Page 40

He’d said he would be hers to do with as she wished tonight. And every night, if he was honest. Nate had to forcibly control his breathing. “I do.”

By the time they made it home, both were almost running. All thought of what they had learned vanished from Nate’s mind. All he could see was Angelique stripping off her dark, fitted jacket, and the way she watched him with a fierce fascination that must be mirrored in his own face. Desire made him hasty and clumsy. At least one button burst off his coat as he struggled out of it. He barely got it off, let alone back on the peg behind the door, before she grabbed the front of his shirt and pulled, sealing her mouth to his in a blazing kiss.

It wasn’t the ether. He was as wild and drunk with anticipation as a sailor stepping on shore for the first time in months. She was a living bonfire in his arms, tempting him toward immolation, and God help him, he was already ablaze. He wrapped both arms around her and lifted, striding toward the stairs.

“No,” she breathed, wriggling free.

Nate set her down without releasing her. “Upstairs now, or here on the stairs.”

“You said it would be my night to command,” she whispered, twining her fingers through his hair as he kissed her bare throat. She tipped her head back and moaned, and the vibration under her skin, against his lips, made Nate shudder. He wasn’t going to survive this woman. She would drive him mad, one way or another.

“Then command quickly,” he growled. He had undone the buttons of her bodice and now pulled it open with a sharp yank. Without taking his eyes from hers, he slid his hands beneath the fabric and cupped her breasts.

For a moment she let him. She braced one hand on the wall beside her and gripped the banister with the other, spread like a sacrifice to his ravenous gaze. Nate all but choked. He gave up; he surrendered. He was wholly, completely, utterly conquered, hers to command in any way she wanted. He wrapped his hands around her waist and kissed the exposed line of her throat down to the swell of her breast. Urgency and hunger roared inside him, and he started to bear her down onto the stairs. Making love on the stairs was hardly what he had planned, but who cared for plans at a time like this?

With a visible effort she gathered herself. She put her palms against his chest and pushed until he had to step back or fall. Her hair was coming down from the tight knot she had secured at the nape of her neck, and her eyes glittered in the dimly lit hall. Her chest heaved, the edge of her corset rising and falling behind the loosened bodice. Her skin glowed like a pearl against the black of her clothing.

“My command,” she said, her voice husky but controlled. Standing a step above him, she was just his height. She laid her fingers along his jaw, leaning close enough that he could see how dark and dilated her eyes were. “Tonight you are mine.”

More than tonight, he thought.

“Come,” she whispered in that bewitching velvety voice that made his stomach fold on itself with lust. She crooked her finger at him and led the way upstairs.

In the bedroom she closed the door, then turned to study him. Nate’s very skin seemed to stretch and prickle under her gaze, and the throbbing in his groin grew almost violent. “What would you have me do?” he asked, because he didn’t think he could stand there much longer doing nothing.

“I find it so interesting where a man keeps his weapons,” she murmured instead. Running one hand along his shoulder, she circled him. As they had been last night, two lamps were left burning in her room but turned down low, and a fire crackled in the hearth. With a soft hiss, she pulled the knife from the sheath strapped at the back of his waist. “A sharp blade,” she said.

He looked over his shoulder to see the gleam of his hunting knife in her hand as she turned it from side to side. “A knife is no good without a sharp blade.”

She smiled darkly. “No.” She laid the knife on the dressing table behind her. “What else? Apparently you have weapons I know nothing of.”

She meant the ether, which had been in his coat pocket. He didn’t have any more weapons on his person now. Nate gave her a slow, predatory smile. “Find them yourself.”

Chapter Twenty

Angelique knew she was playing with fire.

Nate stood motionless as she circled him, pulling away the dark kerchief around his neck with a sensual swish of silk. His face was hard and set, and his eyes never strayed from her. He wanted her to hurry, to tear off his clothes as he had almost done to hers on the stairs. That was his way, flinging them both headfirst into the inferno of desire. Hers… was more leisurely. More controlled.

Her control.

With deliberate lack of haste she unfastened his shirt. It was a simple one, as black as her own clothing. She could see his pulse throbbing in his throat as she pulled it from his trousers, sliding her hands beneath it and up his chest. He inhaled sharply and flinched under her touch as she had to press against him to scoop the fabric over his head. He started to lower his head as if he would kiss her, and she put a finger to his lips.

“No,” she whispered. “Tonight I command.”

He blinked rapidly, his jaw tightly clenched, but finally gave a short nod. She smiled at him as she put her hands to the buttons of his trousers. “That is what you promised, yes?” Again he nodded. His hands were in fists at his sides but still he didn’t move. “Anything I want. ‘Do with me what you will,’” she said softly, repeating his words of the previous night as she slipped the buttons loose.

A shudder rippled through him. He gave another nod, watching her with burning eyes.

“Last night you removed my clothing.” She pushed down the undone trousers. “Take them off,” she ordered, watching as he pried off his boots and shed the trousers in haste, ripping off his stockings and flinging everything aside.

“Not yet,” she scolded, evading his hands as he reached for her. Her own simple bodice gaped open, undone by his frantic hands earlier. She stepped back and looked her fill at him standing naked in front of her, aroused and barely keeping himself in check.

She liked this. She liked having him await her pleasure. She liked having him, and by now her own body was hot and pulsing in anticipation. “Sit down,” she said, indicating the plain wooden chair..

Slowly he lowered himself onto it. The muscles of his shoulder tensed into hard lines as he laid his palms flat on his thighs, but still he waited for her instruction. She whisked the thin black garrote from around her waist. “You held me down last night,” she murmured. “Give me your hand.” His jaw tightened as if he knew what she would do, but he put out his hand.

She knotted the cord around one wrist, then took both his arms behind the straight-backed chair and bound his wrists together, looping the rope through the slats of the chair. His chest filled with air, his inhalation harsh and loud in the dark, quiet room. By the time she came around in front of him again, his head had fallen forward. His hair hung loose around his face, shadowing but not hiding the fierce hunger in his expression.