Enjoy the following excerpt for Beauty Tempts the Beast:
Vivian had pulled a stool over and was sitting upon it, warming herself at the hearth. A firm muscle rounded her calf toward the small bump of her ankle. She had pulled her hair over her shoulder and was raking her fingers through the ends. A hint of her breasts peeked above the towel.
Ashworth swallowed.
He held the brush and dress out to her. “I’ll wait for you in the hall.” Where he could remain harmless.
“Stay.”
Her soft plea halted him.
“I would find it much easier if you would brush my hair.”
Ashworth clenched his jaw. A spring coiled in his gut, winding him tighter. Desire flushed through every cell of his body, but panic tempered the heat. “I could call for Mrs. Plimpton.”
“She cannot be spared.”
“Certainly there is a servant here who can attend you.”
“Please, I know only you.”
Did she realize what she asked? He was a man. A man who had shied away from a woman’s touch for too long. What he would give to try again.
Ashworth took the brush from Vivian’s hands as she stood, pretending to ignore the unease in her eyes. She turned to face the snapping fire and presented him with her silken shoulders.
He ran the brush lightly through her waist-length hair and forced himself to resist the urge to skim across her bottom. In fact, he had to resist touching her anywhere. But the hunger pounded within him like a violent storm, his pulsing flesh ached for release.
Over and over he slid the brush through her tresses, unable to stop, unable to speak.
“My lord?” Her voice was fragile, vulnerable. She spun quickly, suddenly landing within his arms. Her breasts pressed upon chest. The scent of her tempted his restraint.
She was seducing him. He wasn’t a fool. But how could he not react? How could he not take the chance that he might find relief in her warmth? But he would not let her have control.
Ashworth dropped the brush and yanked her hard against him, making certain she understood his desire. Her eyes widened but she did not fight him. He would test how far she was willing to go.
Bypassing her pliant mouth, he grazed her ear with his lips. He licked the curve, inhaled the sweetness of feminine beauty. She tensed briefly, then melted against him.
His hands reached for the cloth wound around her. He wanted to cast it away, lower her to the floor and have his way with her. Why should he not?
Then her arms reached behind him and her palms flattened against his back. It took him a moment to realize that she was embracing him. Ashworth lifted his head and placed a kiss upon her wet hair.
Vivian did not linger. She slid her hands downward, where her fingers brushed the band of his breeches.
Reawakened, he swooped down and lifted her into his arms. Her dark eyes did not leave his. An unfamiliar ache burrowed into his chest. An ache urging him to hold her tight. He’d ignored it. He must.
His breath halted as his gaze traveled the length of her, from her sleek shoulders to her shadowed breasts, past the towel, then down to her well-formed legs.
But those curves which lay beneath the towel…?
He whispered her name then kissed her lightly upon the lips.
She reached for his neck, pulling him down to her.
Passion swelled.
Ashworth ravaged her mouth, suckled on her tongue. He kissed her neck, the hollow space at the base of her throat.
Sitting up, he pulled off his shirt then tossed it to the floor.
She was lovely. Unlike the sheltered white skin of the girls his mother usually sent from London, Vivian’s was the color of warm tea.
He nudged her legs apart and settled his hips between them. A draft circled through the air and glided across his back. The candles dipped then brightened again, elongating the shadow between her breasts. He lowered his lips to the valley, kissing her softness, skimming his tongue along the cleft of her delicious skin.
He wanted more. More.
Rain gusted against the rattling window.
A woman screamed.
Ashworth jerked his head up. He stared at Vivian’s face. Her head lay upon his pillow, eyes closed, lips slightly parted and swollen from his kisses. Uncertain perhaps, but not terrified.
Resuming his quest, he tugged on her wrap. He must have it gone. But it stuck tight. “Vivian,” he breathed. Her eyebrows creased but she arched her back. The towel came free.
Ashworth stared at her beauty, mesmerized. She was beautiful. Incredible. Perfect.
