Her soft lips were warm against his cold ones. Rufus could feel her heart pounding with fright, and her arms were wound around his neck, pulling him closer against her. Passion ignited and suddenly he was kissing her as wildly as she was kissing him.
Averil gasped.
Rufus lifted his head. Her eyes were closed and she looked pale in the murky light of the thunderstorm. He noticed, too, that her dress was soaked where she had been clinging to him, and he could see her tightly budded nipples outlined against the cloth. Desire ripped through him, tightening his body, sending the blood pumping through his veins. He was no longer thinking straight.
He began to shrug off his jacket, hands clumsy, tugging it down over his arms and tossing it aside. His shirt was just as soaked, so he stripped that off, too. Another burst of thunder and she buried her face against his bare chest, whimpering like a cornered animal.
Her golden hair had tumbled down, and he ran the silken strands through his fingers. He wanted to bury his face in its softness, but somehow his common sense reasserted itself. Rufus knew the difference between comforting a distressed woman and seducing her, and he knew he couldn’t take much more of this temptation. This was Averil, the woman he was in love with, and although this felt perfectly right he knew he was deceiving himself.
“Averil,” he said roughly, and tried to draw her away slightly so that they weren’t so close, but she only pressed closer, their bodies melding against each other. “Averil,” he groaned.
This time she lifted her head, her eyes huge and dark. He cupped her face in his hands, feeling the tremors running through her. Her hands reached for him, running over his jaw, his cheeks, his mouth. And then she was kissing him again, and with an abandon he found impossible to resist.
He reached down to touch her breasts, so soft and exquisite, and covered one lush mound with his palm. She moaned and her nipple tightened further. Averil tipped her head back, arching toward his touch, and it was an invitation for him to bend his head and kiss her throat, trailing his lips over her skin.
Outside the rain was tumbling down so heavily he could no longer hear the thunder. All he was aware of was the feel and scent of the woman in his arms, and her eagerness as she responded to his touch, her gray eyes half-closed, her long lashes brushing her creamy skin, and her mouth swollen from his kisses.
He wanted her, by God he did. More than he could remember wanting a woman for years, and even then . . . when had he ever felt this intensity? This desperate need to possess?
Rufus groaned and shook his head. It was impossible. He couldn’t do this. He couldn’t ruin an innocent. Even if it meant gaining everything he wanted, he couldn’t do it.
He was moving away from her. Averil felt a sudden chill, and not just because the warmth of his body had been isolated from hers. In his arms she’d forgotten her fear of the storm, and for the first time ever that she could remember, she had felt safe from the thunder and lightning.
She didn’t want him to go. She didn’t want him to stop touching her. Kissing her. Holding her. She was the huntress, she reminded herself feverishly. It was she who made the decisions.
“Rufus,” she said, her voice husky. “Don’t stop. I don’t want you to stop.”
She touched his hand, and then her fingers slid into his, and he tightened his hold on her. His eyes were so dark and intense, sliding over her face to linger on her lips, and then lower to the shape of her breasts beneath her gown. He looked hungry. Starving. For her.
“Oh, Rufus.” His chest was naked and she reached out, running her hands over his skin. She’d never touched a man like this before and she couldn’t seem to stop. His body was so different from hers, harder, with a line of dark hair running down to his stomach and vanishing beneath his breeches. She leaned forward and licked his skin, running her tongue over the bud of his nipple, shocking herself, and then did it again, just to remind herself that she was a huntress.
He cupped her face, his mouth finding hers in what promised to be a long, passionate kiss. But Averil smiled and pulled away. Her eyes were on his as she began to undo the little buttons that ran down the front of her bodice, one at a time, only the tremble of her fingers to show she wasn’t as confident as she was pretending.
“Averil,” he growled, “you’re playing with fire.” But he was watching her with fascinated attention.
“I know. I don’t care.”
His hands covered hers—to stop her or to help?—but the dress was agape and his knuckles brushed her naked skin. He groaned and bent his head, once more kissing her mouth, his tongue finding hers and doing a dan
ce so erotic she could hardly bear it.
“This is—” he murmured against her lips.
“—wonderful,” she finished for him. “Don’t stop, Rufus. Please don’t stop now.”
Her words seemed to awaken him from a trance. He searched her eyes. “You know this is madness, Averil. Complete and utter madness.”
“I don’t care,” she declared, and knew it was true. Right now, right here, she wanted this man she loved. And if he wanted her then why did they have to stop?
But perhaps that was the trouble; perhaps he didn’t want her?
Rufus was holding her hand, his fingers stroking hers, but he was staring into her eyes with one of his intense looks. She tried to read his thoughts—need and doubt and resolve—and then he was lifting her fingers to his lips. He spoke with certainty.
“Averil, if we do this, then you will marry me. We must marry.”
Her heart gave a thump. Marry him? It was what she wanted, and yet there was something in his face she didn’t understand, something determined and irrevocable, and suddenly she was no longer sure she was the huntress after all.
She opened her mouth to express her doubts, but he wouldn’t let her.