“This conversation is ridiculous.” Her arms crossed over her chest. “I am trying to extricate you from this mess, and you are making things difficult as usual.”
“As usual? I have always been accommodating,” he said smoothly.
She snorted. “You have been driving me mad for years.”
On this particular occasion, Justin was fairly certain that the reason why she was maddened was for just the reason he’d like and if assisting her kept her within his grasp long enough to act upon it, he had no objections. “How can I help you?”
“If you could manage to delay your departure for a few days, we could contrive ways to demonstrate how we are completely inappropriate for one another-such as your love for dogs and my dislike of them. Not simply because we are contrary progeny who refuse to heed the wisdom of our elders, but because we are a disaster together.”
“A disaster?” By the time all was said and done, he would know every reason why she had never considered him for marriage. He would know everything about her, including all the ways he could make her come.
“Well,” she shrugged, “something similar to that, if we have any luck at all. Imagine the fun! Eventually, they will retreat from their plans, hopefully before we cause any permanent damage.”
Justin laughed.
And Sophie was captivated.
Merriment transformed him, thawed him. Fine lines spread out from the corners of his eyes, revealing how often he found amusement in his life. Suddenly, Sophie wished she knew the man who had earned those laugh lines, the private one. Someone he had recently become. Or perhaps he’d always had a hidden side? One she had failed to see?
The prickle of sexual awareness she had felt all evening intensified to the point where she was forced to rub her arms. She stared at him, unable to look away. His smile slowly faded, his expression altering to become fiercely intent. It made her shiver, that look. And he had been giving it to her ever since she’d entered his bedchamber.
“Have you been alone since Langley passed?” he asked in an intimate murmur.
“I have my son.”
“That is not what I meant, and well you know it.”
Sophie tugged her feet out from under George and Edward’s great heads and stood. “Heavens, it’s late.”
Fontaine rose as well, and followed her to the door. She reached for the knob and was startled when he came up behind her, his palm pressed to the panel over her head preventing her from leaving. Caged by his big body, there was no way to avoid breathing in the scent of his skin. It was delicious, as was the warmth that radiated from him. He moved closer, pressing his front to her back. She began to pant. The knowledge that he was fully, impressively aroused was inescapable.
She was tormented by her confusion. Reconciling the seductive male behind her with the aloof boy she knew from the past was beyond difficult. There had been a measure of safety in the distance inherent in friendship. Now, the imaginings in her mind of the two of them as lovers bridged that gap.
“Your heart is racing,” he whispered, his breath hot against her skin. His tongue swept across the vein that fluttered madly at her throat. Her back arched and a startled cry escaped her.
“A portion of your response is desire.” His open mouth brushed behind her ear and she shuddered violently. “But a portion of it is fear. Why? You must know that I would never hurt you.”
Unable to speak, Sophie agreed with a jerky nod. His teeth bit gently into the tender flesh where her shoulder met her neck. Her knees weakened and his free arm came around her, banding at her waist to support her. Taking further liberties, his thumb stroked the side of her breast in a soothing rhythm that did nothing to calm her.
Sophie’s eyes closed and her damp forehead rested against the door. His chest labored against her back, the heat of his body set hers on fire. Her nipples peaked hard and tight, aching. As if he knew, he cupped her breast and kneaded it. Her sex clenched in rhythm with his grasp and she grew wet, slippery and hot.
“Oh dear God,” she moaned, quaking. How did a woman manage a desire such as this? She had lusted for Langley and relished his lovemaking, but those emotions had not reached this depth. She hadn’t the experience required to control her responses. “You overwhelm me. I cannot think or breathe.”
“And I am undone.” His mouth was moving over her bared skin. Nipping, licking, biting. “This is passion, Sophie. Need and hunger.”
“It is insanity, my l-lord.” Her voice broke as he continued to fondle her intimately. “With a small ch-child dependent upon me, I cannot afford to go in-insane.”
“There is only one cure,” he murmured. “Shall we administer it?”
She shook her head, but lack of energy gave the movement no strength. “I do not understand…what is happening.”
Justin breathed deeply. “We are becoming lovers, sweet Sophie. Finally.”
He tilted his head and took her mouth. She gasped at the contact, the tingling of her lips urging her to press them hard against his. Her angle was awkward, but she did not care. The kiss was perfect, his lips so soft, yet firm, the taste of him dark and delectable. She could not temper the ardent way she answered him. Her response was instinctual and greedy.
The groan that left his throat made her shiver, so filled with rough longing and ravenous need. He licked deep inside her, his tongue gliding back and forth against hers, the measured tempo blatantly erotic. She whimpered softly as tension coiled in her womb. He pulled back at the sound, breathing harshly. “Stay with me tonight.”
Her lower lip quivered, her thoughts scattered and unable to settle. Justin licked the soft curve of her mouth, his touch so reverent it coaxed a tear to blur her vision, then slip down her cheek. He wrenched himself away. She felt his loss keenly; the lack of his warmth left her cold, the lack of his support left her shaky.
“Damn you.” The look he gave her scorched. “I can make you stay. I can make you beg me to allow you to stay. But that is not what I want. You will give yourself to me. I will have you no other way.”
Sophie turned to face him, lifting her fingers to press against her kiss-swollen lips. “You have always…” She reached behind her and gripped the knob.
“Always what?” he asked gruffly, the lust within him a palpable thing, barely leashed.
“Always been too much.” With a quick pivot, she opened the door. “Good night, my lord.”
She fled, leaving him standing there staring after her.
George whined softly. Edward paced at the threshold.
Justin knew just how they felt.
Chapter Three
“Lady Sophie said something to me last evening that perplexes me,” the marquess murmured to his mother the next morning as they descended the stairs to the lower floor for breakfast.
“Oh?”
“Yes, she said I have always been ‘too much.’ I’ve no notion of what that is supposed to mean.”
Her mouth curved innocently, an affectation reinforced by her pale ringlets and light blue gown. “Interesting.”
He glanced aside at her. “Do you know what she is referring to?”
“Hmm…Perhaps she means to say you are overwhelming.”
“Yes.” Justin scowled. “She said that, too.”
“Truly? How did I miss this discussion? I recall you two sat quite some distance from each other in the parlor after dinner.”
“Never mind that,” he muttered. “Can you explain what the devil she is talking about?”
She linked her slender arm with his. “When you both were children, she used to make up stories about you. You were a ‘prince’ most often, though sometimes when you were surly, you were cast as a toad or an ass.”
He choked.
“I noted something in her stories. You were usually set atop an intimidating pedestal. A character who ruled over all with an iron fist and nary a smile. She would speak of you with awe.”