He enclosed his lips over an enchanting pink nipple and it sprang to life in his mouth. He swirled his tongue around the knot, as if he were rolling a small pebble.
Blood.
He recoiled, stared down at her skin. Had he bitten her? But no redness marred her skin. She was perfect. Every place he looked upon her, she was perfect.
Slashes. Screams. Blood.
He blinked, but this time the image did not vanish from Vivian’s body. Everywhere, crimson fluid spurted from gaping wounds. He looked down to see his hands covered in it. A nauseating odor stung at his nostrils. Nearby, someone wailed.
Ashworth sprang up from the bed.
“My lord?”
He shook his head, but he still saw her covered in a red haze. Ice choked his veins. Cramps ravaged his gut. Bile burned in his throat.
Vivian sat up, covering herself. “What is it? What’s happened?”
Ashworth back away, bumped into a chair. “Leave me.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Go. Now.” He spun away from her and braced himself against the window ledge. Rain thrashed at the panes. Lightening fractured the night.
“Have I done something to upset you?” She came close. Stood directly behind him. He could destroy her with a quick blow of his arm.
Warm fingers settled upon his bare shoulder. “Lord Ashworth?”
“LEAVE ME!”
At last she scurried to gather her things. Hurried footsteps faded and then the door slammed.
He panted, struggled for a normal breath. He’d prayed Vivian would be different, that her innocence and beauty would be enough to heal him. He had been mistaken. He would not be fool enough to challenge his destiny again.
The Monster was doomed to live alone.
In this game of hearts, winner takes all.
A Betting Chance
© 2010 Lynne Connolly
The Triple Countess, Book 4
Sapphira Vardon needs five thousand pounds to avoid a cruel marriage and a grim future, and there’s only one path for her. Don a mask and an assumed name, and risk everything to win at the gaming tables. First, though, she has to get through the door. Luckily she knows just whose name to drop.
Corin, Lord Elston, is curious to find out who used his name to gain entrance to Mother Brown’s whorehouse and gaming hell. The enigmatic woman who calls herself Lucia isn’t the sort of female usually found here. Behind her mask and heavy makeup, she’s obviously a respectable woman—who plays a devilish hand of cards.
Sapphira is desperate to keep her identity a secret, but Lord Elston’s devastating kisses and touches demand complete surrender. And once he learns the truth, there’s more at stake than guineas. Corin finds himself falling hard for a woman who’s poised to run. A woman who’s about to learn that he only plays to win…
Warning: Hot action on the gaming table and in the bedroom might make you go looking for a time machine.
Enjoy the following excerpt for A Betting Chance:
“I wish you’d trust me with your secret. I might be able to help,” Lord Elston said.
“I don’t know you.” Not in any recognized meaning of the word. The connection Sapphira felt to him had to be her imagination. He couldn’t feel it, not this wild needing.
“I think we should get to know each other better. I want you to trust me.” He touched her chin, his forefinger stroking her skin. She wanted
to purr like a cat, but instead she moved back. Before she could retreat out of his reach he tilted her chin up so she had to meet his direct gaze. His eyes bored into her soul. “There’s something about you—I don’t know.” He bit his lip. It was the first time she’d seen any vulnerability about him and she found it meltingly seductive.
She couldn’t risk weakening. She put her guard back up and kept it firmly in place, reminding herself that he was a stranger, that she didn’t know him. “I told you, I can’t do that. I’m here to play cards, no more.”
“I love a challenge,” he murmured, and lowered his head.
The first touch of his lips against hers paralyzed her. Recognition—of what she still didn’t know—shot between them and she opened her mouth to protest, but he used it to his advantage and licked her lips before he slid his tongue into her mouth.
Now shock held her rigid. Nobody had ever kissed her like this. She hadn’t imagined it possible. She’d seen the caricatures in the shops with their sometimes explicit content, watched a man fondling a whore, seen mercenary transactions take place in the street—she’d thought herself reasonably au fait with sexual matters, for a virgin.
