and others, including Josiah. She’d exchanged a loving family for a ranting martinet who never forgave her for being
better born than he. Her disillusionment and his disappointment had combined into a bitter brew that tainted every
moment of her married life.
The marquess frowned at the path ahead but she sensed his vision remained fixed on a purely internal landscape. “Your
father must have been furious when he learned what you’d been up to.”
“Furious. Frustrated. Disbelieving. He’d planned a great match, a viscount at least. I wasted myself on an indigent
shopkeeper forty years my senior and a blasted democrat as well. After he found out, he gave me a terrible scolding. He
banished Josiah from the village, easy when you own every stick and stone.” She took a breath, striving to reclaim her
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ABC Amber LIT Converter http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html
This time when she bumped her belly against his cock, he knew she did it deliberately.
Triumph flashed through him.
Such a small concession. The first of many, he hoped.
He’d learned caution. He didn’t mistake her hesitant cooperation for permission to rush to completion. He snatched at
resolution. Close to impossible when her hot scent swirled around him and threatened to submerge him.
With a superhuman effort, he ignored his urges and focused on igniting hers. He remembered how she’d trembled when
he kissed her neck. He tucked the thought away and closed his eyes, concentrating on her mouth.
Finally, when her body folded against his with the beautiful naturalness of a water lily opening on a lake, she gave a tiny
sigh and parted her lips. Immediately, his tongue plunged inside.
She growled deep in her throat and slid closer. Her hands crept up to tangle in his hair. Her tongue rasped against his,
ventured into his mouth in a quick exploration, then returned for a longer foray. Searing desire zigzagged through him.
He wondered if she even knew what she did. He doubted it. She was lost in kisses. Only reminding himself what was at
stake prevented him from becoming similarly lost.
She’d trusted him this far. If he failed her, she’d never trust him again.
How excruciating to hold to his goal when she clung so tightly. Or when his tongue was so deep in her mouth.
Too intense. Too much. Too soon. Patience.
Damn bloody patience. He snapped and snarled at that restraining voice.
He needed her so much. He needed her now.
Even so, he drew back from the edge. Eased the pressure on her mouth. Broke the long succulent exploration into
smaller, quicker kisses.
He burned to taste her everywhere. To find out if all of her was as sweet as that honey trap of a mouth. He shifted her
onto her back and licked his way down her neck to the fragrant curve of a shoulder. She quivered and made a muffled
sound of excitement. Her legs rubbed against his in a devilishly suggestive dance and her breath emerged in rapid gusts.
Oh, yes, his strategy worked, all right. It might even succeed if he didn’t shatter into a million shards of frustration first.
He nipped and sucked at her sensitive neck and tasted her shivers of surrender.
Only when she gasped and mewed with pleasure did he lift his head.
Flushed with desire, she sprawled against the white sheets. Beautiful. Her eyes were dark and heavy, the pupils so dilated,
they almost swallowed the rich blue of her irises.
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He slid his hand down to raise the hem of the nightdress, revealing long slender legs. Her intoxicating scent assailed him
anew, made the blood surge in his veins.
Jesus, she’d kill him before she finished.
Somewhere he found the strength to rein himself in.
He uncovered the soft plain of her belly. The skin there was so pure and white. He couldn’t help kissing it, dipping his
tongue into her navel, nibbling a path from one hip to the other. She was his territory and he wanted to map every glorious
inch. He nuzzled her hipbone where she curved so deliciously. His hand moved up and down her leg, learning the perfect
shape of thigh and knee and calf.
Her different textures fascinated him.
What a magnificent mystery was a woman. Was Grace.
He didn’t dare touch her sex yet. Even if the incense of her musky arousal promised to send him spinning to the sky.
She moaned again and moved agitatedly on the sheets. He prayed he goaded her into a fever of desire. He certainly
goaded himself into one.
Through years of suffering, he’d learned discipline. He beat back the ravening beast inside him.
He bunched the nightdress higher, revealing the plump undersides of her breasts. The barrier of fabric, flimsy as it was,
had become unbearable.
“Take it off,” he growled. “Take it off or I’ll tear it to pieces.”
“Wait,” she said breathlessly. She wriggled up against the pillows to tug the nightdress over her head.
No teasing fiddle with the ties this time.
Hell, if she teased him now, he’d damn well explode.
His blood pounded hot and heavy, louder than thunder. With a shuddering breath, he knelt over her, straddling her hips.
He filled his hands with her breasts, luxuriating in their beauty, cupping their roundness.
When he bent to kiss one puckered raspberry nipple, her body jerked in startled reaction. But she didn’t move away.
Invitation to continue. He took her in his mouth. She tasted like a perfect summer. He sucked gently, laving the whorled
tip. Her gasp made him pause.
He raised his head. She looked confused, dazed. Luscious.
“Am I hurting you?”
“No.” Then in a rush, “I…I like it.”
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“Good. So do I.” This time he sucked harder, flicking at her with his tongue. She moaned and buried one shaking hand in
his hair, urging him closer. He needed no further encouragement.
Although the commandpatience wore threadbare, he took his time.
He learned what made her shudder, what made her sigh. He became so attuned to her that every touch of teeth or lips or
fingers offered pleasure.
She writhed in his arms, tangling her legs with his, fighting for air. He trailed one hand across her stomach to the soft
curls that hid her sex.
She made a soft sound of desire and arched up.
He slipped his hand between her legs. The merest brush of his fingers in her moisture and she jerked in response. She was
so sleek and hot.
Not being inside her was torture. But it was still too soon. Even while she shivered and quaked with reaction.
