Page 49

She liked the sound of that.

Very much.

It was wrong, but it felt right. He felt right.

One chance, she reminded herself. When she returned to London, her life would be ordinary again. She would return to the proper role of mother and widow. Now was her opportunity to seize. Her mind was made.

She nodded. “Yes.”

He kissed her again and then laced his fingers through hers. Laughing like careless children, they rushed through the rain together back to the manor house.

Ophelia may have been in her cups last night, but now Apollo was the one who was drunk. He was drunk on her.

So drunk that he started kissing her like a callow youth who had never felt a pair of lips beneath his before they had even reached his bedroom. He was that desperate for more of her. They were soaked and bedraggled, but they didn’t give a damn. They had rushed through back halls and up a lesser-used staircase, dripping all over the Axminster as they went.

And now they were bursting through the door of his bedchamber, kissing, tearing at each other’s clothing. It was mayhem. His cock had never been so hard. The taste of her was still on his lips, and he wanted more.

She was wearing too many damn layers, and he needed them all gone. No more barriers between her soft skin and his hands and mouth. Naked. She needed to be naked. Preferably with her thighs locked around his head.

The door closed, sounding as far away as if it were in another solar system. He lifted his head, breaking their kiss with great reluctance so he could stare at her in wonderment. She was in his bedchamber. Her copper hair had been darkened by the rain, a few curly tendrils having come free around her face. Her lips were swollen from his kisses, and her skin had a tempting sheen from the rain.

“Is something amiss?” she asked, sounding breathless.

“Yes.” He tugged at her gown. “I need this off.”

She spun about, wordlessly presenting him with her back. He took a moment to admire her, the freckles dappling her shoulders, the soft skin of her neck, the wisps that had come free of her coiffure. She was bloody beautiful.

His hands trembled as he set about undoing her hooks and tapes. This time, he didn’t stop with her bodice, but continued to the fastening of her silken overskirt. Sodden fabric dropped to the floor. He set his lips on the tender skin at her nape and untied her bustle and petticoats. She smelled of her heady perfume and the fresh crispness of rain, and he couldn’t get enough.

She shivered as he undid the knot on her corset and began loosening it, and he was reminded that the air had a chill and she was still soaked from the rain. He released the lacings and rubbed her bare upper arms tenderly.

He pressed his body against her back, trying to give her some of his warmth. “Are you cold, love?”

“Not cold, precisely,” she murmured, arching in a way that made his indecently rigid cock sink into her softness, separated only by the fabric of her chemise and drawers.

He kissed her damp crown. “Then what?”

“Overwhelmed.” Her hands went to work on the hooks at the front of her corset, opening them one by one.

“I feel the same way,” he confessed, taking a step in retreat so he could help her shed her corset altogether.

“You do?”

He bent his head and gently nipped her shoulder. “God, yes. I’ve never wanted another woman the way I want you.”

“Surely not.”

He whirled her about so she faced him. Her nipples were hard little nubs tenting the fine linen of her chemise. “And why not?”

Her lips firmed, and he had to fight the urge to pull away that damned mask she seemed determined to retain. “There is nothing so very exceptional about me.”

“How wrong you are.” He drew her against him with an arm around her waist. “I’ll prove it to you.”

He kissed her again, deeply and slowly. The fire in his veins urged him to go faster, to seize the release he so badly needed. But the rest of him was equally unwavering. Ophelia deserved to be revered. She needed to know how desirable and beautiful she was. How desperately he wanted her. So desperately, it was a living, breathing ache inside him.

He told her with his lips, with his tongue. Then he took her hand in his and pressed it over his heart so she could feel the frantic beat before guiding it lower, down his stomach to the fall of his trousers. She gasped into his kiss as he molded her fingers over his cockstand.

She tentatively palmed him, and he nearly came in his smalls. With a groan, he raised his head, looking down at her, the tops of her breasts still glistening with rain and freckles, so beautiful, down to her hand on him, caressing him through his trousers. It was so damn erotic, he almost couldn’t bear it.