She’d been wrong. She knew that watching and experiencing were two different things but had never known it could be so devastatingly different. The intimacy floored her, and she could do nothing other than reach out for something to steady herself.
The memory of that other kiss—that disgusting, slobbering kiss George Barber had forced on her—returned in full measure. This didn’t compare, couldn’t. She wanted to press closer to Elston, not jerk away, put as much distance between them as she could. Nothing like that. If anything had told her that she couldn’t go ahead with marriage to George Barber, this did.
Corin cupped the back of her head as her hand made contact with his velvet-clad arm. She clutched it, praying for control as he took his time exploring her mouth, caressing her with soft strokes that made her heat up right down to the forbidden area between her thighs. He held her safe, didn’t move his hands or try to unfasten her clothing. One arm curved around her waist, the other over her wig. She wanted his hands under it, in her hair, cupping her head intimately. One of the strings of her mask loosened.
She jerked back, her hand going to her only protection against discovery. “No, don’t!” Her voice was breathless, whispery, but at least it still worked. As did her common sense.
“I want to see you.” He sounded as out of breath as she did.
“No, you can’t.” She reached up and retied the one string he’d managed to undo. Luckily the other one still held firm. He’d dislodged her wig, and she pulled it back into place, but he must have seen that she was a brunette.
“Why not? Will I know you?”
Having regained her composure, enough to confront him anyway, she shook her head. “It’s highly doubtful. But you might see me somewhere else.”
“And you’ve lost that accent. I knew you’d assumed it, but there’s still a tinge left. Are you a Londoner?”
Born and bred. “I’ve visited London a lot,” she said, hoping desperately to put him off the scent. She had to get out of here before he guessed more. Before he had her out of her clothes and spread out on the bed for his pleasure. How could she have been so stupid?
But she had to pass him to get to the door, and he caught her skirts. “A challenge, sweet Lucia. Just between us.”
“Why?”
“Because of the danger. Because you want a bit of excitement in your life.” If only he knew she’d have more excitement than she’d ever wanted soon. But she appreciated that he didn’t threaten her. He could have her barred from this house with very little trouble, but he hadn’t done it.
She turned around, willing at least to listen, but keeping some distance between them, as much as this small room would allow. He sat there in his splendid clothes looking every inch a prince. A wicked prince. He released his clutch on her skirt, and she resisted the urge to put her hand where his had just been, to touch the residual warmth. “Well?”
“Let me get to know you better. You intrigue me. Can you meet me, talk to me, with your mask and maquillage off? Can you look me in the face without your protection?”
“No.” She couldn’t do it. With no mask or makeup he’d see every expression on her face, and he’d know she was his for the taking, however hard she fought against it.
He leaned back, smiling. “A challenge, then. A bet, just between us, with no money at stake. If I recognize you and challenge you in public without your disguise, you promise to meet me at a place of my choice.”
“Why?”
He smiled. “I want you, sweet Lucia. I want to see your face while I’m making love to you.”
Before she could repress it an image flashed into her mind. Him, naked, admiring her naked body, kissing it, touching it. Oh she wanted it so much, but she couldn’t. Mustn’t. She held back her shock. Barely. “And what’s in it for me?”
His rich laugh filled the small space with joy. “I hope to give you pleasure as I’m taking it.”
She pulled out of his grasp, put her hand on the door latch. “I can’t.” Then she was gone, hurrying toward her servant, Frankie, as fast as she could without colliding with anyone or losing her foothold.
When anger and tenacity collide, sparks are inevitable.
Devils on Horseback: Lee
© 2010 Beth Williamson
Devils on Horseback, Book 4
The Civil War took more than Lee Blackwood’s arm. It took his confidence, his pride…and hope that any woman will see him as more than half a man. His friendships helped keep the demons at bay—until now. As each Devil has found happiness, Lee is left alone to cope with the darkness that claws at his soul.
