A Gentleman's Curse (Avenging Lords 4)

Lockhart brushed a dripping lock from his brow. “I fear I may have been mistaken.”

“Mistaken?” She lowered her eyes and fixed her heated gaze upon him. Desire danced a teasing rhythm, holding him spellbound. “How so?”

Nothing could rid him of his wicked intentions. “No amount of rain can cleanse me of my sinful thoughts.” His breathing grew fast and shallow. “No amount of rain can temper my raging blood.”

He wanted her more than he’d wanted anything in his entire life.

“And yet the water seems to wash away my doubts.” She blinked away the droplets clinging to her lashes.

“What doubts are those?” The husky tone of his voice should leave her in no doubt as to what he wanted. She’d found the courage to meet him. Would she find the courage to confess?

“Doubts about kissing you again.” She swallowed. “Doubts about … about surrendering to these cravings that show no sign of waning.”

The admission brought a shift in the air between them. The thunder groaned. A crack of lightning somewhere in the distance sparked a sudden sense of urgency.

Claudia gasped as her breath came quickly, too. “We should hurry indoors.” Her gaze dropped to his shirt. “You nee

d to get out of those wet clothes.”

He had every intention of doing precisely that.

Lockhart placed his lantern on the ground and straightened. He held out his hand. The time for honesty was nigh, and yet he couldn’t find the words to explain these foreign feelings swirling in his chest.

“Let me kiss you once, just once in the rain.” Desire flamed his blood.

Claudia placed her lamp on the ground, a few feet from his. “What sort of kiss will it be, Hudson? A tender one to prove a point?” She stepped towards him and slipped her damp hand into his. “A wicked one to test my resolve?”

His heart hammered against his ribcage, harder than the rain battered the ground.

“Neither,” he said, drawing her slowly into an embrace. “The only thing I can promise is that it won’t be the kiss of actors on a stage.”

She reached up on tiptoes, her eyes fluttering, her mouth achingly close. “Then kiss me, kiss me like you mean it. Kiss me for no other reason than because you want to.”

Lockhart brushed away the wet tendrils of hair plastered to her cheeks and cupped her dainty face between his palms. He kept a tight rein on his desire, poured every honest thought and feeling for her into that first tender kiss.

One kiss was not enough to soothe the crippling ache within. One kiss soon became two, three. Each open-mouthed claiming spoke of his respect and admiration. With the first soft stroke of his tongue, he worshipped her strength and integrity. Claudia Darling touched him in a way no other woman had, ever could. He drank in her exotic taste—a unique blend of wanton innocence that proved highly addictive.

He kept a firm grip on his control, kept the rampant devil at bay, and made love to her mouth in the way he wanted to make love to her body. Slowly, and with long, deep thrusts of his tongue.

It wasn’t the soft hum resonating in her throat that woke the devil. It was the two curious hands working their way up under his shirt, the two wandering hands creeping up to touch his bare skin.

A growl left his lips, the sound full of carnal longing.

He would take her here and now, against a tree, writhing on top of her on the muddy ground. Anywhere, as long as he drove home and buried himself to the hilt.

“Claudia, is this what you want?” A fleeting moment of logic forced him to drag his mouth from hers and ask. The flimsy thread of restraint would soon snap. “Do you want me? For I fear once we start we’ll not stop.”

She looked up at him through hazy eyes. “As an unmarried woman I should say no, but I cannot.” Her hands drifted over his chest, grazing his nipples. “What if I never experience these feelings again?”

Hudson hissed a breath at her teasing touch. His swollen shaft throbbed in his breeches. “Then we need to get out of the rain.”

“Where can we go?”

“Not the cottage,” he said quickly before conversation dampened his ardour. “What about the house?”

“The house?” Her brief hesitation forced him to take matters into his own hands. Without warning, he scooped her up into his arms. She gasped, fidgeted a little but soon settled against his chest and twined her arms around his neck.

Leaving their lanterns on the ground, he strode up the drive and skirted left towards the stables.