He watched the fabric slide over her skin and felt his mouth go dry.
When her fingers were bare, she reached up and put her hands on his shoulders. Then, cautiously, slid one hand across the tight wool of his coat and brought it to the line of his jaw.
“Again,” she said. “Once wasn’t enough.”
Everything in the world went still.Again. Yes. Again.
He gave a muffled groan and dragged her hard to his body, angling his head down and claiming her mouth.
She tasted like raspberry syrup, and thank God his gloves were still tucked in his jacket because he needed the feel of her bare skin on his hands like he needed the lungs in his chest. More.
He ran his fingers up her bare arms, touched her shoulder, the line of her collarbone. He gave in to the temptation to slide his tongue along the seam of her lips, and when her mouth parted under his, he couldn’t control the way his hand tightened on the back of her neck.
When she took his lower lip between her teeth, he groaned again.
Mother of God, she was so deliciously herself, even in this. Fearless and bold and electric with life. He ran a hand down her back, traced the line of her spine, and moved his mouth to her neck, licking, tasting her delicate skin.
She tipped back her head, wordless, and arched her body into his.
Her breasts met his chest. His hand curled around the generous weight of her bum and his cock leapt against her belly. God. He’d spent the last five days trying to forget the feel of her. Hehad tried to tell himself he’d imagined the perfect backside on this impossible woman.
He hadn’t imagined. And he hadn’t forgotten.
Two hands. He needed two hands to fully appreciate it. He slipped his other hand out of her hair and brought it to the curve of her buttocks, lifting her against him as he did.
His hips jerked at the contact, and she moaned breathlessly, rolling her pelvis against his. Her fingers locked around his neck.
God. It wasn’t enough. It still wasn’t enough. He lifted his head, trying to find a wall he could press her against, but his eyes caught on her breasts, straining against the tight fabric of her bodice, and he gave up and bent his head to the line where satin met skin.
He licked. She whimpered, her hips dragging against his own, and he did it again.
Somehow, despite her skirts, she had one of her legs wrapped around him. Had he done it? Had she? He didn’t care. He pulled a hand under her leg, lifting it higher and cursing her skirts, cursing anything that separated his skin from hers, his aching cock from her heat. He had to feel her. He had to taste her.
There was a loud scrape of wood against wood. His mind registered the sound and couldn’t make sense of it—his world was all Selina and heat and starlight.
In his arms, Selina stiffened and tried to leap away, but he, like an idiot, tightened his grip. She stumbled back and her skirts caught around his legs, and he was so damned dazed, his brain still trying to work out where they were and what in hell was happening, that when she started to fall, he fell with her.
He turned as they fell, pulling her on top of him, taking their combined weight on his hip and elbow.
Which was why, when Lady Eldon peered into the room, herbottom lip caught between her teeth and her gaze slightly puzzled, he was on the floor, Selina half on top of him, her buttocks still carefully cupped in both his hands.
Peter froze. Atop him, Selina seemed to do likewise. Her fingers still clutched the lapels of his coat, and as he watched, her gaze flicked between his face and Lady Eldon’s.
Selina looked almost panicked, and he fought the mad impulse to cradle her against his chest.
Lady Eldon was still standing stock-still, as stunned as the rest of them, when a voice intruded.
“Bessie? Have you gotten turned ’round? That’s not Rowland’s library.”
Eldon. That stern, hearty voice was certainly Eldon.
Lady Eldon turned and tried to block the doorframe with her diminutive frame. “Oh! No, my dear. Nothing—nothing—”
And then Eldon was in the room too, and Lady Judith, and Nicholas Ravenscroft, and Selina was trying frantically to scramble off his lap, but her hair was mussed and one of her slippers had fallen off, and he was pretty sure he’d heard something tear when they’d fallen.
He registered it all in the time it took him to stand and steady Selina on her feet.
Eldon’s glower. Lady Judith’s unreadable calm. Nicholas—Selina’sbrother, damn it all, what had theydone—appeared absolutely incensed.
