by Tracy Sumner
Higher, lower, faster, harder…more.
Arousal flooded his body, his cock digging painfully against the bone buttons running the length of his trouser close. He dropped his arm to cover it and breathed hard through his nose. Then he remembered. A memory propelled by the fingers dipping into the hair framing his nape and skimming his scalp, the teasing, cinnamon-scented breath streaking past his cheek and diving into his senses.
The haircut.
His lids slipped low as the scissors made a metallic hiss next to his ear. She would do this when they’d agreed to friendship? Agreed to a denial of their attraction?
When she knew who and what he was?
My God, she was a reckless bit of baggage. Or mad. Or both.
He’d not consented to touching. Standing so close he could almost taste her. Feeling enticement of this magnitude without his gift tainting it, turning his feelings in upon themselves until they were a twisted mess. Emotion, honest and pure, and overwhelming, with nothing to suck the life from it.
“Don’t be alarmed. I used to do this for my brother. And some of the household staff when funds got ridiculously tight, and we had to reduce wages.” She tugged on his hair, pulling the strands taut as she snipped, and he barely contained a groan of delight. Goosebumps erupted along his arms. His chest constricted. His heartbeat raced. “I’m quite proficient. Steady hand and all that.”
“What?” he asked breathlessly, his concentration held captive by a raging erection and the air trapped in his lungs. She thought he feared the haircut? That he cared if she had a steady hand? A jolt of humility hit him, the Blue Bastard brought gutter-low. He wasn’t sure how experienced she was, what with the hasty kisses she tossed out like torn stockings, but this effort pointed to it being less than he’d assumed. Much less.
Because her touch was setting him on fire.
She went on talking like nothing momentous was occurring. Although the chatter did somewhat diminish the impact of her hands roving all over him. “How is the Duke of Ashcroft involved with the League? I believe the giant called him Fireball.”
Finn suppressed the shiver that pleaded for the opportunity to work its way up to his spine as bits of hair fluttered to his lap. “Um…” He struggled as another sweet breath blasted past his ear. Why did she always smell like biscuits? “This stays within the confines of this estate, but he has a rather unusual talent for shooting fire from his fingertips. Rather, he can start fires at will. It’s quite extraordinary. Or bloody frightening, take your pick. Because his control has not always been tip-top. It’s why he’s known to favor pyrotechnics. A solid excuse for the accidents at his estates.”
The scissors snapped shut as her gasp circled the room.
“It’s true. I have the singed clothing to prove it.”
“He’s part of the League,” she whispered.
“For years. Since he helped us resolve a kidnapping incident with Piper before she and Julian were married.”
“Kidnapping?”
“We have enemies. I tried to tell you.” He suppressed a shiver, curling his hands into fists to keep from running his fingers through his newly-shorn hair. “Ashcroft’s contacts have broadened our reach in ways we’d never have without him, while Piper has helped him gain modest control. An equitable trade. Also, he’s a former soldier with mercenaries on his payroll, ones Julian likes to plant like shrubs around the estate. You’ve seen them, the ones with stern expressions and scarred faces. Julian’s increasing them around the perimeter, with you here. In the future…” Finn clenched his jaw to keep the sentiment from spilling free.
The Grape couldn’t protect her.
But the Duke of Ashcroft could.
And he had the funds to save her family, save a thousand families. A destitute aristocrat, the duke was not. Although Finn made no mention of it, thanks to Julian’s sounds investments and his own of late, he could save a few families himself. But money could not change fact. Finn would never be more than a noble byblow—and the actual truth, which he’d want his wife to know—was even less palatable.
He would never be a suitable choice for an earl’s daughter.
Despite the challenge his body was issuing with one standing behind him smelling of sodding flowers and sweets just pulled from the oven, her attentive little breaths racing past his ear, her fingers having stilled to rest lightly on his shoulder. He’d never before felt like he might, with an innocent, grazing touch, spill in his trousers like a randy adolescent.
Christ, being this close to her was torment of a variety he was unaccustomed to.
Because he usually took what he wanted. Was offered what he wanted.
