A mistake. As her lips parted beneath the subtle, hungry pressure of his own, Justin knew kissing her
had been a terrible mistake. But it was too late to extricate himself. He could only slide his tongue between her parted lips, making hot, slippery love to her mouth with all the tender ferocity his body craved. Her taste was magic and he couldn't have pulled himself away if she had wrapped her legs
around him and dragged him to her kingdom deep beneath the sea.
He buried his face in her damp curls. The faintest aroma of vanilla clung to her hair, rendered erotic by
its very purity. Just one touch, he promised himself. Just to rake his fingers across her sand-sugared skin, to cup the gentle swell of her breast in his palm…
He was already reaching for her when the husky whisper came, so close to his ear it had the intimacy
of his own thoughts. "I stabbed the last man who stuck his tongue in my mouth."
Justin slowly lifted his head. He hung there, caught dead in the sights of her sparkling brown eyes.
"What's wrong? I didn't swallow it, did I?" Her pert nose crinkled as she laughed. Justin thought it was
the most endearing thing he had ever seen.
Her merry eyes went somber. She lifted her hand. Justin couldn't move, couldn't breathe. Her fingers caught a stray lock of his hair, brushed it gently from his brow. "You have the most extraordinary eyes," she whispered.
Then she rolled over, snuggled her face against the warmth of his lap, and went back to sleep.
Time stopped. Justin couldn't have said how long he knelt there, brushing the sand from her tangled
curls and enduring the exquisite torture of her warm sigh breaching the threadbare calico of his dungarees.
He didn't even hear Penfeld approach, huffing and puffing as if he'd trotted all the way from England. "There you are, sir. I was just out for a stroll-" His gaze dropped to Justin's lap. He threw a hand over his eyes. "Good Lord!"
"What?" Justin gazed dumbly up at him, still lost in the throes of his reverie.
Penfeld peeped between his round little fingers. "If I've come at an inopportune moment, sir…?"
Justin blinked as if coming awake after a long sleep. The sleep of a lifetime. He reluctantly untangled his fingers from the skein of curls. "No, no. You've come at the perfect time. Give me your coat."
Justin had to admire his valet's aplomb. Penfeld turned his back and peeled off his coat as if finding his master cuddled on the beach with a nude, insensible woman were a normal occurrence. He started to
fold it. Justin tugged it out of his hand. If he hadn't stopped him, Justin knew he would have washed
and pressed it before handing it over.
Penfeld rubbed his arms, shivering in his crisp linen shirt as if he were the one naked. "I do say, is it
a mermaid, sir?"
"Do you see any gills?"
Penfeld chanced a tentative glance over his shoulder. What he did see was a voluptuous young woman being tenderly enveloped in the folds of his coat.
Justin stood, gathering her like a child in his arms. Her head lolled warm and damp against his shoulder. His gaze traced her features-the elfin tilt of her nose, the pout that made no apology for its sensual promise.
Penfeld dared to turn around. "Wherever did she come from, sir? Could she be the victim of a shipwreck perhaps? Or a stowaway?"
Grinning, Justin lifted his head. "No stowaway, Penfeld, but a gift. A gift from the sea."
Penfeld couldn't remember the last time he'd seen his master truly smile. Justin was already striding
down the beach, his steps no longer weighted, but as light as if he carried not a woman, but a blithe
spirit fashioned of sea foam and Stardust. As Penfeld watched, Justin did the most extraordinary thing.
He lowered his head and pressed a kiss to the tip of the woman's nose.
Penfeld mopped his forehead, wondering if they'd both been struck with the moon madness so coveted and feared by the natives.
Emily burrowed into the thin mattress, her mind tugging greedily at the blurred edges of sleep. She despised waking up. Despised the sleet tapping at the tiny attic window, the wash water frozen in her basin, the prospect of crawling down the steep stairs to teach French to wealthy little brats who didn't know their demitasses from their derrieres and who teased her mercilessly because her dress was two years too small. Groaning, she fumbled for a pillow to pull over her head. Perhaps if she hid long enough, Tansy would come tapping on the door with a mug of steaming black coffee smuggled out from under Cook's bulbous nose.
Her groping search yielded no pillow. A new sensation crept over her, a feeling utterly delicious and so foreign to her gloomy attic that she wanted to weep at its beauty.
Warmth.
She slowly opened her eyes. The sun fanned tingling fingers across her face. She lay there, stunned, basking in its heat, enveloped in its healing rays. She closed her eyes against the dazzling shaft of light. When she opened them again, a twisted green face hung only an inch above her own, its pointed teeth bared in a ferocious grimace.
She shrieked and scrambled backward, groping for a weapon. Her fingers curled around the first blunt object they could find. As her back slammed into a wall, dust exploded, setting her off on a quaking
chain of sneezes.
"Now look what you've done, Trini. You've frightened the poor girl. I dare say she's never seen a
savage before."
Emily wiped her streaming eyes. Now two faces were peering at her. One was still green, but the other was round and decidedly English. It was clicking its tongue and shaking its side-whiskers like a great overgrown hamster.
The fierce green face loomed nearer. "How do you do, miss? The sheer luminosity of your countenance beguiles me. I take extreme delight in welcoming you, our most charming breast."
The round face pinkened. Emily gaped. The savage's words had come rolling out in deep, resonant tones as if he'd just strolled from the hallowed corridors of Cambridge, his feathered cloak swinging around his shoulders. Emily realized his teeth were bared not in a snarl, but in a beaming smile. Nor was he entirely green. Deep furrows of jade had been tattooed in his honey-colored skin in elaborate curls and soaring wings.
A soft groan came out of the shadows. "Not breast, Trini. Guest."
She squinted into the corner, but the sunlight had blinded her. She could make out only a vague shape.
The tattooed man stretched out a hand. She recoiled and smacked it away. "I'll keep my breast to
myself, thank you. I'm not a simpering ninny for some native Lothario to ravish."
The savage threw back his head. His musical laughter rocked the small hut.
"Did I say something amusing?" she asked the hamster. Her head was starting to pound and she was wishing even more desperately for that coffee.