He found one particular place that made her cry out. He scraped his teeth over a tight nipple and touched her between the
legs again.
Her spine bowed and she bit back a scream. A hot flood drenched his fingers. His nostrils flared as the scent of her
arousal rose stronger, sharper.
How could she call herself a cold woman? She was living flame. She flickered and burned and glowed and her heat
warmed him to the depths of his soul.
“Oh, Matthew,” she said on a long sigh, opening herself wider to his hand. “Matthew…”
He loved the way she no longer hesitated over his name. He loved the way she moved restlessly under his seeking fingers
as if she wanted more.
Perhaps at last she wanted him.
He rained kisses down her ribs and over her belly and across her thighs. Then he used his hands to nudge her legs further
apart.
The flushed, plump folds of her sex were as beautiful as any flower. More beautiful. As with any flower, his impulse was
to bury his face in it, to inhale its essence.
He’d promised himself he’d kiss every part of her.
It was a promise he meant to keep, by God.
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Grace lay back on the pillows, basking in the worship of Matthew’s mouth and hands. The sweetness of what he did
made the breath catch in her throat. She’d found a lover who set her blood singing. He touched her with such reverence,
even when he pushed her to her limits. Who would have thought a man could subvert her control? What a grand and
amazing discovery.
How strange that this untried youth taught the widow about sensuality.
She should put him out of his misery, tell him to take her. He’d given her pleasure beyond her wildest dreams. He
deserved a reward.
But she loved what he did. She didn’t want it to end, selfish cat she was. He made her feel like a goddess.
If the ultimate act offered nothing but endurance, she could bear it. As long as he touched her again the way he touched
her tonight.
Those fiendishly skilled hands—where had he learned such things?—pushed her legs further apart.
Oh, heavens, was he going to touch her there again? She closed her eyes and braced for shivery delight.
Nothing happened.
His hands stayed tantalizingly close to where she wanted them, but not close enough. She bit her lip to muffle a frustrated
moan.
Oh, Grace, you are a wanton. The angels despair of you.
She opened her eyes.
He was looking at her. At her…there.
She couldn’t mistake the unalloyed yearning on his face as he knelt between her white thighs.
It should disgust her. He should disgust her.
But the idea of him seeing that hidden part of her made her shake with raw excitement.
A good woman would close her legs, roll away, cover herself.
A good woman wouldn’t be in this bed in the first place.
His grip on her thighs tightened. His eyes blazed in his pale face and his cheekbones stood out in sculpted relief. Before
she could speak, he moved further down the bed and bent his head. For one bewildering moment, she registered the heat
of his breath on her cleft.
Then his mouth took her.
It was too much. For one long quivering moment, she lay unmoving. His mouth was hot, heat to her heat. She felt the
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ABC Amber LIT Converter http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html
probe of his tongue. Flame licked at her skin.
She couldn’t let him do this. It was depraved.
With trembling hands, she reached down to push him away, trying to ignore the springy softness of his hair under her
fingers. Her arms had the strength of jelly and she couldn’t shift him.
Scrambling up against the head of the bed, she stared at him in shock.
He lifted his head and looked at her. To her horror—and reluctant fascination—his mouth glistened with moisture.
Her moisture.
She shivered, not entirely with revulsion. Although the thought that a man could do this, would even want to do this, had
never occurred to her.
Goodness, until tonight, she’d had no idea a man needed to do anything other than shove his member inside a woman.
“You can’t!” she gasped, raising herself on her elbows.
“Why not?” His eyes were brilliant with pleasure. How decadently beautiful he looked caught between her thighs.
“It’s…it’s wrong,” she stuttered, knowing she sounded like a fool.
“Did it feel good?” the smiling devil asked.
“Not at all!”
He arched a cynical brow. “Really?”
“Really!” she said with breathless emphasis.
“Don’t you want to try again and make sure?” He sounded ridiculously reasonable for a man who wanted to do…
that.“Aren’t you curious? I am.”
“Curiosity killed the cat.” She absurdly fell back onto the old proverb as if that answered anything. All the time, the
curiosity she so derided built and built. What would it be like if he kissed her there? The brief instant when his mouth had
touched her hadn’t been unpleasant. Far from it, actually, if she forced herself to be honest.
Of course, no decent woman would countenance such a thing.
But she was no longer a decent woman, was she?
Tonight, she’d ceased being respectable wife, indigent widow, virtuous lady. Tonight, she’d become a madman’s harlot.
A madman’s harlot wouldn’t shrink from an act just because it struck her as strange and perverse. A madman’s harlot
would embrace every indulgence her madman offered.
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“You’re thinking about it. I can see it in your eyes.” He curled his fingers more firmly around her thighs and spread them
wider. “I swore I’d stop if you asked. That hasn’t changed.”
“Don’t you want to take me?” she asked almost on a wail.
His long mouth quirked with wry humor. “More than I want to breathe. But this time, you’ll be with me all the way.”
“You promise you’ll stop if I say so?” she asked doubtfully, even while she lay down.
“I promise. Though never trust anything a man tells you when he’s got his head between your legs.”
Grace’s giggle ended on a strangled moan when with a ruthlessness she’d never have credited to him, he tilted her hips up
and buried his mouth in her. He made a low, deep sound of enjoyment. She shivered as his tongue and lips and teeth
worked her.
The sensation was odd. She wasn’t sure she did like it.
Until the first blast of pleasure scorched her.
She stiffened in astonished reaction and clenched her hands hard in the sheet. She swallowed a startled whimper.
Still, he must have heard her. He paused and stared up at her. “All right?”