Page 30 of When the Scoundrel Sins

He understood her hesitation—she didn’t know if she could trust him with this embrace when he’d so foolishly wounded her after the last one. “I would never do anything to hurt you,” he reassured her, despite the husky rasp of his voice, now thick with desire. “I only want to bring you pleasure.”

Which was the God’s honest truth. He’d never cared about pleasing another woman in his life the way he did with Annabelle. He found his own satisfaction in giving pleasure to her, and even now that sweet reward pulsed through him and left him insatiably wanting more. He wanted to bring her to bliss.

Not breaking eye contact with her, unable to tear his gaze away from her beautifully flushed face even if he’d wanted to, he lifted his right hand to his mouth and removed his glove with his teeth. He dropped it to the ground.

Her eyes widened nervously. “What are you doing?”

“I want to touch you, Annabelle,” he purred and felt her sharp intake of air. He hadn’t meant to sound so wolfish, yet he couldn’t keep the arousal from his voice. “I’ve wanted to touch you for six years. Will you let me?”

His heart pounded so fiercely as he breathlessly waited for her answer that he suspected she could feel it—

“Yes,” she whispered, the word shivering from her lips.

His body flashed hot at her soft permission. He leaned forward to place a tender kiss on her throat, making her eyes close again. A soft, shuddering sigh seeped from her. He placed his hand on her leg and slowly, so not to frighten her, slid it upward along her inner thigh.

She dug her fingers into his shoulders as his hand reached the juncture where her legs met. Her name fell from his lips in a low groan as he lightly stroked his thumb against her, down between her legs along the seam of her trousers. She trembled.

“All right?” he asked.

“Good,” she whispered, simultaneously nodding and holding her breath.

With a smile at her contradiction of alluring innocence, he stroked against her again, this time harder and tantalizingly slower than before. She gasped, only for the soft sound to turn into a low moan of pleasure.

“Oh, that’s—” She licked her lips as he continued to caress her through her trousers. “That’sverygood.”

Her mouth found his again, and she kissed him ardently as her fingers ran through his hair in silent encouragement. She widened her thighs in shameless invitation, one he very much wanted to accept—

A shout went up from the fields below.

With a startled gasp, Belle slipped off his lap and staggered away from him, brought back to her senses by the intruding world around them. Her hand flew up to her mouth as she stared at him, moon-eyed and stunned, as if she couldn’t believe what they’d done.

Instantly, he missed the warmth of her and the light weight of her small body pressing into his. He reached for her. “Belle—”

“No.”

The single word cut him to the quick. Dropping his hands to his sides, he tightened his jaw as he watched her fumble to fasten up her waistcoat.

“Damnation, Belle,” he growled, unable to tamp down his anger over her rejection, or hide the frustration evident in his stiff cock. “You don’t get to kiss me like that and run off the—”

Another shout went up. This time closer.

Her eyes locked with his for one pained heartbeat. In that moment’s connection he saw both her desire for him and her regret. “Good-bye, Quinton.”

As she turned away and ran down the hill, he saw that familiar fire blazing inside her, the one he loved so much to rouse. Always had, even when they were children. But they certainly weren’t children anymore.

With a pained jolt, he realized, finally, why he so enjoyed tormenting her.

It wasn’t because he enjoyed seeing the fire inside her, but because he enjoyed being the man who put it there. Theonlyman who could stir the anger and passion inside her until it flamed through her like the shimmering of shaken foil.

And he’d never get to experience it again.

***

Belle hurried down the path and across the field toward the irrigation ditch. With each step she prayed that her lips weren’t as obviously swollen and red as they felt beneath her fingertips and that no one who saw her would realize what she and Quinn had been doing. Yet thoughts of that wholly unexpected embrace swirled through her mind, confusing her and leaving her in a fogged daze.

Quinton had kissed her. Again. And oh, what a kiss, too. As delicious as she remembered.

No—better. Everything about this last kiss was right. More than right. She groaned—it was perfect. So perfect, in fact, that he had her wanting so much more than just a kiss and a fleeting touch. Which was not only delicious, but downright dangerous.