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“No,” Tina said patiently. “I don’t recommend that combination. Let me see your hand.”
Bianca displayed her cards obediently and played the ones Tina suggested.
The reason Bianca could not get Harry out of her mind was not because they’d shared a scandalous kiss. As the daughter of a courtesan, Bianca wasn’t the least concerned about Polite Society’s rules of propriety. If she wanted to indulge in a kiss, she would do so without hesitation or self-recrimination. If Bianca wished to take a lover, then she’d do that, too.
What she wanted to know was if it hadmeantsomething to Harry, other than yet one more stolen kiss in a rakish lifetime of stolen kisses.
The problem was, it hadn’t been “just a kiss” for Bianca. She could line up every other gentleman in that ballroom and kiss them all night long without feeling the slightest spark. With Harry, it was more than a spark. It was an inferno. An eternal flame that burned deep within her soul.
She didn’t want to put out the fire. She wanted to fan the flames higher. She wanted him to burn for her as she burned for him. But only the foolish believed wishes came true.
Bianca had hoped he would come to call.
He hadn’t.
She had hoped he would barge into the sitting room where she sat with his sister, using any nonsensical pretext that came to mind as an excuse to see Bianca again, if only for a moment, across a room.
He hadn’t.
If Harry did not care about her, if they were not to be friends or lovers or anything else, she could make her peace with that. But to do so, first she needed to know the truth.Wasshe nothing more than a conquest? Or, when he kissed her, had he also felt—
Footsteps sounded out in the corridor.
Bianca froze, her white-knuckled fingers denting the cards as she cocked her ear toward the open doorway and listened with all her might.
The steps paused, just outside the visible section of the corridor, as if whoever stood there was listening just as intently, whilst deciding whether or not to make their presence known. After a long, interminable moment, a soft sigh sounded, and the footsteps retreated from the sitting room.
Bianca dropped her cards and sprang to her feet. “I’ll be right back. I have to… I have to visit the water closet.”
She hurried from the room without glancing to see whether Tina was remotely fooled by this thin excuse.
Bianca had barely taken three steps down the corridor when the figure at the other end turned around.
ItwasHarry! Bianca’s breath caught and her skin flushed hot.
He was gorgeous as always, but in a different way than before: Bianca had caught him in deshabille. Rather than his rakish ballroom uniform of black breeches and black tailcoat, with a perfectly starched white cravat at his throat, Harry’s strong legs were encased in soft buckskins, and his shoulders unfettered by any coat. A smart waistcoat of wine and taupe complemented the buckskins, but his shirtsleeves fluttered free in the invisible breeze of an open window.
If she touched his arms now, the way that she had that starry, starry night, she would be able to feel his musculature and his warmth through the thin linen that cloaked him.
Harry did not come to her. Nor did he turn away. He stood there helplessly, staring back at her with unconcealed hunger, his posture tensed as though poised to flee but unable to move an inch.
It was as though their roles had been reversed. She was now the huntress, and he the prey. A sense of power infused her blood and quickened her heartbeat.
Very well. She was no frightened rabbit. If it was up to her to make the conquest, then conquer she would.
She took a step forward, then another, then another. Harry remained still as a statue—or still as a deer startled in the forest—but he drank her in as though his thirst for her would never be sated.
Good. Bianca felt the same way. The sight of him did not quench her desire, but rather made her hunger for him all the more.
When she reached him, she kept her voice coy, light. “Weren’t you going to greet your guest, my lord?”
“No,” he said hoarsely, unable to take his gaze from her.
She reached out to touch his chest, then paused with her fingertip half an inch above the loose V of his neckline. Close enough to sense his warmth and feel the air pulse with each beat of his heart.
“I suppose I should leave you alone, if I’m unwanted,” she murmured.
Before she could lower her arm, he grabbed her around the waist and whirled her up against the wall. Her spine flattened against the silk wall coverings. She barely had time to gasp aloud before he slanted his mouth over hers, claiming her in a kiss.
