Silence Is Golden (Storm and Silence 3)

My hand reached for his top button, and he ducked out of the way, stumbling back farther into the stream.

‘No!’ he ground out between clenched teeth. ‘Impossible! What if somebody came…if somebody saw us…saw you, like this!’

‘Oh, yes, that would be a real tragedy.’ I followed him, my eyes sparkling. ‘Those poor natives have probably never seen anybody naked before. I bet it would scar them for life.’

‘What about Karim? If he came-’

‘He already saw me.’

‘What?’

For one moment, Mr Ambrose wasn’t flustered. For one moment, his eyes flashed with cold, ruthless fire.

‘Don’t worry. I packed the mud on thick.’ Stretching on my toes, I whispered in his ear: ‘But I’ll let you wash it off, if you want. Everywhere.’

The promise of vengeance vanished from his eyes, and instead, another cold fire started to burn there. One that lit me up inside, drawing me closer.

‘What do you want to start with?’ Reaching out, I took his unresisting hand. It was unnaturally still. I could feel the power in it, barely contained under a shell of cold stone. Slowly, I raised it until it hovered just over my belly.

‘Here?’

Softly brushing over his palm with my thumb, I raised his hand high until it hovered over a far more interesting area.

‘Here?’

He made a low noise in the back of his throat. I smiled. The first cracks were appearing in the stone.

‘Oh, no! I have a better idea. Here…’

Raising his rather unwilling hand up even farther, I brought it to my lips and with his wet fingertips, brushed off the specks of mud on my lips. The first touch was incredible. His fingers brushing across my mouth were like the tips of angels’ wings. They sent a blast of heavenly fire through me, making me crave more. Languidly, I parted my lips and slid one of his fingers inside, my tongue flicking against its pad.

His breath hitched - and I pounced! He was so dazed, he didn’t have a hope of evading me. My arms locked around his neck before he’d had time to blink, and then my lips were on his, taking him, devouring him, in the most wanton kiss we had ever shared. He fought. Not to get to me this time, but to get away. Trying to protect his precious mint-condition shirt, I guessed. Or he just couldn’t deal with a woman going for what she wanted.

Ha! He would just have to! I was not going to let his rock-hard stubbornness get in the way of this. This was too good to end.

‘Mr Linton…Lilly…no, I…’

‘You what?’ Freeing his lips, my mouth raced down his throat, scattering kisses all the way. My arms came down from around his neck, and the first button of his shirt popped open in a moment. ‘You want more? Coming right up!’

‘No!’ he growled. ‘We can’t do this!’

‘Can’t we?’ I softly bit him on the neck and felt him quiver against me. Oh boy, this was fun! ‘Why? It’s not as if we haven’t done a bit of this before.’

‘That was different,’ he groaned.

‘Why?’

‘You weren’t covered in mud!’

I smirked against his granite skin. ‘What? You can’t engage in amorous congress while you’re dirty?’

‘Not if you’re English, no!’

‘I must say,’ I whispered, my lips moving slowly further down to the hollow at the base of his throat, ‘I disagree.’

I started forward, and was just about to mash my dirt-covered body against him, when he - damn him! - slipped from my grasp like an eel, ducking down into the water and coming up with a splash a few yards away.

‘Hey! Don’t you move!’