To Tempt An Angel (Book 1 Douglas series)

by Grasso, Patricia;

  Angelica recovered herself slowly. The more alert she became, the more her behavior embarrassed her. She felt her whole body heating with a blush.

  How could she have told the marquess she loved him? Angelica wondered. More importantly, how would she extricate herself from this situation? Should she dress and leave? How could she do that when she wasn’t wearing anything and couldn’t possibly parade naked in front of him?

  “You’re still wearing your garters and stockings,” he said.

  “So I am,” Angelica replied in a small voice.

  Robert raised himself up on his elbow and loomed over her. He stared down at her for a long moment and then smiled.

  What now? she wondered, feeling self-conscious.

  “You’re blushing,” Robert said, his gaze and his hand gliding down the length of her body. “You’re blushing all over.”

  Angelica shifter her gaze away from his, saying, “I should leave now.”

  “Relax, angel. The afternoon is young,” Robert told her. “Roll onto your stomach.”

  “Why?”

  “Do as I say.”

  Angelica rolled over, and Robert knelt beside her. The bed creaked as he reached for something on the bedside table, and then she felt his hands on her shoulders, kneading her muscles with lotion, gliding his hands across her back.

  Sighing, Angelica luxuriated in the feel of his strong hands massaging her, magically erasing her tension. A warm, languorous feeling seeped through her body. By the time he started on her buttocks, her eyelids had grown heavy and then closed.

  “Awaken, my sleeping angel,” Robert whispered in her ear.

  Opening her eyes, Angelica realized that she had dozed off. How long had she slept?

  Clutching the coverlet to her breasts, Angelica sat up and leaned back against the headboard. Still naked, Robert sat on the edge of the bed. On the table was a tray containing a bowl of steaming soup, slices of bread, butter, and jam.

  “What time is it?” Angelica asked.

  “Two o’clock.”

  “I need to leave.”

  “Eat something first,” Robert insisted.

  “Pass me a slice of bread,” she said.

  Robert placed a slice of bread onto a plate, asking, “Butter or jam?”

  “I want it dry.”

  Robert cocked a dark brow at her. “Dry bread?”

  “The bread will soothe my queasiness,” Angelica explained.

  He looked concerned. “Are you ill?”

  “I ate an early breakfast and missed lunch,” Angelica said. “I always feel sick when I miss a meal.”

  Robert set down the bread plate and lifted the spoon. “Then I insist you eat a little soup,” he said, dipping the spoon into the bowl. Holding his hand beneath the spoon lest he spill the soup, he offered it to her, saying, “Open your mouth.”

  Angelica did as she was told. “Delicious,” she said. “May I please have my bread?”

  Robert passed her the bread, and when she’d eaten it, Angelica said, “I really must be going.”

  “I’m not finished with you, angel.” Robert pulled the coverlet down to reveal her nakedness.

  “But I really—”

  Robert lay down beside her and drew her into the circle of his embrace. His mouth covered hers in a gentle kiss that soon became demanding. The idea of leaving drifted away as his hands slid down her body.

  Breaking their kiss, Robert reached for the crystal dish containing strawberry jam. He dipped one long finger into the jam and held it close to her lips.

  “Lick it, angel,” he whispered.

  Angelica smiled. What new game was this? She flicked her tongue out and tasted the jam.

  “That’s a good girl,” Robert said. “Now, lick it off the whole finger.”

  Angelica grabbed his wrist, holding his hand immobile, and licked the jam off his finger, slashing her tongue this way and that. Catching his dark gaze, she licked his finger in long strokes and then took the tip of it into his mouth to suck it.

  “My sweet angel,” Robert whispered, kissing the excess strawberry jam from her lips.

  Robert dipped two fingers into the jam. Angelica opened her mouth to receive his fingers, but he surprised her by grabbing her wrists with one hand and drawing her arms over her head.

  “What are you going to do?” she asked.

  “Pleasure you, my lady.” Robert touched her lips with his fingers, and she flicked her tongue out to taste them.

  “You like licking and sucking me,” he said.

