To Bed a Beauty (Courtship Wars 2)

Stiffening, Roslyn forced a bland smile. “That was very…educational, your grace. And now I had best try to put your instruction into practice.”

“Yes, you should go now. You don’t want to keep Haviland waiting.”

Smoothing her skirts, Roslyn rose and made her way to the library door, where she risked a backward glance at the duke. She couldn’t tell at all what he was thinking, though; he hid his thoughts so skillfully behind that lean, handsome face.

“Won’t you wish me luck, your grace?” she asked, deliberately imbuing her voice with a note of flirtation.

His mouth twisted in an ironic half smile. “I doubt you need any luck, sweeting. You’re sure to be a success if you apply the arts you’ve learned. I expect a report when you’re done. I shall wait for you here.”

“As you wish, your grace.”

When she was gone, Drew blew out a long breath as he fought against his maddening feelings of desire and his even more irrational pique. Admittedly Roslyn’s appearance of cool serenity irked him. He had to be losing his touch with the fairer sex if she could remain so unaffected when he was throbbing with heat from such a simple encounter.

“Hell and the devil,” Drew swore at himself. “You were a fool to become so involved with her.”

His lessons in seduction had unexpectedly backfired on him, he realized. He’d craved to take his instruction much further just now. He’d wanted Roslyn to touch him in return, wanted those delicate hands caressing his own body, drifting over his bare skin…

It had required supreme willpower to draw away from her. Just that brief physical contact had left him in a state of severe sexual frustration.

Drew grimaced, feeling his erection straining painfully against his breeches. The innocent enchantress had no idea how powerfully she aroused him. The damnable truth was, he wanted her. More than he could remember wanting any woman. And he was beginning to be positively haunted by visions of bedding her.

He muttered another mild oath. His loins were aching, no doubt because he hadn’t sated his lust in the scented arms of a courtesan last night as he’d expected to. When it came right down to it, the thought of taking his pleasure with a voluptuous tart had held little appeal, especially when he kept comparing all the Cyprians he knew to Roslyn’s elegant, regal beauty.

But his decision to abstain last night had left his control with her this morning tenuous at best.

His jaw taut, Drew closed his eyes. He would have to assuage the painful pressure in the privacy of his bedchamber tonight, he knew. If he didn’t give himself relief soon, he might very well lose control with Roslyn and do something they would both regret.

Even now he couldn’t restrain his lascivious thoughts about her, couldn’t help picturing her there with him. His imagination insisted on undressing her…stripping her gown away and baring her exquisitely lovely body…laying her back against the sofa.

She looked wildly desirable, her golden hair spilling over her shoulders in a pale, tawny mane, her ripe breasts beckoning, her creamy thighs parted in invitation. In his fantasy he covered her with his body and sank into her, thrusting deep and hard. He could almost feel her inner tightness, her sleek warmth as her sheath clenched and shivered around him…

Grinding his jaw in frustration, Drew rose abruptly. He couldn’t explain why Roslyn filled him with such hunger, but he was not about to let his lust for the woman run away from him.

“You would be mad to cross that line,” Drew muttered to himself.

Still aching and restless, he took a turn around the library, yet his thoughts remained on Roslyn. She was supremely dangerous to him, but not only because he felt an extraordinary attraction to her. It was because she managed to get beneath his guard so easily. Except for Marcus’s sister Eleanor, he had never been able to relax around a genteel young lady. He was always on the defensive, alert for matrimonial traps. But being himself with Roslyn felt entirely natural.

And so did his fierce sexual urges.

Giving in to them, however, was strictly forbidden. Not only was she under Marcus’s protection, Drew reminded himself, but he had promised to help groom her to ensnare the affections of another man.

He suddenly frowned at the inexplicable twinge of jealousy that stabbed him. He had no right to

be jealous. And in truth, he was eager to help her win Haviland as a suitor as soon as possible, so she would cease plaguing his own thoughts, and worse, his fantasies.

It might take some time, since Haviland appeared to view her as much as a cordial neighbor as a potential bride. Roslyn’s affections weren’t fully engaged yet, either, she had admitted so. Drew had carefully scrutinized her response toward the earl yesterday. While she’d been perfectly amiable, there was little sign they were more than friends, although she hoped for so much more.

Wondering what success she was having at the moment, Drew strode to the window to look out, even though the landscaping prevented him from seeing the earl’s estate next door. He was impatient for her return, yet she had barely been gone ten minutes, and would likely take a good while longer.

Chiding himself for even caring, he glanced down at the window seat where Roslyn had been sitting upon his arrival. When he picked up the heavy tome she’d been reading, his mouth curved at the title… Volume VII of William Cobbett’s The Parliamentary History of England.

Drew shook his head in mingled amusement and admiration. The contrast between Roslyn’s delicate beauty and her scholarly mind was highly intriguing.

He’d always valued intellect and education. Marcus and Heath were his closest friends in large part because their minds were sharp enough to keep up with his. At university, he’d been the studious one. And his library at his London town house was even more extensive than this one. So he couldn’t help but be pleased to find a woman with a thirst for knowledge as great as his own.

Remembering Roslyn’s complaint that she had never been permitted to learn Greek, Drew found himself grinning. She was certainly not simply a beautiful featherhead. Rather she was extremely well read and well educated, with a sparkling intelligence that presented a challenge even to a man of his intellect.

In fact, he’d already read the twelve volumes of Cobbett’s History that had been published to date and had a standing order with the publisher for future volumes. But he settled in the window seat with Volume VII and lounged back, prepared to pass the time reading until Roslyn’s return.