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One day soon.
Not today.
Right now, she did not care much. She was more worried about her knees supporting her.
With an impatient imprecation, he neared her and covered that body part with his hand. His warm, callused, stroking hand.
Talk about taunting a domineering male.
His bristled mouth glued to her neck. What did she do, for pity’s sake? She would be lost in four, three, two…
“You let me taste one,” he rumbled on her skin. “Now I want to taste the other.”
Gracious me! If the man did not excel in ways to persuade a woman.
A small grin breathed out of her in the hopes of building a smoke-screen to her near-demolished condition. “Since we already established that the tempter is the tempted, I do not think we need that.” Later, she would wonder how her voice came firm if her insides were dissipating—about to give in, and the rest be damned.
“This is a game without winners or losers, Otilia,” he murmured in her ear as he drew her dress back in place. “The loser wins, the winner loses.”
They had just proved his presupposition, had they not? She denied she would allow a man to bring her to surrender. Yet she quite nearly crumpled with his caresses. From what she could tell he was not immune to her. Which meant frustrated desire should mean defeat. Or did it? Because she did not regard herself as a winner at all here. Managing to resist the blasted Earl did not rise that triumph she would have expected. If anything, there was loss and hindered completion.
More’s the pity, he had said. It became increasingly difficult not to agree with him.
She owned no more forces for a reply, merely stood there, watching him vanish through the door.
A
Edmund stormed into his bedchamber close to bursting. He had been stupid enough to touch the siren, his siren. And whenever their skins came into contact, conflagration took place. Her responsiveness to him fuelled him, and together they incinerated any social stricture, any inhibition, any resistance. Any sensible thought.
Of all the women throwing themselves at him, for the title, for the money or simply for an enjoyable tryst, he had to come undone with this one. He must see her settled and not jeopardise her chances.
But on that landing? Any decency he had before now vanished. His flesh craved her, craved release in her. And when she melted into him as she did, nothing even mattered.
Devil take him! He did not remember having ever touched skin so silken, a mouth so thirsty for his, or
a breast so ready for his attention. He was still hard, and the memory got him to shaming point.
He was damned if he would go to sleep in this state, and risk having another wet dream like a randy lad.
On his bed, he unbuttoned his pantaloons and brought out his already weeping member. He pictured her mouth and all the things he wanted to teach it to do with him. He lost control. His arousal was so on the edge that three strokes of his fist were enough for him to spill his seed in the air with a ragged groan.
Spent to the bones, he fell on the sheets and slept at once.
A
Sleep had been a luxury unavailable to Otilia. She tossed and turned, the images of the previous evening twirling in her head forward, backward with every possible detail, and with all the jumbled emotions they evoked.
At daybreak, she gave up the struggle. Dressed for the morning, she trod to the kitchens to take Coal to the garden and play with the lovely little feline. Both were developing a friendship, and she got fonder of him by the hour.
After a thankfully solitary breakfast, she decided to go to the park. The blue sky promised sunny weather. The exercise might prove soothing. Leaving word with the butler, she stepped into the street.
She had been right. Parasol in one hand, her reticule dangling from her gloved arm, light-blue dress and walking boots, she ambled the tracks, her mood lightening. With some effort, she succeeded in not remembering anything related to the Earl.
A few people nodded politely at her, but for the most part they saw through her. She was of no consequence, just an orphaned miss who got lucky enough to be brought up by a countess. Never did she mind this indifference, much preferring to be left to her own devices. If only the arrogant lords did the same without hurting her with despicable propositions. London would not then be so unpleasant to her.
Aunt Agatha lamented the fact her sister never revealed the identity of her father. The countess suspected it had been a forbidden affair with a married man. The man himself did not come forward to claim his daughter. Myrtle, her mother, lived far from her sister and Agatha got no clue as to what happened or who the woman used to consort with. Having lived with Earnest and Agatha from the very beginning, Otilia thought little of her parentage. It gained importance only when she came to London and realised how the ton treated orphaned misses. By then, she had been a young woman capable of shielding herself from such scorn. Most of it, in any case.
Far ahead, a footman helped a lady to sit on a bench. Nearer, she saw it was the Dowager Marchioness of Mandeville, in a grey dress and parasol. The servant placed her cane by her side and bowed to stand a few feet away.