  “Oh, yes,” she breathed, his words igniting a throbbing heat between her thighs.

  Tracing a line of strawberry jam, Robert moved his fingers from her lips to her throat and then paused to dip his fingers into the jam again. Teasing her, he swirled his fingers around one of her breasts until the circles of jam reached her nipple. Then he dipped a finger into the crystal dish and topped the nipple with a tiny dollop of jam, its coolness on her nipple increasing the throbbing between her thighs.

  “Take me again,” Angelica whispered.

  “Are you asking or demanding?”

  “Please . . . ”

  Robert smiled. “I’ll give you what you want when I’m ready,” he said, rubbing his hardened manhood against her thigh.

  Dipping his head, Robert licked the jam off her lips, his tongue following the streak of jam down her throat to her breast. In teasing strokes, he flicked his tongue around her breasts, licking the jam, and then took her nipple into his mouth and drew upon it, gently at first and then harder.

  Angelica moaned and arched herself toward him. Her hips began a rhythmic gyrating movement as she tried to entice him to enter her. By the time he finished decorating her other breast with the jam and tormenting her with his tongue, Angelica was desperate with need.

  Robert dipped his finger into the jam again. With one hand he opened her soft folds of flesh, and with the other he smeared her nub with the strawberry jam. Lowering his head, he licked the jam from her pearl.

  Angelica lost control. She arched herself into his mouth, surrendering her very being to him as spasms of ecstasy carried her to paradise.

  Robert fell back on the bed and pulled her on top of him. “Sit up,” he ordered in a voice thick with passion. “Take me deep inside you and let our juices mingle.”

  Angelica needed no further invitation. She lifted her body into a sitting position and, holding his gaze captive, impaled herself on his aroused manhood until his groin pressed against her sensitive jewel.

  Smiling at his groan of pleasure, she whispered, “I love the way you fill me.” Then she moved, riding him slowly at first before increasing the tempo.

  Angelica raised her arms into the air as she ground herself into him. Never had she felt so gloriously alive. When he caught her nipples between his thumbs and forefingers and squeezed them, she cried out and exploded, her juices flooding his manhood.

  Robert flipped her over and rode her hard. Within minutes, he groaned and shuddered and found completeness within her body.

  Falling to the side, Robert pulled her with him and said, “Sleep now . . . ”

  Two hours later, with her tousled mane of blond hair covered by the hood of her cloak, Angelica hurried down Park Lane. She raced up the front stairs of the duke’s house and flew into the empty foyer. Relief at making it home undetected washed through her, and she dashed up the stairs to her third-floor bedchamber.

  Rounding the corner of the second-floor landing, Angelica nearly collided with her aunt. She cried out in surprise and then laughed.

  “There you are, darling,” Aunt Roxie said. “I’ve been looking for you all afternoon.”

  “I went to visit the marquess.”

  “The marquess?” her aunt drawled.

  “I—I needed to speak to him about Daisy,” Angelica lied.

  “For so long?”

  “Robert challenged me to a game of chess,” Angelica told her. Warming to her lies, she added, “Only, I had never play
ed chess before, so he needed to teach me the game.”

  Aunt Roxie gave her a curious look and asked, “Why do you smell like strawberries?”

  “I—I spilled strawberry juice,” Angelica stammered.

  “Strawberry juice?” Aunt Roxie echoed. “Why are you flushed?”

  “I ran home,” Angelica said. “I’ll see you at dinner.”

  Angelica brushed past Lady Roxanne and raced up the stairs. She looked back once to see her aunt watching her, a feline smile on her face.

  Chapter 15

  Telling Robert she loved him had been a mistake, Angelica told herself for the hundredth time since leaving his town house five days earlier.

  Passing that afternoon in his bed had been ecstasy; Angelica blushed when she thought about what they had done. Now, however, she was paying for that weakness of the flesh.

  Each day Angelica had expected Robert to appear at the duke’s mansion to see her and Daisy. Especially Daisy, who asked about him constantly.

  Although his unspoken rejection hurt, Angelica concluded that she was an adult woman and could bear the pain. Daisy was another matter, however.