Following a blind impulse, he swiveled to face her. Her gaze was the glazed, cavernous color of a forest at midnight, her bottom lip swollen as if she’d been assaulting it. As he watched, holding himself as steady as he had in his life, her cheeks lit, a vivid wash followed by an unsteady exhalation.
So, he wasn’t the only one affected by the haircut.
“I didn’t enjoy the kisses,” she whispered. “Three to be exact. March, Lyle, Somerset. Oh, well, four counting Rossby. Although his was painful. Bruised my lip. I dare say I’m not looking forward to that again.” She smiled, but it didn’t reach her eyes. “That will make having offspring rather a problem, won’t it?”
He blinked, releasing his own unsteady breath when he wanted to smash his fist into the Grape’s face. “Why tell me this?”
Her pupils flared, chin lifting, gaslight winking off her spectacle lenses. “Because I think I’d like yours.”
The devastating confession held him captive, boxed in on all sides, his heart bumping against his ribs until he was sure she could hear it over the ticking mantel clock, the call of a Whippoorwill outside the window, the clang of a washbasin down the hall. Like a translation, he was uncovering obscure pieces of her one word at a time. Lashes so long they dusted her skin when she blinked, a delightful sprinkling of freckles across the bridge of her nose, the one next to her mouth that had called to him from the first moment he’d seen it.
She held his gaze, accepted his regard with quiet courage. A formidable partner should he be looking for one.
He recalled her warning at the Blue Moon. I’m not going to yield.
Evidently, neither was he.
With judicious intent, he slipped her spectacles from her face, gave them a gentle fold, and placed them on the desk. “You’re right,” he agreed, sliding his hand up her cheek and into her hair, guiding her body into position between his spread legs. “You will like it.”
“What are you doing?” Her voice was frayed at the edges.
“Breaking our agreement.”
Then with a soft sigh, he pressed his lips to hers.
Touching him had been a mistake.
Tendering such an intimate gesture as trimming his hair had been a mistake. All she’d done was free the strands to curl adorably about a face that needed no further introduction. Gambling with herself and him for some irrational reason. Likely because, hellion at heart, she couldn’t help herself. Backing down from a dare, even her own, was not a skill.
Now, his lips were covering hers, his head tilting to adjust the fit, the hand at her nape squeezing as he released a hoarse sound that ignited her blood, sending a river of fire through her veins. He was as tied up by their attraction as she was, this unbelievably handsome, brilliant man.
“Let me in,” he pleaded, his thumb drawing her bottom lip down until she had no choice but to follow his command. Follow every forbidden one whispering through her mind.
Step in until your hips meet.
Tangle your fingers in his hair.
Angle your head.
Touch his tongue with yours.
Clash, engage, explore.
It was a kiss unlike any she’d ever experienced—and she tumbled into it with abandon. It wasn’t born of domination or teasing flights of fancy, an effort to persuade or negotiate. An endeavor built around running from trou
ble or into it.
It wasn’t soft. It wasn’t gentle. A typical first-try experiment.
It wasn’t even perfect.
It was fierce.
His tooth bumped hers, the one with the chip. When she ran her tongue along the ragged edge, helplessly digging her fingertips into his scalp and bringing him closer, he reacted with a moan and a hip shift that brought his shockingly stalwart erection into play against her thigh. She shouldn’t have known what it was, a gently bred young woman, yet she did.
And it, he, felt magnificent.
She sighed in yearning as astonishing discoveries ripped through her. His breath teasing her lips as he repositioned his mouth over hers and dove deeper. The moist flush of his skin beneath her questing hands. Broad shoulders, muscular chest, lean hips. Brushed cotton caressing her cheek as he wrapped his arms around her. The enticing scent of spice and chocolate clinging to his hair, his skin, his clothing. His hands moving lower, grasping her hips and settling her against him as she went up her toes to secure the fit. The world spun, racing at high speed, and locking them in its fiery center.
What a kiss was all she could think.
What a man.
What a find.
