Page 31 of The Companion’s Secret

Her mouth was dry, too parched for speech. She longed for a glass of the ice-cold champagne that had been flowing so freely in the other room, though she feared if one were in her grasp now, she would have tossed it back like a trollop.

“Y-you couldn’t,” she managed to say at last, all the while a prisoner to his heated gaze.

“Is that a challenge?” His hand slid forward and he traced the curves and dips of her upper lip with the pad of his thumb, then dragged it across the fullness of the lower. Inexplicably, her tongue longed to dart out and chase the sensation of his touch. Not the first time, certainly, that her Irish tongue had got her in trouble. She did not part her lips until she could be certain it was under her control.

“You cannot compromise me,” she declared. And she meant it. “No one gives a fig about my reputation. I am a woman of mature years—almost eight and twenty of them, if you must know—no green girl whose innocence must be carefully guarded. And most important of all, I am a lady’s companion, not a lady.”

He took in her words without blinking, without releasing her, without reacting in any way. As if he expected them, or accepted them in any case. Until she reached the end of her litany.

“You are a niece of the Earl of Merrick.” His voice was firm, correcting her error. “A granddaughter of the late earl, if my understanding of your family tree is not faulty. Therefore, by birth, a lady.”

If he had not been touching her, she would have shaken her head in denial. But the gesture would only have nestled her cheek into his palm. “I am the daughter of a noblewoman, it is true, but one severed from her family with the neatness and completeness that ordinarily requires a surgeon’s scalpel. I am also the daughter of a Dublin solicitor,” she reminded him. “Not a gentleman, in the common usage of the term. I cherish no hope of rising to a rank to which I have never belonged.”

“Why then did you come to London?”

“Partly for my mother. My uncle expressed a desire to heal the rift in their family.”

“But you are skeptical of his success?”

“At present, he is in no position even to help himself. As you well know.”

Those words did produce some reaction. For the briefest of moments, his eyes slid away from hers. But almost before she had noticed their movement, they were once more focused sharply on her face. “If not only for your family, then why?”

It was her turn to shift her gaze, to let it drift over his lips to settle in the vicinity of his cravat. “I have reasons of my own.”

“Which are not to be divulged…”

“Not at present.”

“And never to me.” Once more, she heard disappointment in his voice. Along with a note of certainty that he deserved to be disappointed.

She longed to smooth a cool hand over his brow, to wipe away the cynicism etched there. But how foolish, really, to imagine that she of all people—sharp tongued, skeptical—had such a gift. If he could be soothed, improved, sweet Felicity would be far better suited to the task, would she not? “I came here to speak with you about the fate of my cousin,” she insisted. “Her brother and her parents have behaved shockingly. And I do not wish to see her hurt.” That, at least, was the truth. Certainly Cami did not want to be the one causing her pain.

“Lady Felicity will be perfectly safe,” he vowed. His thumb now traced the edge of her jaw, then slipped lower to brush back and forth across the silk ribbon encircling her throat. Reflexively, she swallowed, though she knew he would feel that proof of her nervousness, could not miss the flutter of her pulse. A wicked smile curved his lips, and the pressure of his hand increased. He was drawing her closer, lowering his mouth to hers. “You, on the other hand…”

Awareness of what was to come hovered like a freshly dipped quill suspended above a blank page. Her fingertips, the ones he had once kissed, tingled. When she laid that hand against his chest and slid her palm upward to his shoulder, anticipation gathered and grew, trembled at the edge for a moment, then tumbled headlong, chasing through every vein, every fiber of her being, the way a droplet of ink fell from a pen, seeped into the very fibers of the paper, and could never be erased.

The slightest movement—she would not even have to stretch onto her tiptoes—and she would be kissing him.

Instinct told her to close her eyes but the writer in her resisted, determined to absorb every detail of this moment: the unexpected softening of his expression, the sparkle in his heavy-lidded eyes, the grain of beard peppering his skin.

“You should go.” His breath whispered across her lips. “Now.”

But she was not even wise enough to heed the warning in his voice.

Did he move, or did she? In that moment, all that mattered was the meeting of their lips, gentler than she had expected. Gentler than she needed. Sliding her hand higher, around his neck, she pressed closer to him and was rewarded with the hard length of his body, fitted perfectly against her softness. His other arm came around her waist, his palm settling on the flare of her hip, his fingertips tracing lightly along her curves. Oh, yes. He was a rake. He was not in the habit of denying himself pleasure, and a woman’s body was no mystery to him. And she would revel in that knowledge. Just this once. Just this once.

The kiss deepened, grew firm. When his tongue touched the seam of her lips, she parted them eagerly to his invasion. But he pressed no further. Instead he teased her, little flicks of slick sensation that had her chasing and darting after them, until her tongue was right inside his mouth, and he was sucking on it, drawing her in, drawing her down. Proving she could be tempted. A moan of longing rumbled in her throat, and she was not ashamed.

Still, she did not close her eyes. He held her gaze as she held his, and it was more intense, more intimate than the dance of their tongues, the kneading hand at her bottom, the hot weight of his erection against her belly. She was lost, utterly lost in his dark eyes. This was the descent, the fall. The end. She had been wrong about not being ruined. This was not her first kiss, but it would surely be her last. It would ruin her for any other.

Her left hand rose and met her right at his nape, fingertips tangling together in his hair where it fell over his collar. Did the tug of her searching fingers give him pain? If so, his only answer was to hitch her higher against him, to plunder her mouth with a kiss so greedy, breath was an afterthought. Then his eyelids drifted closed at last, breaking the spell.

Before she knew it was over, she was standing apart, her feet flat on the floor, her hands sinking to her sides. As free of his embrace as if it had never happened. Cooler air slipped between them.

He tugged one coat sleeve into place, an entirely unnecessary gesture. Did she look as unmussed, unrumpled, unaffected by their kiss as he? Well, she might lack his expertise in such matters, but she would not be bested by his practiced composure. She forced her ragged breathing to slow, though her nostrils flared at the effort. Perhaps, in the dimly lit room, such a small detail would go unnoticed.

No such luck. A smile quirked at the corner of his mouth as he reached up to straighten her skewed spectacles. The movement made her aware of smudges across each lens. Mastering her annoyance, the way her fingers itched to tug them off and wipe them clean, she met his gaze. Squarely. Sternly.