Because, God help her, she loved him still. It took a moment for her wits to formulate a useful answer; she didn’t rush them. Drawing a breath restricted by their embrace, she didn’t try to escape his gaze, but calmly held it. “I told you. I decide who I’ll admit to my bed. Those others—none of them interested me sufficiently to warrant an invitation. Apparently I’m exceedingly fussy. You, I issued an invitation to years ago, and for some reason and certainly against my better judgment, the grounds on which I made that decision still appear to be valid.”
Something leapt behind the dark blue screens of his eyes; her breath was suddenly even shorter.
“Be that as it may…” Eyes locked on his, increasingly watchful, she tried to ease back, out of his hold, but his arms gave not an inch. “You shouldn’t presume on that previous invitation, not after all these years.”
As always with her, Charles felt…not quite in control. “Forget your previous invitation.” He bent his head, brushed her lips—just enough to refocus her attention on what was, still, burning between them. “Issue another.”
His voice had lowered of its own accord. He watched, following the battle within her, between physical desire on the one hand and a desire to escape it on the other. She distrusted getting caught, enmeshed in physical desire—and he was the only man capable of weaving a web strong enough to hold her; in that instant, he saw that much clearly.
It only led to the next Why?
Her palms on his chest, she tried to push back. “Your mission. You’re supposed to be keeping watch, remember?”
“I haven’t forgotten.” He had no intention of letting her escape, her desire, his, or the strands they wove together. “If anyone comes driving or riding up, I’ll hear them. If Nicholas sends to the stables, I’ll hear that, too.”
“What if he goes out walking?”
“He can’t leave the house without walking on gravel—I’ll hear him.”
“He might creep out.”
“Why? He doesn’t know we’re here watching.”
She looked at him, thought, frowned.
He smiled, blatantly intent. “That’s check—”
“Wait!” She was starting to panic. “What about the reason you insisted I come home to Wallingham? It was so you wouldn’t seduce me—remember?”
His smile deepened. “So I wouldn’t seduce you under my own roof.”
Her jaw fell. “Your own…?”
“There are a few elements of honor not even I will compromise—that’s one of them.”
When she simply stared, dumbfounded, he lowered his head. “And mate.”
CHAPTER 11
HE INTENDED TO DO PRECISELY THAT, WITH HER, AS SOON as possible. For now, however…he kissed her. For now it was enough that he had her in his arms, that regardless of all else he’d secured his second chance. He still had the twin mysteries of what had upset her years ago and why she’d turned her back on marriage to solve, but it was difficult to think when she was in his arms, her lips soft and pliant beneath his.
She held aloof at first, not resisting yet not actively participating, her attitude more in the nature of a sulk. He enjoyed teasing her from it, holding her lightly while tempting her with slow, sultry kisses, until she sighed, softened, and offered him her mouth.
Penny simply gave up—surrendered, resigned the battle to remain apart from him, impervious to the heat that licked around them, over them, through them—a battle she seemed forever doomed to lose. But she should have known, should have guessed that he wouldn’t simply set aside his desire. Sexual passion was an integral part of him, entrenched in every fiber of his being; she couldn’t imagine him without a sexual agenda. She shouldn’t have forgotten he would have one, no matter what else was afoot.
Pushing her arms up, she twined them about his neck, leaned into him, met him boldly, and launched herself on his tide. Met his thrusting tongue, met his desire with her own, boldly engaged his expertise with her own brand of assurance. She’d be damned if she let him have things all his own way; she fanned the flames, let pleasure rekindle, rise and drag them both down, in, under.
It was pointless pretending she didn’t enjoy this, that with him she demonstrably could have a sexual agenda of her own. If she wasn’t going to be able to hold him off, then she’d take what she wanted, take all her starved senses wished from what he so readily offered. As he was determined to escort her to this particular banquet, then why not savor and enjoy? She had absolutely no doubt he would be a generous lover. He was an openly generous man. A good man…
She caught her thoughts, hauled them back from the brink. Not that way. She would enjoy all he brought her, but she wasn’t going to—didn’t need to—let her heart become involved. She might still love him, but she didn’t need to offer her heart to him, didn’t need to let him, however unwittingly, break it into pieces again.
What lay between them, what fired that compulsive, flaring heat, was physical attraction. Deep, intense, and abiding, tinged perhaps with shared memories, shared background, with long friendship and the ease that brought. But it was simply physical; she’d learned that thirteen years ago and wouldn’t forget; but he was here again now, wanting her as he always had, and—she pulled back from the kiss, gasping, letting her head fall back as his hands claimed her breasts, as his lips traced a line of fire down her throat…she’d been cold, physically cold, for a very long time.
Now she burned, and it was hotter, sweeter, infinitely more real than her memories. He set her alight in so many ways, with such deliciously pleasurable flames. She wallowed, distantly aware that he lifted her and sat on the chaise with her on his lap. They were supposed to be keeping watch, yet although with her senses wholly focused on the magic his hands and mouth wrought she couldn’t hear, she knew he could, and would, if there was anything beyond the cocoon of their world to react to.
She could safely leave the outside world to him and concentrate solely on theirs.
On the frankly amazing fact that she was lying once again in his arms, this time bared to her waist, that he’d managed to unlace her gown, open her bodice, ease her arms free, then untie her chemise and draw it down, all without raising a single qualm in her mind. Not a single impulse to protest.