She was sliding his brace off his shoulder, having already tugged his four-in-hand from about his neck when voices in the hallway suspended rotation of the clandestine world they occupied. With a wrenching, awkward movement, he gripped her shoulders and pushed her back, blinked hard, and met her gaze, presenting as bewildered an expression as she guessed she’d ever see from him. She watched, waiting. It was seconds, long, measured seconds, before the room they stood in, their being locked in each other’s embrace, before everything—good, bad, indifferent—came to him, riding on his sharp intake of air. “Fucking hell,” he whispered, brushing his knuckles across his lips as if they stung.
This won’t end well, her mind taunted. Not when such a grim expression was seizing his features, his eyes darkening to a thoughtful, complicated, hands-off indigo. He uncurled her fingers from his brace and slipped it back in place, then went to a knee to retrieve his necktie from where it lay crumpled on the carpet. Appalling, perhaps, but she, Victoria Lane Hamilton, disregarded daughter of an earl, had been in the process of undressing Finn Alexander, celebrated bounder, in his brother’s library.
Victoria took two steps back and slumped to the sofa they’d shared a mere twenty-four hours prior with their attraction admitted to but not acted upon. A disastrous difference. Finn was set to deny everything—she could see this from the stiff set of his shoulders, the downcast eyes, the way he yanked the tie about his neck, and created the ugliest four-in-hand she’d ever seen with fingers that, thank you very much, Tori darling, shook.
“Fine,” she whispered, dropping her brow to her hand and squeezing. She could play this game. She’d played any number of games with any number of gentlemen. Forlorn but fine in the end, she wanted to tell the Blue Bastard but didn’t dare.
In that fantastic world we stepped into, we were normal.
Did you feel it, Finn? Normal.
Maybe that was what unnerved him, because he looked unnerved crouching there on Julian’s faded Aubusson rug, collecting hair she’d clipped from his head and placing it delicately in his cupped palm.
After all, the poor man had never experienced normal.
“You’re a virgin in this area. Is this the source of your discomfiture?”
His gaze hit her, the ire in his eyes—and just who the devil he was angry with she’d love to know—a surprise. “What?”
She tapped her temple. “For the first time, you can’t steal someone’s thoughts. Did I like it? Was it better than the others? Do I suspect you’re a most extraordinary lover? You’ve bedded half of the women in London, so why the tumult over a simple kiss? Because you can’t read the mind of the accomplice? Join the rest of us who have to make an insecure guess, Mr. Alexander!”
“Don’t believe everything you hear. It’s far less than half.” He gave his neckpiece a solidifying jerk and rose to his feet, dusting at his shoulders, hair flying. She tried to ignore the bulge in his trousers, she really did. Inelegant of her, but it was too impressive to ignore. He was too impressive to ignore. “I’ll tell you this much, no simple kiss I’ve ever participated in included the accomplice removing my clothing one tantalizing piece at a time. That’s reserved for the complicated kisses. My bright idea, this whole debacle, true enough, but you ended it close to climbing atop me.” He dropped to the chair, dumped the hair on a stack of letters, and gave her spectacles a dink that had them sliding across the desk and against a ledger. His firm jaw was set like stone. “And if you’ve ever had better, I’ll eat my goddamn hat. I’ve seen a few of them, remember? Those graciously-offered-behind-pillar kisses extended to every loose-lipped fop in town. Truthfully, they looked inhospitable and not much else.”
“You don’t wear hats,” she snapped, insulted by his riposte when his reputation was beyond horrendous. Had she ever had a better kiss? Of course not. Not when she’d never dreamed there could be a kiss like this one. Inhospitable? True. The others had been boring and brief, no tongue or teeth, for heaven’s sake. No strangled breaths batting her cheek and clenching fingers curling around her hip. No full-body flush that was still warming her to her toes.
She straightened her spine and raised her chin, prepared to fight. Why save all her enthusiasm for her intended when the Grape couldn’t possibly put it to good use? If her technique was lacking, it would be excellent with a little practice. “Is this how charming you are after every romantic encounter? Why, I’m relatively faint with delight.”
