She hadn’t expected any such change, yet she welcomed it, joyously embraced it with her whole heart, and so did he.
Their tongues dueled.
Their lips commanded and demanded, turn and turn about.
His hold on her tightened, then his arms circled her, cinched, and crushed her to him.
Giddy and glorying, even through the layers of gown and stays, she felt the rigid rod of his erection hard against her stomach and wantonly sank more evocatively—more provocatively—against him, pressing her body to his in flagrant encouragement.
He dragged his lips from hers on a shaky gasp, then as if helpless to resist, trailed his lips along her jaw. “God, how I want you! But…” He raised his head and closed his eyes.
Passion starkly etched his features.
Sanity trickled into her mind. “But we aren’t a pair of giddy young lovers.” If they were discovered, or even if such an interlude between them here, after five years of marriage, was suspected…
She hauled in a tight breath, then eased her arms from about his neck and sank her fingertips into his shoulders, trying to steady her whirling wits. Her lips throbbed. “We’re not even older lovers engaged in an illicit affair.”
Apparently striving to slow his breathing, he nodded. “The gossipmongers would have a field day.”
He breathed in deeply, then opened his eyes and met her gaze. His eyes were dark with desire. “Can we leave?”
She took half a second to recall what had gone before, then smiled with blatant anticipation. “Yes, let’s—it’s late enough.” It had to be midnight at least. Stepping back, her eyes locked with his, she seized his hand. “Now.”
His answering smile was edged with intent.
Delighted, laughing, she towed him to the door.
Very much like the illicit lovers they weren’t, by mutual accord, they skirted the ballroom and found their way by minor corridors and secondary stairs to the front hall. Fighting to maintain their customary façade of haut ton dignity, they donned their evening cloaks, and Devlin collected his hat. Their carriage was summoned, and they waited with barely concealed impatience, with desire threading through them and tightening their nerves, and the instant their carriage rolled up before the Cassington House steps, Devlin escorted her across the porch, down the steps, and into the carriage.
He followed on her heels.
She waited only until he sat beside her and the carriage door clicked shut, then flung herself at him.
He caught her, and she kissed him, and he palmed her head and held her steady as he ravaged her lips.
The kiss turned incendiary, setting spark to their already smoldering desires. Within seconds, greedy flames licked over their skins. They seized each other, wanting, claiming, and possessing. Need glowed, then caught alight and flared.
Through the fine silk of her bodice, his clever fingers clasped her breast, then found the tight bud of her nipple and flicked, and she gasped. She closed her fists in his lapels and hauled him to her, into a ravenous kiss, only to tip back and back, until with a smothered shriek, she overbalanced and landed on her back on the padded seat with him looming over her.
He chuckled, the sound dark and laden with desire, then he dipped his head and set his lips to her collarbone and, with his tongue, traced the delicate curve, and she held him to her and shuddered and closed her eyes.
Only to feel her hunger surge as her sensitivity to touch dramatically heightened.
She felt every evocative caress he pressed on her swollen, already aching breasts. Her nerve endings sparked as if lightning danced over them. Then with one hand, he followed the long line of her bent leg, then rucked up the silk of her skirts and petticoats and, setting his hard, hot palm to her silk stockings, traced upward…until, above her garter, he met the hem of her silk drawers and, beneath that, bare skin.
She shivered; she felt his intention to further explore as if it were her own, and anticipation leapt, but then the carriage rocked and swayed, turning a corner, and he froze.
Cassington House stood at the southern end of South Audley Street. While they were so hotly engaged, the carriage had rolled sedately north, presumably passing the darkened expanse of Grosvenor Square… It had just swung left into Upper Grosvenor Street.
They had only minutes before the carriage drew up outside the door of Alverton House and the footman opened the door.
Devlin swore, his voice a gravelly rumble. Therese knew how he felt. He withdrew his warm hand from beneath her skirts, sat back, and hauled her upright.
“Quickly,” he murmured, glancing out of the window at the houses sliding past while he rapidly straightened his cravat, coat, and cloak.
Smoothing down her skirts, she softly laughed, then grasped the upper edge of her bodice and wriggled it to resettle her breasts. “I’d forgotten how…limited moments like this tend to be.”
There’d been a few such incidents when they were courting, but back then, she hadn’t known what the ultimate destination on their sensual road actually was. Now she knew, and greedy need fizzed in her veins. If the journey had been longer…she really didn’t think she would have had to argue to get Devlin to appease their mutual need. Thinking of what that would have entailed, as the carriage turned in to Park Lane, from beneath lowered lashes, she slanted a glance at him.
