Jacquie D’Alessandro - Seduced at Midnight

Just when she thought his hot scrutiny would incinerate her where she stood, his gaze shifted to study each of her features. When he came to her mouth, he lingered for several breath-stealing seconds before slowly raising his gaze back to hers.

"You should return to the house."

Julianne had to swallow twice to locate her voice. "Yes," she whispered.

She should return. She knew it. But apparently her feet did not, as they remained firmly rooted in place. Perhaps she might possibly have convinced her feet to move, but then he lifted one hand from the tree trunk and touched a single fingertip to her cheek. And the only thing fleeing the garden were any thoughts of her leaving.

His finger followed the same path his gaze had just traveled, painting featherlight strokes over her face. The tip of his finger was hard. Blunt. Calloused. Yet infinitely gentle.

She watched him as he touched her, noting the avid way his gaze followed his finger. The muscle that ticked in his square jaw. With his finger lightly circling the outer curve of her ear-a bit of skin she'd had no idea was so sensitive-he leaned in. Brushed his cheek against her hair.

In an agony of anticipation, Julianne remained perfectly still, terrified that if she so much as breathed, he would stop. End this wondrous adventure. She heard him take a slow, deep breath, one he released in a ragged stream of warmth against her temple.

"Delicious," he muttered. "Bloody hell, I knew you'd smell delicious." The last words ended on a low groan. "What is that scent?"

How could he possibly expect her to answer questions? With an effort, she managed to say, "Vanilla. It…it's my favorite flavor, so I commissioned a perfumer on Bond Street to make it into a fragrance for me."

He pulled in another deep breath. "You smell like the bakeshop: warm, sweet, scrumptious." His lips brushed over her hair, and he groaned again. "You really need to go back, Julianne. Now."

The intimacy of that gravelly voice saying her name, without the formal use of her title, touched something deep inside her. She could no more have left the garden at that moment than she could have held back the tide. She'd longed for a moment like this, and nothing her common sense or conscience screamed at her could deter her.

"No," she whispered. "Not now."

"Don't say you weren't warned."

Perhaps she'd been warned, but she certainly wasn't prepared. For nothing could have readied her for the onslaught of his mouth capturing hers. With a hunger beyond anything even her darkest imaginings could have conjured. His tongue swept along the seam of her lips, demanding entrance, and with a gasp of shocking pleasure, she complied.

The delicious friction of his tongue tangling with hers rendered her light-headed. She'd read of such intimacies, most recently in The Ghost of Devonshire Manor , had imagined such a kiss, but the reality… the reality yanked her from her moorings, setting her adrift on a stormy sea of sensation, battering her from all sides.

Heart pounding, knees shaking, she opened her mouth wider, desperate to taste more of him. She'd known he looked like adventure, smelled like adventure. Now she knew he tasted like it as well. Like a foreign land she'd always longed to explore but never thought she'd have the chance to visit.

His hands came forward to cradle her face, holding her immobile while he kissed her senseless. Breathless. She mimicked his every gesture, gliding her tongue over his, reaching up to touch her fingertips to his face-only to lament the fact that she couldn't feel his skin through her gloves. Any worry that her technique was lacking dissipated when he growled low in his throat and pressed his lower body into hers.

Heat whooshed through her at the feel of his hardness pinning her to the tree. Her entire body felt as if it had been awakened from a deep, cold sleep, and for the first time in her life she knew the overwhelming power of desire. She began to tremble, shake with this heady, incredible assault on her senses.

Engulfed in a haze of lust, Gideon deepened their kiss, his mind empty except for the single word pounding through him with every rapid thump of his heart. Julianne. Bloody hell, she tasted so damn good. Felt so damn good. Smelled so damn good-like a sweet treat he wanted to gobble up in two big bites.

A shaking sensation worked its way through the fog of want enshrouding him, clouding his better judgment, and he realized it was her. A small corner of his mind had noted with grim satisfaction her initial gentle shivers, but somewhere during their kiss they'd clearly grown into full-fledged shakes. He could feel them vibrating against his thighs, where his body pinned her against the tree. Beneath his hands, which held her head immobile. Against his lips that roughly ravaged hers.

With a groan of self-disgust, he broke off their kiss and stepped back. The instant his hands fell from her face, she slid several inches down the elm's trunk. Muttering an oath, he clasped her shoulders lest she slither all the way to the ground.

Bloody damn hell, now he'd done it. One touch, and he'd completely forgotten the sort of gently bred hothouse flower she was. Scared her to the point she couldn't stand up. What the devil had he been thinking?

Problem was, he hadn't been thinking-a constant difficulty around this woman. Bad enough he'd been such an idiot as to kiss her at all. But then he'd kissed her like a pillaging barbarian. No finesse, no gentleness-just taking. It had gone exactly the way he'd known it would if he were ever stupid enough to touch her: ten seconds of tenderness touching her face, then a total loss of the control he prided himself upon. And now he'd clearly frightened the bones from her knees.

He peered at her through the darkness, hoping to hell she wasn't going to fall victim to the vapors, and another groan rose in his throat. Rapid breaths puffed from between her kiss-swollen, moist, parted lips. She just looked so damn… kissable .

Yet her eyes remained closed, and tremors still racked her body, arousing his conscience-an inner voice he'd thought long dead-which lashed him with recriminations. For not sending her back to the party the second he found her. For that instant of weakness, of giving in to his overwhelming desire to touch her, taste her. For allowing himself to be drawn into an impossible situation.

That kiss, the feel of her softness pressed against him, her sweet scent surrounding him, her delicious taste flooding his senses, had all but brought him to his knees. That kiss had done nothing to appease his hunger for her. No, instead, his previous cravings paled to nothingness compared to the ravenous appetite for her now scraping at him.

What a bloody idiot he was.

Her eyes blinked slowly open, and she gazed at him with a glazed expression. She was still shaking, but at least she hadn't swooned. Yet. She slowly moistened her lips, a leisurely lick that tightened his fingers on her shoulders and swelled him against his breeches-something he wouldn't have thought possible, as he was already harder than a brick.

"Why… why did you…"

Ruthlessly pushing away the desire clawing at him, he braced himself for a barrage of outraged recriminations-which, in spite of his warning to her, he deserved for the way he'd all but mauled her.

"Stop?"

He blinked. "Why did I stop?"

Again she licked her lips-a fascinating gesture he longed to study at length-and gave a limp-necked nod. "Why did you stop?"

"You were shaking. I frightened you."

"I was shaking… but you didn't frighten me."

Realization dawned with another swift stab of lust. She hadn't trembled with fear but with desire. Before he could fully wrap his mind around the idea, she reached out and grabbed his lapels. Yanked hard, but certainly not hard enough to move him had he chosen to remain in place.