Page 19 of The Rogue and the Viscountess

He moved closer, cautiously, as if he were approaching Creon to take his bridle and did not want the horse to bolt.

“Do you like it?” he asked again.

She turned to look him full in the face. “I think you should kiss me.”

Pete’s throat closed as if a honeysuckle vine had wrapped around his neck. “Why?”

What a ridiculous question. Why shouldn’t he kiss her? Why wasn’t he kissing her already? But the request stunned him. Here he’d been mooning along, thinking of nothing but kissing her, and then to have her pose the same question in such a startling manner—

“It’s a foolish thought.” She whirled away.

He caught her hand, the thin silk gloves warm from her skin. Her hand was as soft and smooth as he imagined the rest of her would be. “’Tis a meet thought. A very excellent idea.”

Her eyelashes fluttered as she stared back at him. The color of her eyes was a tempest, all the colors of the countryside wrapped together, shifting in the light, as if there were many depths and facets to her character and he couldn’t hope to learn them all.

Her voice was the merest whisper, as if this confident, self-possessed woman had gone suddenly shy. “But you said—”

“Why me?” He tugged her hand, gently, and she swayed toward him, as supple as a rowan tree on a lofty height. That sharp, clean scent surrounded him. It was as though all the baggage of his hard past and less-than-lawful choices sheared away and he stood before her as a man stripped bare, nothing more than what he was, and nothing less.

“Because you keep trying to rescue me,” she said.

That was all the invitation he needed. He slid his fingers along the curve of her jaw, smooth as powder, and tipped up her chin. Her breath hitched as he lowered his head, and that small response untied the knot holding the last of his senses together. Every sound disappeared but the rush of blood in his ears as their lips met and he finally, finally kissed her.

She was every degree of softness. Her lips were warm and supple, her breath sweet. She tasted of ginger candy. Pete released her hands to fasten his palms on either side of her jaw, and his fingertips slid into hair as fine and smooth as silk. She was heaven. She was rapture. She was every beautiful thing that he’d never been allowed to touch in his life—never been allowed to look at, given what he was—and yet she was yielding. She opened her mouth to his kiss, fitting her lips to his, and when he slid his tongue into her mouth she met him with a small moan, as if she’d forgotten how wonderful a kiss could be.

He’d forgotten, too. Or rather, he’d never known. He’d never been enveloped in a kiss like this.

She slid her hands to the back of his neck, fingers tangling in his hair, and he shivered at the slide of silk against his skin, the warm pressure of her fingertips. Need ignited like a firework. She held his head and returned his kiss with ardor. The top of his head burned. Every part of her body was pressed against him, breasts, belly, thighs, and his brain was melting from the heat, from the sensations pummeling him.

She pulled back to stare in his eyes. Her skin flushed the pink of the sunrise over the Severn Sea, and her mouth trembled.

“I knew it,” she whispered, her breath fanning his cheek. “I knew it.”

Knew what? That the touch of her mouth would flatten him? That holding her in his arms would stagger him with delight? That she could crook her finger and he would do anything for her?

He didn’t pause to question, because it was imperative that his mouth be upon her again, only this time, her mouth wasn’t enough. He dragged his lips along her jaw and nipped at the lobe of her ear. Her entire body quivered, and his own murmur of satisfaction, at making her shiver in his arms, rumbled his chest. He sank onto the bench and pulled her fully into his arms, nestling her round bottom on his thighs. She fit him perfectly. He’d known she would. Prunella Price had been made for him to hold her, kiss her, love her.

“You’re a beautiful woman, Nell.” The words scraped from him, as if he’d forgotten how to use language. He couldn’t even say her full name. What right did the likes of him have in using her proper name?

“Oh.” The sound escaped her in a little puff of surprise. She slid her palm along his neck, fingers tracing the hollow of his throat beneath his neckcloth. Her touching him beneath his clothing was unbearably erotic. She pressed her hand along his coat, tracing the muscles of his chest. Air and need and heat filled and swelled him until he thought he might burst.

She nestled further into his lap, and the slide of her bottom made him gasp with the flare of arousal, a bolt slamming down his spine. “You’re so strong,” she murmured, sounding pleased. He was the strongest, most brilliant, most unstoppable man in the world, if he pleased her.

He couldn’t hold back any longer. Cradling her close with one hand around her back, he dragged his other hand from her shoulder to the billowy swell of her bosom, and her intake of air sent that bolt slamming through him again. He pleased her with his touch as much as it pleased him to touch her. And ye Gods, just the feel of her through her clothing, the surge of heavy flesh pushing into his hand on her indrawn breath, pillowy softness and a firm shape all at the same time.

There was nothing on earth quite like a woman’s breasts. There was nothing on earth like Nell’s breasts. He wanted to pluck apart the frogs fastening her pelisse and burrow through the layers of gown and shift and stays until he could close his lips around a nipple. He wagered she would taste like apricots, and the very thought of having her breasts in his mouth made him so hard he ached.

Because he couldn’t bite her breasts at this moment, with all this gear in the way, he settled for reclaiming her mouth, nipping at her lips, capturing her tongue. She moaned and met him, nipping back, swirling her tongue around his. St. Aidan’s eyeballs, she was delicious. She pushed her breasts into his hand, rubbing against his palms like a cat, demanding more strokes, firmer pressure. He closed his fingers and squeezed, and she moaned into his mouth.

He devoured the sound. If she shifted on his lap one more time, he couldn’t be held accountable for what happened next. A man could only strain at the breaking point for so long. Their leisurely kiss of discovery and exploration had taken a turn toward urgency, and the roaring heat bound them both. That staggered him more than anything else: that she matched him, kiss for kiss, pleasure for pleasure, and he couldn’t even imagine the overpowering bliss of a culmination—

She broke the kiss, pulling back to catch her breath, just as if she, too, were at a breaking point and wanted to catch and linger in this moment. To savor this passion that shook them both like a mighty wind. She clamped her hand over his hand at her breast, her palm so much smaller, but her grip firm.

He measured the rise and fall of her breath, his own falling into her rhythm. Her eyes threw out glints of gold and green in a soft brown background that seemed bottomless. This woman had a calm, true soul, and for the moment, she lay quiet in his arms, deepening their connection. He felt humbled by her beauty, by her trust, by the generous gift of herself. She didn’t make him feel as if he’d sullied her with his rough touch. She made him feel as if he were a god.

He made an attempt at clearing his throat. “I—”

“Peter Wilkins.” His grandmother’s voice was a lash of fury, the cut of cold steel. “When I told you to find yourself a wife, I did not mean this.”