  If it hadn’t been for Robert’s absence, life at the duke’s mansion would have been heaven. With Venetia’s departure, the tension that hung like a cloud over the household disappeared, leaving its occupants lighthearted.

  Angelica and her sisters passed each day in the company of Daisy and Colin. Life had become one long game, interrupted by meals and sleep. She and her sisters hadn’t spent a day in play since their father had lost the Douglas fortune.

  Would Robert speak to her at his father’s ball? Angelica wondered, the prospect of seeing him unsettling to her. Even now she heard the musicians in the ballroom, tuning their instruments in preparation.

  Pulling on her white gloves, Angelica stepped in front of the cheval glass and inspected her reflection. She’d chosen this particular gown to entice Robert, though she intended to ignore him for the rest of her life.

  Angelica was a Greek goddess in her white silk evening gown. The bodice’s neckline was square, cut low, and form-fitting. The whole of her bust, shoulders, and arms were exposed as the gown sported a mere strap—a whisper of silk—over one shoulder. She wore silk stockings and evening slippers of white satin with golden rosettes. Around her neck hung her diamond-and-gold pendant. She had pulled her streaked blond hair into an intricate knot at the nape of her neck and adorned it with a sprig of baby’s breath.

  “Lady Angelica, you look beautiful.”

  Angelica turned toward the doorway. Daisy and Colin hurried across the bedchamber.

  “Hello,” Jasper called from his perch inside his cage.

  Angelica crouched down to be at eye level with the children. She opened her arms and said, “Give me a kiss.”

  She hugged Daisy and kissed her cheek. Then Colin received the same attention.

  “Won’t you get messy?” Daisy asked. “Lucille never let me hug her when she dressed up. She said I would mess her.”

  “Who’s Lucille?” Colin asked.

  “My mother.”

  “My mother doesn’t want me to mess her either.”

  “Lady Angelica, why do you let us mess you?” Daisy asked.

  “You and Colin are more important than this old dress,” Angelica told her.

  Daisy threw her arms around her neck, saying, “I love you, Lady Angelica.”

  “I love you, too,” Colin said, clinging to her other side.

  “I love both of you,” Angelica told them, putting an arm around each. Then she asked, “Will you sit in my chamber to keep Jasper company?”

  Both Daisy and Colin nodded. Angelica could see the gleam of excitement in their eyes.

  “You must promise not to open his cage or stick your fingers inside it,” she warned.

  “I promise.”

  “I promise, too.”

  Angelica gave each a kiss on the cheek and stood. “I want you to decide what games we’ll play tomorrow.” Then she watched them cross the chamber to sit on the floor near the macaw’s cage.

  Opening the door to leave, Angelica saw Mrs. Sweeting and Mrs. Honey headed down the corridor. “I asked Daisy and Colin to keep Jasper company,” she told them. “Please, sit in my chamber until their bedtime.”

  Angelica walked down the corridor to the top of the stairs. The music grew louder as it wafted up to the third floor.

  She wondered if Robert had arrived, and then told herself she didn’t care. But the least he could have done was visit his own daughter. Why did he reject his own flesh and blood? Louisa’s suicide wasn’t Daisy’s fault. Why was he punishing the child?

  Angelica walked into the duke’s study, where she’d been summoned by her aunt. Her sisters were already there, as well as Duke Magnus and Aunt Roxie.

  “Close the door behind you,” Duke Magnus said.

  Angelica did as she was told. With a smile on her face, she crossed the chamber to the desk and stood beside the chair occupied by her aunt.

  “I see that my nieces look spectacular,” Aunt Roxie said, beaming at them. “I feel that tonight will be special.”

  “Hopefully, Charles Emerson will lose his fortune tonight,” Angelica said, making her sisters smile.

  Aunt Roxie patted her hand and replied, “Perhaps the time has arrived to think about something other than revenge.”

  “Nothing is more important than ruining the villain,” Angelica said.

