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“Mary?”
“I am not—” Her breath sighed between them. “Yes?”
“Toss the shovel to your side, toward the hole—and away from the blame cat.”
“Domineering gamekeeper, are you not?” The thunk met his ears the same moment she tried to twist from his grasp.
“Nay.” His hold tightened, tugged her palm lower and anchored it at his side, at his waist. “Hold on.”
Cursing his inability to cup her face with both hands, he filled his palm with her cheek, threaded his fingers along her jaw and hairline, and traced the outline of her lips with his thumb. Giving no quarter—for he sensed she wanted none—he angled her head up to his and claimed her mouth.
Opened his over hers, his tongue swiping a horizontal swath across the seam of her lips. Then again.
He released her mouth. Stared at the blackness between them that should be her face. Took a breath, and returned for more.
Lips covering hers, tongue sweeping—and there!
Aye. Satisfaction rumbled through him when her lips opened. At the next swipe of his tongue—still outside her mouth—she moved closer on a tiny moan. Her fingers fisted in his shirt—when had they delved beneath his coat? Her other hand wound behind his neck, gripped the ends of his hair as her tongue met his. Echoed his actions—touching his, then lightly dancing over his lips.
His heart thundered far faster than the simple kiss warranted.
Selfishly, for this was all she’d asked for, he wanted to feel her breast, cup its fullness in his palm, test its weight against his fingers, circle her nipple—after pebbling it—with his thumb. But when he moved to do so—
When he lifted his arm to caress her there—it waved in the air. Floundered. Touched nothing. Certainly not the warmth of her body.
For his was gone.
His damn hand no more.
And his other seemingly glued to her cheek. To her softness. Her heat. Her exasperating, alluring stubbornness.
Frustration made him careless. “Give me your tongue, damn it.”
“What?” He sensed more than saw her pull back, lick lips made sensitive by his own. “What do you mean?”
“I no longer want a teasing, slow kiss,” he said with a reckless abandon foreign to him since before he’d gone off to fight Napoleon’s dangerous tyranny.
A pressured edge hardened his tone—and his resolve. “Either give me your tongue and a real kiss or be gone.”
What are you doing, Ed? Trying to frighten off the first female to look at you since you left Spain piled in a cart?
“A real kiss?” His plan—if it were to intimidate her away—wasn’t working worth a farthing. She returned, closer than before, her hand upon his nape weaving higher through his short hair. Her other, winding its way from his chest around his side to his back. Standing on tiptoes, practically climbing up his chest, she squirmed, then stilled. A beat of silence deepened the moment between them. “Show me, then.”
Her words tumbled him back into passion’s snowy abyss.
He didn’t forget he was likely kissing a sedate widow. Didn’t forget every moment in her company only tempted him to further liberties. Didn’t forget—with his planned engagement—he had no right to take things any farther with this particular female.
He just didn’t care.
“Where are you bound for the night?” he asked instead of giving into temptation, more afraid than not if he started, he wouldn’t stop, not until he had her spread in the snow.
His duty as a gentleman, he should abandon such thoughts and escort her home, but devil take it, the day and half the night had worn them both to dust. At the moment, he wanted nothing more than to collapse into bed and sleep till he grew cobwebs. “Do you live close by?”
She hesitated and the rest fell from his lips, unbidden and unplanned. “If your abode is not within easy reach—and mind, the snow is picking back up as I speak—will you join me at Warrick’s gamekeeper’s cottage? Tomorrow morning, after rest and food—hopefully a thaw, dare we hope—I shall dispatch your vow to young Owen and bury yon Grayson.”
She hesitated again. So… “My promise to you, Maryann. I will see the cat safely entombed. Come now, there are still more hours to sunrise than not. Would you share them with me?”
Would you share them with me?
