hot and ready for me.” His fingers brushed up through the opening in her drawers, grazing her curls and then—dear God—the soft petals of her flesh.
As his fingers touched her core, caressing her aroused bud, Adelia arched against his hand. Eyes closed, trembling, she let him stroke her, hardly able to breathe. It was so…. Abruptly recalling where she was—and who she was—she opened her eyes and scooted away from him to the end of the sofa, yanking down her skirts.
Breathing hard, her body feeling as if it could explode with the tension coiled low between her hips, she shook her head.
Watching him, he lifted his hand to his face and touched his fingers to his nose and lips.
Her eyes widened. Owen was sniffing her scent as if she were fine perfume. Apparently, there was an entire world of intimacy she knew nothing about, but which she longed to discover with this man.
“I guess it is best I am not at your house, my lord.”
“I, for one, think it’s a damnable pity,” he shot back.
“It would undoubtedly end with me giving you my virtue. And then, where would we be?”
He lifted his gaze to hers.
“Where indeed?” Cocking his head, he stretched his arm out so he could trail his finger down her bare arm, leaving gooseflesh behind. “Would you regret it?”
“I don’t…I don’t think so.” She could hardly imagine, as an unwed lady, having a man between her legs, experiencing the ecstasy that belonged to the lawful marriage bed. It went against her upbringing for certain. But merely thinking of herself utterly unclothed with him, her insides seemed to liquify.
“I can guarantee you would not,” he promised. “You would give me your virtue and give it again and again before morning. Each time willingly.”
Trying to diffuse the heavy sensuality of the moment, she pointed out, “I believe I can only give my innocence once.”
His face split into a wicked grin. “Truly, but there are ways to make each encounter feel new. In any case, each time we made love, you would experience this great release that is exciting and relaxing at the same time. It is as if your soul is being nourished.”
Was he saying that only to get her to give him her virginity?It sounded too delightful to be real. But he had never lied to her. And in the brief time, he had touched her, it had been heavenly. If they had been secluded in his townhouse, she would willingly have given him her body that very instant.
Hadn’t others felt the same way about the charming Lord Burnley?She had witnessed ladies at balls who either angrily shunned him or followed him around, hoping for his attention after having been linked with him. Without doubt, he had wooed and courted many young women, some of whom he must have taken to his bed.Once he had deflowered her, then what?
“And afterward?” she asked.
His face darkened, and he stood abruptly. “I have honor, despite many thinking I am all but a rake.”
“I never said that.” Although she could not state honestly that she’d never thought it. Or heard it among theton.
Scrambling to her feet and smoothing her skirts as she did, her cheeks warmed at the recollection of how his hand had been upon her most private parts.
“Why did you come here?”
Again, with his telltale mannerism of tension, Owen ran his hand savagely through his hair, which had been perfect when he’d arrived. With her own fingers ransacking it and now his own, the viscount’s valet would need to restore him to perfection prior to him going out for the evening.
“I needed to see you,” he confessed. “Presently, you are the only light in my life.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
Adelia took astep back, having never expected such a vulnerable confession.
In truth, Owen held precisely the same position for her. In her otherwise lonely world, he filled it with companionship—and kisses!
Nevertheless, she thought it inappropriate to tell him such. At the moment, he was as a plank to a drowning woman, but she would be forced to cut off all ties to him if her brother were convicted.
“I value our…,” she wanted to sayfriendship, but it had become so much more than that. Even so, she could see no future if Thomas were taken from her—making it more imperative she get her brother released. A charge of murder, as she’d since learned, usually ended in hanging, an outcome she refused to contemplate.
