Lyon. Elizabeth Amber
Читать онлайн книгу.
position and hope she approached him. He’d been here nearly an hour and she was the only female in the room who hadn’t.
The Cossack spoke again, raising his glass in a caricature of a toast. “Good luck to you then. I’ve attended these salons every Thursday for the past three months and still haven’t won a turn in that one’s bed. My pockets are deep enough, so I can only assume it’s my pedigree that Mademoiselle Rabelais’s guardian finds objectionable.”
Lyon’s gaze narrowed on their host, Monsieur Valmont, the apparent owner of these apartments. A tall, slender man with preternaturally white hair, he was handsome, Lyon supposed. But so pale that he put him in mind of a portrait his eldest brother had in his vast collection. The one that depicted Vlad the Impaler, a Romanian prince with an infamous past and an appetite for blood.
He returned his gaze to the more pleasant perspective of Juliette Rabelais. One of ten women set amid nearly three dozen men, she was the obvious trophy. She was one of those women whose every gesture put him in mind of the soft slide of a velvet drape across warm flesh—soothing, lush, and full of sexual promise. Something about her was hypnotic. Watching her was a pleasure he could quickly grow accustomed to.
As if she were blithely unaware that every man in this luxurious salon panted after her, she serenely held court on her satin throne, like an orchid set among a besotted cast of dandified thistles, pigweed, and toadflax.
“Six months for me and still nothing,” a Frenchman on the Cossack’s other side commiserated. “Why I still come is un mystère.” He gazed into the depths of his glass, then back at the green-eyed object of his desire as though unable to prevent himself.
Lyon never understood this sort of talk from men. Like his brothers, he had a voracious appetite for the company of women, both in and out of bed. But though he had come to Paris specifically to locate his bride and had to his amazement found two candidates rather than one, he was under no illusion that Juliette Rabelais would fell his heart any more than Sibela had.
Conversation ebbed around him and her voice reached his ears. His hand tightened on his glass. Hearing an attractive, available woman speak in French was almost guaranteed to gift him with an erection. Particularly a woman with almond hair and a long white throat. Particularly one whose every deliciously accented syllable caused her lips to purse as though she were kissing the air. Particularly a woman he planned to bed.
That decision had been made for him the moment he’d scented her on the bridge. Then, when she’d spoken, he’d felt something inside himself shift. Unlock. Open.
In that instant, even as he lay atop another woman, a need to protect this one had been born within him. A need to keep her from want. A need to bury his heated, straining cock so deep inside her that she would be forever branded as his.
Here was the intense, immediate attraction he’d not found with Sibela. But of course, it wasn’t love.
“If you wish to visit Valmont’s back rooms, approach one of the girls for hire,” yet another Frenchman volunteered. “Negotiations for the favors of Mademoiselle Juliette are done in a different manner than for the others.”
Lyon cocked his head. “How so?”
The first Frenchman eyed him, obviously beginning to worry all this coaching might lead Lyon to usurp his own chances with her. “Such arrangements are made through M. Valmont,” he said with reluctance. “Ask about her culinary talents. You’ll only waste your breath if you directly request that she visit your bed. If an agreement for her favors is made, it’s understood she’ll serve you at your table as well as in your boudoir.”
“It’s said that she sets a table comparable to some of the finest chefs in all of Paris,” someone chimed in.
“It’s likely true if these éclairs are anything to judge by,” said the second Frenchman as he lifted one from his plate. He consumed the pastry with a single gulp of his greedy mouth. “And have you tried the cream-filled baguettes?”
“If I ever get Mademoiselle Rabelais to myself she is more than welcome to suck the cream from my baguette,” the Cossack groused darkly into his glass.
This was met with a burst of randy, good-natured guffaws from his companions. Except for Lyon, who shifted all six and a half feet of his muscular form toward the man, sending a crystal, swan-shaped bowl on the pedestal between them tumbling to the floor in the process.
“I’m certain you must have business elsewhere that calls you away from this establishment. I suggest you attend to it.” Amber glinted dangerously, coloring his words.
The Cossack’s eyes widened and his drink sloshed as he sidled away. “Pardon me—I must…yes, I…” Without finishing, he strode off, his boots tripping in his haste to put distance between himself and Lyon’s annoyance.
The others drifted off on various excuses as well, wary of him now. He stared into his wine, shocked at himself. And a little embarrassed. He’d never been jealous about a woman in his life.
If he was testy, it was likely due to the frustrations of the evening and anticipation of Moonful, he reassured himself. His blood was already quickening in preparation for tomorrow night’s Calling, and he was more easily roused to lechery, anger—and jealousy, apparently.
He looked up, toward the woman across the room. Her eyes darted away. She’d been watching him again. Could she handle what he would become tomorrow? Would she, willingly?
With a curl of her delicate wrist, the tip of her painted Chinese fan traced her collarbone, then drifted lower toward the ripe curve of a porcelain breast. More than one male eye followed its downward path.
She was dressed to tempt, in a shimmering gown the color of her hair with silver edging along a neckline that barely concealed her nipples. A frown creased his brow. No doubt even those were on display to the man seated beside her, if the direction of his eyes were any indication. He and every other man in the room studied the shift of her breasts as she turned, evading his overly familiar hand.
He realized he’d begun staring at her in a manner he feared was as besotted as his previous companions and his fist tightened on the fragile stem of his glass. That she’d had other men before him mattered not a whit. Considering the inauspicious circumstances of their prior meeting, he could only hope she would be as generous toward him.
His gaze slid over her bodice and traveled boldly lower. In another venue, he’d have been more circumspect, but everyone here knew her body was on exhibition. He studied the drape of her skirts, looking forward to discovering the shape of her below them, for a woman’s derriere held her greatest attraction for him.
Never mind a blushing cheek or pretty lips. Give him a nicely rounded ass and he was more than content with that asset alone.
Mademoiselle Rabelais chose that moment to rise to her feet and see to one of her duties as hostess. Leaving the men on the dais to their own conversation, she went to survey the food displayed on the side table.
Lyon saw his chance and took it.
Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.
Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».
Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию на ЛитРес.
Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или