Breathless and full to brimming with those champagne bubbles, she found herself swaying into that light touch of his finger leaving alive, little sparks in its wake.
Which consequence were they on now? Number four?…Five?
“Or with a curl positioned just so at the collarbone.” Her finger continued its progress. “The décolletage would be the focal point.”
In the way her finger progressed on the page, his progressed on her body, tracing along her collarbone to indent at the base of her throat—hesitating there.
This wasn’t mere breathlessness.
This was what it was to be in thrall to a man.
And it would be this man.
“Or,” she said, no longer able to recognize her own voice, such a raw-edged scrape it had become against her throat, “the lightest touch of rouge on the bottom lip.”
Until this very moment, she’d never fully comprehended the power of words.
That they could make the entire world stop spinning and go completely still.
From the corner of her eye, she detected it—movement—and his fingers were beneath her chin, light, but insistent, guiding her to face him, her head tipping back, her eyes meeting his.
She’d only met Lord Rhys Osborne, reformed rake.
But here, holding her gaze with intensity and intent, was that other Lord Rhys—the unreformed rake.
“A touch of rouge here?” asked this unreformed rake.
To illustrate his question, he pressed his thumb to her bottom lip, the calloused pad rough as it skated deliberately across that sensitive skin.
Her gaze locked onto his, she nodded.
Another of those world-gone-still moments passed, the intent within his silver-gray eyes unwavering, as he angled down and replaced his thumb with his mouth. He sucked her bottom lip into his mouth, his tongue gliding across, languid and expert. Oh, but weren’t his beautiful lips as soft and firm, capable and skilled, as she’d thought they would be?
A spell wove around and through her.
That was how she would explain it to herself later.
A spell.
His large hand slid to the back of her head, steadying her, as he pressed forward, deepening the kiss, his mouth firmer, more insistent, as he touched his tongue to hers. She inhaled a gasp. It wasn’t that she didn’t know what to do, but never had she taken such pleasure from it. She reached up, touching trembly fingertips to his cheek…his jaw…around to the hair that curled up at the nape of his neck, those hairs soft and ticklish, as she swayed forward, her tongue tangling with his.
He groaned into her mouth, that deep, masculine utteration resonating through her, becoming one with her in all its longing and ache.
Her body understood that soul-deep groan and echoed it.
It resonated not only through her, it resonated with her.
“Oh, Miss Birdwell,” he muttered against her lips. “You’re so sweet.”
Sweet.
In her life, she’d been referred to by a multitude of words—saucy…mouthy…bold…bawd… Worse words than those, too.
But not sweet.
Yet this man looked at her—saw her—in a way she’d never been looked at or seen.
To him, she was sweet.
