This Perfect Kiss Read Free Page A

Pompadour?”
    â€œI wish above all things to be seduced by you.”
    There was no mistaking the feel of him against her waist. Her heart raced and she pushed aside her nerves. She might have been an innocent when it came to sexual encounters, but she was not naïve about what men and women did with each other, how male and female fit together.
    But no amount of inducement was pushing him beyond the initial kiss. “Remove your mask.”
    â€œNay, my lord.”
    His hand covered her breast, tentative at first as he registered her start at the intimate touch, then boldly as he cupped her in his palm. He turned to the side, maneuvering her body against the ivy until he had neatly confined her between his arms and the stone wall.
    His lips touched hers with heat. “I could take it off you.”
    â€œBut then the seduction would lose its magic.”
    He cupped her chin, raising her face another fraction. Moonlight glanced off his hair. He kissed her, pressing his lips to hers without regard to tenderness, sending her blood racing through her veins like a potent aphrodisiac. He plunged his tongue in her mouth and she heard herself moaning with strange torment. The echo in his chest became a growl as his mouth trailed down her neck and lingered on her collarbone. Nothing could have prepared her for the hunger that seemed to grow inside her. She leaned into his body. His hair was soft and silky. He smelled exotic, with a hint of cool citrus.
    â€œIs there a brother or father or uncle waiting in the shrubberies to launch at me? Call me out?” His breath was warm. “Expert swordsmen ready for an excuse to fillet me?”
    â€œI have no brothers or father.”
    His breathing was harsh against her shoulder as he braced his hand against the wall and leaned with his head down. It was not precisely confusion she sensed but something akin to it. “Then why?”
    Her lips trembled beneath his. “I . . . wish to know what it feels like.”
    She thought she heard him swear, but she didn’t recognize the word he’d said, except by its tone.
    â€œSurely, ’tis no sin to be a virgin,” she ventured. As an invitation, she could not be clearer.
    â€œYou wish to escape a marriage by ruining yourself. You have picked me because you saw me naked on the beach and thought I would be . . . amenable to the idea?”
    â€œI picked you because . . . because you are the most beautiful man I have ever seen. I mean you no harm. I will tell no one.”
    He laughed almost as if her words made him blush. He seemed gratified that his reaction was finally one she could interpret. “Are you trying to protect my reputation?” he asked.
    â€œNo one need know, my lord.”
    The cadence of his breathing changed. “ I would know.”
    â€œIt cannot be good for you to think so much.”
    He laughed, this time not with discomfort evident in his tone but with an acknowledgement that her words couldn’t have been more true.
    Footsteps and voices on the upper walkway caused them both to pause. Someone was walking down the pathway. Neither of them breathed. She shut her eyes. They stood in the shadows like coconspirators, the bastard daughter of an adulterer and England’s hero and heir to an earldom. What would he have said if he’d known her mother had been known as Ayrshire’s “Colonial whore”? That she was no lady at all.
    The footsteps stopped. “My lord?” a voice called from the walkway to her left.
    She heard the hiss of an oath against the soft shell of her ear. Shifting his weight, he shielded her from view. “What is it, Smolich?”
    â€œI am sorry to disturb you, my lord, but your father is asking for you. The last set has begun and ’tis a half hour before midnight. Your grandmother is about to send out the cavalry to find you.” Clearing his throat, he added, “I saw you come down here earlier