Sweet Temptation

by Leigh Greenwood

  Other books by Leigh Greenwood:

  BORN TO LOVE

  WICKED WYOMING NIGHTS

  WYOMING WILDFIRE

  The Night Riders series:

  TEXAS HOMECOMING

  TEXAS BRIDE

  The Cowboys series:

  JAKE

  WARD

  BUCK

  CHET

  SEAN

  PETE

  DREW

  LUKE

  MATT

  The Seven Brides series:

  ROSE

  FERN

  IRIS

  LAUREL

  DAISY

  VIOLET

  LILY

  Sweet

  TEMPTATION

  LEIGH GREENWOOD

  Copyright © 1991, 2011 Leigh Greenwood

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Author’s Note

  About the Author

  Chapter 1

  London, November 1745

  “I think you only love me for my breasts,” Clarice Wynburn said to her young lover, her tone a mixture of petulant rebuke and mounting desire. Gavin Carlisle had bypassed his usual ritual of flattery and the presentation of a gift, and gone straight to the true object of his visit.

  “I love all of you,” Gavin muttered, as he fondled the warm flesh of his mistress’s generous bosom and teased the firming nipples with his fingertips. He was too far under the sway of hot desire to be drawn into an argument over which attribute of the well-endowed widow appealed to him most.

  Even though Gavin’s virile presence made her tremble with desire, Clarice was not entirely mollified. “Sometimes I don’t think you care enough which woman is in your arms to look up,” she protested as she halfheartedly attempted to check his passionate advances.

  “Are you afraid I might confuse you with someone else?” There was only a faint trace of a Scottish burr in Gavin’s deep bass voice, but it was clear he was more interested in planting kisses on the white skin of Clarice’s neck than attending to her answer.

  “No,” she admitted, gazing at her lover out of eyes veiled to hide the caution and speculation in their depths, “but then, I always make sure no one else is about to distract your attention.”

  “I haven’t been with another woman since Cumberland introduced us,” Gavin muttered, as his large, strong hand delved into the front of her dress. “I haven’t wanted to.”

  Clarice had intended to make a more substantial complaint, but the effect of Gavin’s lips on her breast robbed her of any desire to halt his exploration, however briefly. She had been his mistress for almost three months, but she still had not accustomed herself to the marvelous perfection of his body or the fiery energy of his lovemaking. After marriage to a wealthy squire—who had providentially died before her youthful appeal could fade—Clarice was not about to waste time quarrelling over niceties of manner.

  A knock at the door surprised them both, but Gavin didn’t pause in his attentions; when the knock came a second time, it was an intolerable irritation; when it came a third time, followed by the entrance of Clarice’s terrified maid, it was impossible to ignore. Gavin paused but remained where he was; Clarice sat up abruptly, hastily clutching her crumpled gown to her bosom.

  “I have told you never to interrupt me!” she shouted in cold rage. “I’ll turn you off for this.”

  “Please, Madame, I didn’t want to, truly I didn’t, but there’s this gentleman downstairs …” The flustered girl stopped, too overcome by her own embarrassment to continue.

  “I’m already with a gentleman,” Clarice said in icy tones, “or do you think I should be the better satisfied with double rations?”

  “No, Madame. I never would …” The silent laughter which shook Gavin’s six-foot length did nothing to improve Clarice’s temper.

  “Get out and don’t bother me again.”

  “But—”

  “And no but’s!” screamed Clarice, flinging her discarded slipper at the overwrought maid. “Get out, or leave this house at once.” The beleaguered servant hesitated only a moment before closing the door.

  “I wonder what that was about,” mused Gavin, a half smile on his lips as he resumed his exploration of Clarice’s body.

  “Damn!” she exclaimed, still seething with anger. “There’s nothing to do but get rid of her. She’s a stupid creature, poor child, but she’s the best maid I ever had.”

  “Why do you have to turn her off?” Gavin said idly, amusement dancing in his black eyes. “She didn’t bother me.

  “So I noticed.” Clarice’s rich chuckle rolled from her effortlessly. “You acted like maids pop in on you all the time.”

  “Maybe she would like to join us?” Clarice’s laughter erupted again despite the shuddering waves of sensual delight that were sweeping over her body.

  “If you did to Janet what you’re doing to me right now, she would run screaming into the street.”

  “Then it’s a good thing you’re the one who’s in bed with me,” Gavin said as he tugged at her gown.

  “I’d murder you if I caught you with Janet,” Clarice swore. She ran her fingers through his thick black hair and roughly drew his head to her bosom. His face was clear and smooth, with no rough beard to scratch her sensitive skin.

  Gavin pulled Clarice’s badly wrinkled gown over her rounded hips.

  “You could have waited for me to change.” But Clarice’s coyly voiced objection failed to conceal her satisfaction at Gavin’s impatience.

  “I don’t mind helping,” he murmured, as his marauding lips ranged over her neck and shoulders.

  “I think you like taking my clothes off,” Clarice whispered, biting his ear. “It makes you feel like a savage, dominating male.”

  “You make me feel savage,” Gavin muttered. “I’m a perfect gentleman at all other times.”