  Duke Magnus cleared his throat. “My barrister has completed the document making me your legal guardian,” he said, holding up the document. “It’s a mere formality.” He passed her aunt the quill and set the paper down on the desk in front of her, saying, “Roxanne, you sign first, and then your nieces.”

  Without reading it, Lady Roxanne took the quill and signed her name. She passed the quill to Victoria, who signed it next, and then Samantha. Angelica took the quill from her sister and started to read the document.

  “Darling, just sign the paper,” Aunt Roxie said. “We’re already late.”

  Angelica signed her name. Then she passed the quill and the document to the duke, who walked around his desk.

  Duke Magnus offered Aunt Roxie his arm. They followed the three sisters out of the study and walked down the corridor to the ballroom, located on the same floor.

  Their group gathered at the top of the ballroom, opposite the musicians at the other end. Two violins, a cornet, a cello, and a piano comprised the orchestra.

  No sooner had they entered the ballroom than Venetia walked in and, smiling, crossed the room to them. She looked especially lovely in a sky-blue gown.

  “Good evening, Your Grace,” Venetia said, ignoring the Douglases. “I came early to act as your hostess.”

  “That won’t be necessary, darling,” Aunt Roxie drawled. “I am His Grace’s hostess.”

  Venetia appeared ready to explode, but Duke Magnus said, “Do not even consider creating a scene. Why haven’t you visited Colin?”

  “I didn’t think I would be welcome here,” Venetia answered, an expression of hurt appearing on her face.

  “You are always welcome in my home as long as you behave civilly,” Duke Magnus told her.

  The arrival of their first guests precluded Venetia answering. She stood beside the duke, pasted a gracious smile on her face, and pretended to be the duke’s hostess.

  Swallowing a smile, Angelica turned away and spied Robert walking into the ballroom. She turned her back and whispered to her sisters, “Remember, no more than two dances with any gentleman.”

  Samantha and Victoria looked at each other and rolled their eyes.

  “I mean it,” Angelica warned. She shifted her gaze and found her aunt watching her, a knowing smile flirting with the corners of her lips.

  Sacred sevens, did her aunt know how Robert and she had passed the other afternoon? Angelica wondered. Where should she look? If she turned one way, her aunt and Venetia were there; but if she turned the other way, Ro
bert—

  “Good evening, Countess.”

  Angelica turned around and smiled coolly at Robert. “Good evening, my lord.”

  “I hope you will save a dance for me,” he said, a devastating smile on his face.

  Angelica felt her heart wrench. The man was too handsome for her peace of mind. If he really cared for her, he would have shown his face before now.

  “Countess?”

  “I will be happy to save you a dance,” she said. “If you will excuse me?”

  Angelica tried to brush past him, but he grabbed her arm, asking, “Where are you going?” She shifted her gaze to the hand on her arm. When she raised her gaze to his again, he dropped his hand.

  “You aren’t leaving on my account?” Robert asked.

  “You flatter yourself if you think your presence affects me,” she answered.

  Angelica walked away from him and left the ballroom. She went to the ladies’ resting area and sat down. Her stomach churned, and she longed to return to her chamber. She felt comfortable with the children and out of place with society. Oh, why couldn’t Robert have left her alone that day at the fair? She didn’t belong with these people, who had never known a day of poverty; she didn’t know how to play these aristocratic games. She was the penniless Countess of Nowhere.

  Society was not to blame for the way she felt, Angelica knew, pinching her cheeks to retain some color. She had created her own problems by spending an afternoon in the marquess’s bed and professing her love for him. Aunt Roxie had always said that men loved challenges. She should have listened to her aunt.

  Returning to the ballroom, Angelica saw Robert in private conversation with his father and her aunt. Her sisters were dancing, as was Venetia, and Angelica wondered uncomfortably what she should do.

  With no other choice, Angelica walked slowly in the direction of her aunt and the duke. Their conversation ended abruptly when she reached them.

  “I hope this is our dance,” Robert said.

  Angelica inclined her head and stepped onto the dance floor with him. Though her smile remained placid, she felt a hundred butterflies winging through her stomach.

  What could she possibly say to him? Angelica wondered. What would she do if he mentioned their tryst?