Page 27 of The Best Marquess

Then she curled her arm under his and near-dragged him away to the dancing space in front of the string quartet.

“All a bit much?” he asked sympathetically as the opening bars of a waltz sounded and they began to twirl around the floor.

“I was getting interrogated.”

“Your brother just waylaid me for an interesting conversation. And by interesting, I mean extremely alarming. He’s not an assassin or spy or something, is he?”

Pippa bit her lip. “Before today, I would have laughed myself into a catatonic state at even the suggestion. But he made some comments earlier that make me wonder where he goes most days.”

“Well, he just told me to beware of treacherous women. So…”

“Good lord,” she replied, her laugh edged with hysteria. “I need some air. I don’t suppose you could waltz me over to the balcony?”

“I can waltz you anywhere you like, Pippet.”

When they made it to the double doors that opened out onto the narrow stone balcony, both inhaled deeply of the frigid but blessedly fresh air.

“That kiss,” she said abruptly.

Finn hesitated. “Yes?”

“No one has ever kissed me like that before.”

“Is that a good or bad thing?” he replied, striving for a lighthearted tone when the answer to the question might just determine his future happiness.

Pippa adjusted her spectacles and gazed at him; her expression more serious than he’d ever seen it. “Without a crowd or chant, would you have done the same?”

“Yes. And then some.”

The blunt words dropped like boulders into a puddle, but he couldn’t lie or dissemble. Not when he’d yearned to kiss Pippa since he’d first woken from one of those sweaty, sticky dreams as a lad.

“And then some?” she asked, so softly he could scarcely hear her. “You mean you would like to do more than kissing? You would like to pleasure me the way they do in our romance novels? Make me come?”

Finn’s cock jerked, and he gripped the stone railing in an attempt to cool his lust. On about a million occasions he had thought of making Pippa come; of sliding two fingers into her hot, tight pussy while his thumb rubbed her clitoris, or perhaps burying his face between her legs and licking up every drop of sweet musky honey. Other times his fantasy had been sucking her swollen nipples while he filled her slowly, so slowly with his aching virgin cock. Then he’d introduced her to the heady world of pleasure toys like the laird did in The Highland Marauder, even bent her over a desk and fucked her from behind with all the tender ruthlessness of A Wicked Comte.

“Yes,” he rasped. “If that was what you wanted, I would make you come. Over and over.”

Pippa made a shuddering, needy sound. Then she tugged on his jacket so he leaned down and she could speak directly into his ear. “Finn, I know it is complicated because we are friends…but I think…that is…now we are publicly betrothed I should like to try some things. Not bedding. But you know…other things. With hands and mouth. You would be doing me another great favor. Pleasure lessons in preparation for the marriage bed!”

Christ.

If that wasn’t a rose with poisoned thorns, what was? The thought of her in another man’s bed was unbearable. Yet the chance to pleasure the woman he loved…

“Pippet—”

“Knighton.”

Shit. SHIT.

Naturally his father would ruin a conversation of the utmost importance.

Finn straightened and turned to where Pinehurst stood in the doorway, looking more dead than alive. “Father?”

The marquess sniffed in Pippa’s direction. “I suppose I must offer my felicitations even after that vulgar display. That I had to find out alongside everyone else here is unacceptable, however I understand members of the Nash family were equally…surprised.”

Pippa rested her cheek on Finn’s arm. “They were. Wasn’t it marvelously romantic, my lord, two people deciding they could not be parted by another and making a public declaration?”

“Lady Pinehurst thought so, but she has always been foolish. One presumes you’ll be able to do your duty and secure the line without fuss, gel? Menses regular?”