Her lids lowered, and her gaze dipped. She stared at his lips.
Which were precariously close to her own. When had that happened? Well, eye for an eye and all that. He dropped his own gaze to her lips. She pulled the bottom one between her teeth, an innocent sign of desire? Or of confusion?
He wrapped his hands around Jane’s shoulders and stared into her eyes. “You stick in a man’s mind like the perfect first words of a poem.”
Her chest rose with a sharp intake of breath, and she leaned forward, her lips settling against his own, and it was enough invitation for George to release the shawls and blankets and replace them with his own arms, warming her with his own body.
The kiss she’d given him yesterday had been the definition of innocence. That would not be how he kissed her. He slanted his lips over hers, encouraging them to open, and then slipped inside, tasting her mouth for the first time.
A sound, half cry and half moan, slipped up her throat, and he swallowed it.Mine. Everything about her.Mine.
Her hand flattened against his chest, then her fingernails dug into his clothing, tugging him closer. He pulled her closer, tightening his legs about her body as she perched precariously on the edge of her chair.
And they kissed, and each kiss and sigh turned winter into summer, and that dying flightless bird, hope, grew feathers and flew.
Jane’s kisses were dangerous. Embracing her felt like the most daring thing he’d ever done, taking for himself when he’d never done so before. But he could not stop now. Would he ever stop, or would he kiss her still when the sun rose high in the white noon sky, then dropped into dark-blue darkness at day’s end?
Her hands on his chest flattened, and she pushed, tore her lips from his. She arched her neck to the side, hiding her face from him, breathing like she’d run for miles. She shot to her feet and paced away from him, her arms wrapping tight about her body.
He stood and stalked toward her, walking her backward until she hit the wall of the house between two windows. He should not. She feared strong emotion. He should approach her carefully, a single hand outstretched in supplication. But he’d let go and could not yet leash his control.
He dipped his head low and whispered in her ear, “Tell me to stop, to go.”
The breath she inhaled was sharp as was the tiny shake of her head.
“Does that mean no or does that mean no do not stop?”
“No. Do not stop.” Jane shivered. What little skin she bared to the sky and to his gaze looked like berries spilled on snow.
He pulled her into his arms, or tried to. The deuced sling prohibited his movement. “Damn,” he hissed. He ripped the swath of fabric over his head, jostling his still-sensitive shoulder, and threw it to the ground.
Her eyes grew wide. “Put that back. You’re injured.”
“I’m well enough.” He rolled the shoulder, testing it. “Stiff and a bit painful, but not bad enough to stop me.”
“Stop you? From what?”
He pulled her into his arms, this time successfully, and pressed her to the cold brick with his body. He seethed in a breath at the touch of her soft curves, wrapped a hand around the column of her neck, and rubbed the skin over her rapidly beating pulse.
She turned startled eyes up at him, and her chest rose and fell with a rapidity matching his own.
He dipped his lips near the shell of her ear, unable to control the need to tell her how he felt, but knowing some words would make her run. But there was more than one way to tell a woman how you felt.
She was a Phantom of delight
When first she gleamed upon my sight.
A lovely apparition, sent
To be a moment’s ornament.
She shivered again.
Last night had been the first time he’d spoken a poem out loud since childhood, since he’d gained his majority and freed himself from his uncle’s madness. The act should roil his stomach.
But speaking words that meant so much to George, tothiswoman… only brought pleasure. It resurrected a passion he’d thought long dead. He wanted more. Of her. Of the words.
Her eyes as stars of Twilight fair;
