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strangely enough enthralled the ladies.
    Hell, Iain could barely remember a time he felt that much at ease to let himself go. In the bedroom he was always calculating, every move a choreographed dance.
    He didn’t lose himself, and most definitely had never been transported to his imaginary plane of pleasure on the wave of a fierce climax.
    “Shall I wait here for your return, my love,” she asked,
    “or will you come ravish and debauch me in Larabie’s bed?”
    Iain smiled at that and watched her in the mirror as he belted his kilt with the little leather strap and buckle. “A wicked creature you are. Have you no shame, Georgiana, mussing up the earl’s sheets with another man’s body?” Her smile was scheming as she sat up and came to her knees, unashamed of her nudity and the fact that there was another present in the room with them to witness it.
    “Very little, I’m afraid. You’ve stripped me of any decency I might have had.”
    “Indeed?” he asked before taking another drink.
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    TEMPTATION & TWILIGHT
    Her eyes were glittering. “You’ve stripped me of many things with your immoral ways, my lord. I fear being bad with you is really rather addicting.”
    “Rather like Scotch,” Sutherland grumbled as he knelt to fasten Iain’s clan pin to the kilt.
    “Watch it,” he growled, “or I’ll slam my knee into your nose.”
    Sutherland, immune to his moods and taciturn disposition, merely ignored the threat and squelched a grin.
    “Well, my dear?” Iain inquired as he slipped his dirk into his woollen sock. “Do I pass muster?”
    “Indeed you do. I see that the story one hears about a true Highlander is correct—you do wear nothing between the plaid and your flesh.” Halfway to being good and sotted, Iain turned away from the mirror and faced his paramour. Lifting the kilt, he showed her what she wanted to see. Grasping himself, he let the lady admire it.
    “That part of you is magnificently made, Sinclair, even in this state.”
    Quirking his lips, he stroked himself once, giving the lady what she wanted, so that later, she would give him what he wanted—which differed vastly from what she desired. He was bedding her only to get information about a secret club she frequented—the House of Orpheus. Orpheus was an enemy of the Brethren Guardians, and had to be destroyed. Iain was playing the part of a Casanova to gain what he and the other two guardians—the Earl of Black and the Duke of Sussex—needed.
    Casanova, he mused mockingly as he let his kilt fall back into place. No, he did not feel like the legendary Italian lover, but rather like a male whore—as filthy and corrupt as an East End flash boy.
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    had told him that nothing good would happen out of it, but he had laughed, mocking him for the prig that Sussex was. Iain believed his soul was already gone, believed himself impervious to any more pain. But the truth was, he was not. He was drowning in sin, and any time now, he believed he’d wake up one morning only to look in the mirror and find all the sins he had committed marring his face. It would be a horrific sight, but a true reflection of what resided in his soul.
    “Have you time for another round? Sex always in-vigorates men.”
    “You think me full of sap, then?” he teased, when he did not feel the least bit light and cajoling. “You are a biter, aren’t you, sweetheart?” Sutherland did laugh then, smothering the outburst quickly.
    Her eyes narrowed. “I hope that isn’t derogatory, my lord. I would hate to have to instruct my dear husband to shoot you dead.”
    As if Larabie, that fat, pompous bastard, could even try. “My dear, a biter is a term used to describe the most lascivious and wanton of wenches, which I am