Genevieve Blanchard has only one thing going for her: her no-good late husband’s run-down farm. That, and a fancy name no one can spell might get her a cup full of dirt in Tanger. Room, board and seamstress skills aren’t much, but it’s all she can offer any man willing to help her bring in her wheat crop.
Reluctantly Lee takes on the job, the widow’s smart-mouthed daughter and his growing attraction to a woman who stubbornly refuses to see him as anything less than whole. Slowly, his bitterness begins to fade under the light of their blooming love.
Warning: Y’all will fall in love with this stubborn cowboy, cheer for his strong woman, and get caught up in plenty of fightin’, lots of makin’ up, bone-meltin’ sex and forever kinda romance.
Enjoy the following excerpt for Devils on Horseback: Lee:
As she dried herself, Genny resisted the urge to linger over her painfully hard nipples. After hearing the noise outside, she had the silly fantasy that Lee had been observing her bathe. She even took extra time getting undressed to prolong the game for herself. The foolish thing was, she wanted him to actually be there. Her body still throbbed with the hum of arousal from watching him, fantasizing about him.
Playing sexual games really wasn’t like her, and that’s what bothered her the most. There weren’t many things throughout her life that were under her control, but one of them had always been her physical reactions, particularly to men. Henry was a shitty lover, selfish and clumsy. Genny hadn’t gotten a single moment of pleasure from having sex with her husband at all. It was like one of her farm chores, boring but necessary. Her experience before Henry had been horrific, the stuff of nightmares she still experienced now and again.
She shook her head to dislodge the dark feelings that always overtook her when she started thinking about Camille. She’d promised herself when she moved to Tanger that she’d stop thinking about her life before Texas, the squalor she’d been used to, and the disregard for human beings she witnessed daily as a child. Nothing about the farm reminded her of the dark street in New Orleans so there was no need to dwell on it.
No, she’d much rather remember why she’d been aroused in the bathtub in the first place. Truthfully, she had never experienced pleasure with a man, only
by her own hand.
Right now though, she ached for release. One day with Lee and she was fantasizing about being intimate with him, without even a smidge of interest from him. He grunted, answered in one syllable or ignored her. There was no rhyme or reason to her body’s apparent infatuation with the man. It should set off warning bells inside her.
Genny couldn’t risk being distracted by a man when she needed to focus on getting the wheat crop in. Too much depended on her keeping her mind and her body on that task and not on Lee Blackwood. She knew her options with men were limited, even if widows had the freedom to choose a bed partner. Until the blond one-armed man had swaggered into her life, there hadn’t been a man she would choose.
As an intelligent, strong woman with needs, sometimes she just had to let herself feel. And at that moment, she was feeling quite a bit. As the towel rubbed across her skin, it pebbled up, sending shivers through her. God how she wished it was a calloused hand instead of the rough material. She could look for him, but knew it wasn’t a good idea even if her mind raced with the possibility of what would happen if she found him. What would happen if he was just as willing as she was.
A shiver wracked her body at the thought. No matter how much she wanted to, it just wasn’t a good idea, and that was that. With something like remorse, she picked up her nightdress to put it on. A small knock at the door had her jumping out of her skin.
Heart pounding, she had to swallow before she answered. She knew who it was, yet she called out anyway. “Who is it?”
There was a pause. “It’s Lee Blackwood. I, uh, wondered if you were done with the tub. I can empty it and take it out for you.”
He sounded strange, almost talkative, and she hadn’t yet heard him speak so fast either. Perhaps her fantasy wasn’t hers alone. Tingles raced through her at the thought and a single heavy throb resounded in her lower belly.
“Not yet. About five more minutes.”
The sound of boots scraping on the wooden porch sounded outside the door. “Well, okay. I’ll just sit a spell out here and wait then.”
A Tarnished Heart Page 27