  “I don’t want you to be a gentleman with me,” Clarice moaned suddenly, her whole being filled with a yearning as urgent as that of the male animal who was about to possess her.

  Clarice raked Gavin’s strong mouth with her own, glorying in the heavily muscled power and lithe grace of the body that filled her arms. She was eager for him to satisfy the craving that suddenly shook her like the ague, and she clung to him, kissing his face with hot, hungry lips. She knew that no matter how perfect their first consummation, no matter how shattering its results, it was no more than a prelude. Gavin’s young, insatiable body demanded much more, and before the night was over, he would completely exhaust her with his demands.

  All petulance and artifice gone, her eyes glazed with desire, Clarice abruptly turned toward Gavin, impatient to surrender to him without reservation.

  The bedroom door opened again—there was no warning knock—and Clarice sat up with a convulsive start. “Hell and damnation!” swore Gavin, not nearly so sanguine this time.

  “I regret the necessity of disturbing you at such a moment,” announced a male voice which reverberated with tightly controlled fury, “but I wo
n’t take more than a few minutes of your time.”

  Gavin froze, his eyes not needing to seek the visitor’s face to know it was his father, the Earl of Parkhaven. His thrusting, seeking tendrils of desire withered into nothingness, as the Earl advanced toward the center of the room. Clarice cowered behind Gavin, reaching frantically for her discarded gown, but the Earl didn’t appear to be in the least disconcerted by the presence of a half-naked woman in his son’s arms; in fact, he didn’t seem to notice Clarice at all.

  “I would never have intruded on you, if you had taken the trouble to answer any one of the several messages I have had sent around to your rooms,” the Earl began. “And please don’t tell me you were out of town, or that your valet only remembered it when you were stepping out the door,” he continued before Gavin could reply. “I’m only too well acquainted with your reluctance to answer any summons from me.”

  “That’s because you never say anything I want to hear,” replied Gavin, not the least cowed by his imperious sire. “And your complaints about my style of living have become extremely irksome, not to mention entirely predictable.”

  “And altogether ignored,” replied his father, favoring Clarice with such a fierce glare that the not-so-courageous beauty cowered behind her lover. “I had thought such overripe fruit must have lost its savor by now, but I fear I failed to take into account that though you are old in debauchery, you are young in appetite.”

  Gavin struggled to keep his temper under control. “Say what you’ve come to say and get out,” he barked. “Your presence is damned inconvenient.”

  “You have only yourself to blame. I would have much preferred to conduct the interview in less vulgar surroundings.”

  “It cost me a fortune to have this place done,” Clarice exclaimed hotly, goaded into speech in the defense of her lavishly decorated boudoir.

  “Be assured it suits you to perfection,” sniped the Earl.

  “Thank you,” she replied, her indignant frown transformed into a gratified smile. “I worried for months over the colors.”

  “Don’t be a simpleton. He’s not flattering you,” Gavin snapped before turning back to his father. “Stop baiting Clarice, and come to the point. Not even you can believe I would choose a mistress for her taste in hangings.”

  “Some do, but you are correct in assuming I did not take you to be one of their number.”

  “Damn you!” Gavin snarled in a harsh whisper. “Will you never let up?” He had no filial feeling whatsoever for this desiccated old aristocrat, but the bastard could always slip past his guard with his damned poisonous tongue.

  “It’s the rest of your life that I wish to speak with you about.”

  “You can’t mean to do it now!”

  “It does seem to be an unauspicious moment,” the Earl remarked, with a wry glance at a room decorated to give one the feeling of being at the bottom of the sea. “This overabundance of green makes me feel unwell. Perhaps tomorrow morning at ten would suit you better?”

  “I already have an engagement. An important one,” Gavin added when he saw his father’s brows gather.

  “Then I suppose it will have to be now.”

  “You must be joking!”

  “This discussion has already been postponed too often. There is a very real clanger that even now it may be too late. I’m quite prepared to wait while you weigh your decision.”

  “That won’t be necessary,” Gavin said furiously, when he saw his father preparing to settle into one of the several chairs with which the room was provided. “I’ll be there at ten, though it’s damned inconvenient. My friends will wonder at my standing them up.”

  “Send them a message, or is writing another of your laboriously acquired skills which has been put aside in your unending quest for gratification of the flesh?”

  “I’ll be there!” shouted Gavin. “Now get out. You’ve already ruined my evening.”

  “I shouldn’t think I have been here long enough for that,” drawled his father. “Considering the heights of ecstasy within your mutual grasp, I would say that five minutes ought to be enough to regain any lost ground.”

  Gavin was nearly speechless with rage, as much from the ruthlessness of his father’s speech as from the cruelty of his judgement.

  “You needn’t bother to accompany me to my carriage,” the Earl added with a sardonic smile. “I don’t think the watch would understand.”

  “I’m tempted to do it, just to see your face,” replied Gavin with a savage snarl.

  “It would not be my face that would draw their attention,” his father responded dryly.

  “Get out before I break your neck,” Gavin said with a reluctant crack of laughter. “I’ll be around at ten sharp, soberly dressed like a dutiful son.”