He grunted and yanked his hand through his hair, sending the liberated strands into elegant disarray. He made a face that had his dimple swooping in, should she have forgotten about it, denting his cheek like she’d poked her finger against his skin. “Your hair looks like a bird built a nest in it, Tori darling, and I’m terrified to imagine what mine looks like. Did you even finish the trim?” He threw a circling glance around the room. “Never a mirror when you need one.”
Finn Alexander would be bloody gorgeous if he shaved his head, she seethed while struggling to reassemble a coiffure he’d ruined with his eagerness. She’d darling him. He’d almost pulled her atop his body. She wouldn’t have had to climb anything. Would he like her to point that out?
“We have to face Julian in fifteen minutes,” he said and dropped his head to the back of the chair, “and my hands are shaking. I’m not good at hiding things from my brother. He’ll know the minute he sees me that something happened. Kissing you, the blocking, the League, he won’t like it. I can just hear him, ‘Boy-o, this is a remarkable conflict of interest’.”
“What about the other”—she eyed his lap—“issue?”
He glanced down, frowned, not even trying to act like he didn’t understand her question. “Still apparent. I shall remain seated.”
In for a penny… “You said I could be different here. Free. What’s the harm?”
His head jerked up, color rushing across his cheeks. Unbelievably, for such a skilled libertine, he wasn’t good at hiding his emotions. “No. Oh, no. No way. This kiss was it. Finito. A fleeting lapse. A moment’s insanity. Masculine idiocy.” He half came out of his chair. “We’re doubling down on the friendship bet. You’d be mad to consider anything else. I’m not for you, for any proper lady, in any way but one. A road you and I are not traveling. You know this. You know my story. The rookery, the orphanage. Isn’t that ignominy enough of a detriment?”
She rose, walked to the desk, leaning over it until her face was inches from his. He didn’t move a muscle, but he drew a staggered breath as his arms tensed. Interesting. Finn Alexander was only comfortable when he was in control. “Has anyone ever said no to you, Blue?”
His eyebrow rose, just the one, an excellent recovery. “It’s rare.”
Lowering her lashes, she smiled, then laughed at the fascinating mix that crossed his face. Curios
ity, suspicion. “Most of us mere mortals hear it all the time, so we quickly find ways around it. Lots of ways.”
A choking sound ripped from his throat. “Good God, is that a dare? Hell’s teeth, are you one presumptuous piece of baggage.”
She moistened her lips, pleased to see his gaze sharpen, his hands clench where they rested atop the desk. “I’d say it’s more a statement of fact.”
“You can take your statement of fact and jam it—”
This kiss caught him off guard, threw him off balance, which is where she wanted him to be. She missed his mouth trying to reach him, but the spontaneous reaction from earlier raced back in even with her lips pressed to his cheek, tangling them in need and blinding desire. She shifted and popped up on her toes. If he would just move a little to the—
He broke away and circled the desk in three strides, caught her shoulders and walked her back, almost lifting her from her slippers. “You love puzzles, Tori. And as I’m coming to find, so do I.” Then he slanted his head and captured her lips, crowding her into the wall and pressing his long, lean body against hers until she couldn’t tell where hers ended and his began.
The kiss was punishing, filled with two parts retribution and one part rage, finally fully exposing the man beneath the cavalier façade. Overlord of a gaming hell, mind reader, gifted interpreter. Intelligent, furious, passionate, perplexed. Going against his anger, his hand rose to cradle her jaw, a tender, trembling touch that softened the assault. Softened her heart until her weakened knees failed, and she had to grasp his forearms for balance, only his broad chest and the wall holding her up.
“Incorrigible,” he murmured against her lips. “Mischief-maker.”
“Very,” she agreed, looping a gloved hand around his neck and pulling him closer, her body unfurling like rose petals dipped in dew as his tongue swept in and engaged. His arm coiled around her waist and tugged her in tight, up high on her toes until they fit, lock and key, against each other. His body was more muscular than it looked beneath his beautiful clothing she found as she began to explore. He ended the kiss, and she thought to argue when his mouth trailed her jaw, nipping, soothing each point he touched, to the shell of her ear and back. Goosebumps dimpled her skin like raindrops striking a pond.