The Governess's Scandalous Marriage. Helen Dickson
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him. A strange feeling, until this moment unknown to her, fluttered within her breast and she was halted for a brief passing of time by the flood of excitement that surged through her.
‘It’s useless to resist me,’ he said huskily. ‘Relax. I’m not going to hurt you.’
The darkening of his eyes, the naked passion she saw in their depths drew her even more to him, but it was his tone and not his words that conquered her. She relaxed against him, her entire body beginning to tremble with desire. Her head swam and she was unable to still the violent tremor of delight that seized her, touching every nerve until they were aflame. There was nothing she could do to still the quiver of anticipation as he lowered his head and covered her mouth with his own. The shock of his lips on hers was one of wild, indescribably sweetness and sensuality as he claimed a kiss of violent tenderness. In silent permission she opened her mouth to his and what followed evoked feelings she had never felt before. That was when she realised the idea of resisting him was ludicrous and a gross miscalculation of her power to deny him, for the kiss went through her with the impact of a broadside.
His lips caressed and clung to hers, finding them moist and honey sweet, and for a slow beat in time hers responded, parting under his mounting fervour. She leaned against him, melting more closely to him, as though the strength had gone from her. All her will began to crumble and disintegrate. The moment was one of madness. The sweetness of the kiss, the yielding to it, of willingly parting her soft lips for his searching tongue, made her confused with longing. Unconsciously, and too naïve to know how to hide her feelings, her arm rose and slid over his wide, masculine shoulders and she slipped her hand behind his neck, a movement which, in her inexperience, was an act of pure instinct to Linnet, unaware that it might convince this stranger that she was no different to any other woman he had made love to. Seemingly aware of her weakening, he raised his head and stared down at the softness in her eyes.
‘Please,’ Linnet whispered, trying to sound firm but without conviction. ‘We should stop. This game has gone on long enough.’
‘Games are for children. This is something between a man and a woman.’
‘But...’
He silenced her with his lips, kissing her long and deep and hard. He closed his eyes, intense desire for this woman torturing him. As he caressed and kissed this sweet young woman, his flesh betrayed his need, rising up against his will. He was hungry for her and could hardly restrain himself from flinging her down on to the floor and making love to her.
* * *
Imprisoned by his embrace and seduced by his mouth and strong, caressing hands, which slid down the curve of her spine to the swell of her buttocks and back to her arms, her neck, burning wherever they touched, Linnet clung to him, her body responding eagerly, melting with the primitive sensations that went soaring through her, her lips beginning to move against his with increasing abandon as she fed his hunger, unwittingly increasing it. When he slid one hand down to her buttocks and pressed her to him, she became acutely conscious of her innocence. She was lost in a dreamy limbo where nothing mattered but the closeness of his body and the circling protection of his arms.
Not for a moment did he break the kiss that was inciting her. His mouth was hungering, turning to a heated, crushing demand. What she had felt in the beginning became raw hunger, cindered beneath the white heat of their mutual desires. It was sudden, the awakened fires, the hungering lust, the bittersweet ache of passion such as Linnet could never have imagined.
When he finally drew his mouth from hers an eternity later, Linnet reluctantly surfaced from the glorious Eden where he had sent her, her face suffused with languor and passion, her eyes luminous.
‘Well, well,’ he murmured, lightly touching her lips with his own. ‘I seem to have awakened a temptress. You’re the most direct, self-willed woman I have ever met, traits I admire in any woman, but you are also so damn lovely and desirable.’
His words affected Linnet like a douche of cold water. Stepping back, she glared at him, trying to regain control of her rioting emotions. ‘You should not have done that... We—we shouldn’t...’
* * *
Struggling for control, finding it with effort, Christian swept a lock of dark hair from his brow. ‘Come now,’ he managed to say, smiling, though he himself was shaken by the moment. ‘It was only a kiss—an innocent kiss, nothing more sordid than that.’ But he was not convinced by his words. With her ripe young body, moist lips and large liquid bright eyes, he was led to think that he had never caressed any woman that had evoked his imagination as much as she did. The lingering impression of her lips on his, of their thighs pressed together, had done much to awaken a manly craving that had gone unappeased for some months.
* * *
‘You call what you just did innocent?’ Linnet whispered, still trying to come to terms with what had just happened between them.
Raising his hand, he traced a finger gently down the curve of her warm, flushed cheek. ‘It was a kiss—a kiss that could lead to other things—if you would let it.’
Linnet looked at him with a renewed light in her eyes, under no illusion as to what he was asking of her. He was smiling now, a lazy, masculine, supremely confident smile, a gentle promise in his expression and the flickering depths of his eyes that drew her in. It held her spellbound for the longest moment as a plan began forming in her mind, a plan so shocking she hardly dared enlarge on it. It caused her heart to pound so hard she could scarcely breathe, for it was a plan no gently bred young lady would dare think of, let alone consider.
She had been raised to believe that young ladies of quality must not abandon the restrictive codes of behaviour that governed their conduct without fear of censure, but with one stroke, this stranger had presented her with an answer to her problem. Despite having caught her in the act of what he mistakenly thought was stealing, he was obviously attracted by her. On a stroke of desperation all her fears and wretchedness, all the worries for the future, came hurtling back to her and she thought that maybe she could turn the situation to her advantage. By giving herself to him on her terms, perhaps she could retrieve the necklace, return it to its rightful place and exonerate Toby of any wrongdoing.
The plan sent a chill down Linnet’s spine, but it did not shock her. The misery that Toby’s gambling had caused her over the past months had come to a culmination when this man had made his presence known to her and drained her of all feeling so there was hardly any emotion left in her. If her capacity to feel had been intact, everything inside her would have protested and rebelled against the plan forming in her mind. But with her feelings and emotions subdued by the anxiety of the situation her brother had created, Linnet’s thoughts were entirely practical. She was driven by desperation. She and Toby had been impoverished for a long time and she was determined they would not become beggars. If there was a way of saving herself and Toby from homelessness and starvation, then she would do everything in her power to do so. Afterwards, the shame would be something she alone would have to live with.
‘I am not afraid and I have a mind to test your generosity and exact my revenge—to recoup what I have just lost to you. If I were to lay down terms of my own, would you accept them for an evening of pleasure?’
‘Terms?’
‘An evening of pleasure in return for the necklace you have just taken from me?’
He frowned. ‘And your terms are not open for negotiation?’
‘No. Take it or leave it,’ she said, her voice low and direct, her lovely eyes challenging.
* * *
He had to give her credit, Christian thought to himself, fighting down a rush of disgust. At least she was honest about what she wanted. And he had to respect her honesty and courage, if not her standards. Her decision to consider his offer was anything but respectable. He wondered how, in a matter of moments, he had gone from thinking of her as a thief, then as an opponent in a game of chance, to seriously considering inviting her to share an evening of pleasure.
He had not had a serious relationship with a woman in a long time, nor had he