  “It’s your duty I wish to discuss, but I shall save that until tomorrow,” the Earl added, as Gavin’s brief burst of good humor vanished. “I will leave you to your, uh … how should I put it? Just desserts seems too severe.”

  “Just leave. You can amuse yourself by searching for the mot juste on your way home.” The Earl smiled thinly, saluted his son, and withdrew.

  Clarice let out a long-held breath. “Is that man really your father?”

  “Yes.”

  “He scares me to death.”

  “Then make sure you’re not around when he gets really angry. He may be as thin as whipcord and as pale as a ghost, but the bloody bastard can get into a rage that would make a sailor quake. Unfortunately, I’m the one who usually puts him out of temper. I stay away from him as much as I can.”

  “Is that wise?” Clarice asked, thinking of the costly baubles Gavin had given her. “He does control your allowance.”

  “I don’t have to depend on him to survive.”

  “I’m glad. He might force you to give me up.”

  “That’s not within his power.”

  “He still frightens me,” Clarice said with a pleasurable shudder. She sank back on the bed and pushed herself up against Gavin. “I’m glad you didn’t get your body from him. I wouldn’t find you nearly so attractive.” She snuggled closer and let her hands begin to roam over his broad, muscled chest. “I hope you haven’t forgotten where you were,” she whispered seductively, as she drew his head down between her breasts.

  Gavin swore to himself. It had taken Clarice less than five minutes to rekindle her passion. He had never wanted anything more of her than to be a satisfying bed partner, but to have her so accurately fulfill his father’s prophecy destroyed all the enjoyment he found in her company; even his body refused to respond to her caresses.

  “Damn, damn, and double damn!” he cursed, getting up from the bed so abruptly Clarice nearly tumbled onto the floor.

  “What’s wrong?” she asked, baffled.

  “That bloody bastard has ruined it for me,” Gavin shouted, knowing that Clarice would never divine the real reason for his fury.

  “You can’t let a little thing like a quarrel stop you,” she said, attempting to draw him down close so she could rub her body against him. “This kind of thing is bound to happen lots of times after you’re married,” she said coyly. “You’ll never have any fun if you let it throw you out of stride.”

  “Well, I’m not going to get married,” Gavin declared, reaching for his coat. “There’s nothing I want from a woman I can’t get without it.”

  “How about children?” challenged Clarice mildly. She tried to take his coat away from him, and was not happy when he pushed her aside, but she didn’t persist. The Earl wasn’t the only one with a fierce temper. Gavin’s hooded black eyes, down-turned mouth, powerful jaw, and deep sloping chin, gave him the appearance of a handsome bulldog.

  Clarice was a little afraid of Gavin, yet that was part of his attraction. After a complacent and admiring husband, she wanted someone who would use her roughly. Gavin never did, but there was no doubt in her mind that he would use her very roughly indeed, if she dared cross him.

  “It’s cruel of you to
leave me like this,” Clarice said, pouting attractively. “Will I see you tomorrow?”

  “I doubt it,” Gavin replied with cruel honesty. “I’m not fit for human companionship after I’ve been with my father. I’m liable to bite your head off, or knock it off, just because you’re within reach.”

  “Well, if you don’t want to see me …”

  “It’s not that,” Gavin assured her, yet he knew he wouldn’t be back for several days, if at all. She hadn’t changed, she was still the same lush, attractive woman he had found so desirable in the first place, but in some way he could not explain, his father’s mockery had destroyed his pleasure in her company. He knew she was shallow and silly, even a little rapacious and untrustworthy—he certainly had no intention of marrying her—but all he had wanted was a few hours of unfettered pleasure.

  He cursed his father for denying him that modest goal.

  Chapter 2

  Oliver Carlisle sat stiffly erect in a wing chair near the fire, his legs crossed and his fingers drumming restlessly on a nearby table. His translucent skin and fastidious dress gave him the appearance of an effete aristocrat, a misleading appearance which had caused more than one competitor to underestimate the steel-like determination and dispassionate judgement which had enabled him to accumulate an enormous fortune. Now he was about to bring these same qualities to bear on a problem whose solution had long evaded him.

  Somehow, Gavin must be brought to realize it was time to marry, settle down, and raise a family.

  Distant sounds of arrival reached the Earl’s ear; at least the boy had enough force of mind to tear himself away from that overblown widow when duty called. Maybe there was hope for him yet.

  Gavin burst into the library. His swift stride was a visible manifestation of his unwillingness to be present, and his dour expression an eloquent reflection of the effort he was exerting to hold his ill-humor in check.

  The contrast between father and son was astonishing. Whereas the Earl was of medium height, slight build, and almost feminine in his movements, Gavin’s tall, large-boned physique and athletic appearance gave him the look of a youthful Hercules. Both men shared a clear complexion unmarked by the shadow of a beard, but the Earl’s thin, dark blond hair was in direct contrast to the thick, raven mane of which Gavin was so proud. A strong, broad nose and powerful sweeping jaw completed a face that could stop half the women of London in their tracks, but one so different from its sire that only the Earl’s unwavering certainty of his wife’s fidelity prevented him from questioning his son’s paternity.