‘I don’t intend to let you,’ she finally managed to say.
Nicholas raised a quizzical brow. ‘I think you’ll find that you do.’ He moved closer, watching her all the while, his hold on her still loose, unrestraining, allowing her space and time to retreat. His fingers were on the nape of her neck now, gently exploring, stroking down to her collar bone, up to the shell of her ear. Her body hummed with anticipation, her nerves tingling, her skin, her whole being urging her towards him, as if invisible strings pulled her in, tangled her up, enmeshed the two of them together.
‘Serena?’ His voice was husky. His eyes, dark and disturbing, searched her face questioningly.
She hesitated as his fingers stilled their caress. His hold on her slackened. She knew she should resist, knew it with certainty.
Chapter Three
His lips were gentle, pulling her bottom lip between his own, moulding his mouth to hers, delicately flicking her mouth open with his tongue. Their bodies nestled, thigh to thigh, chest to chest. The buttons from his coat dug into her through the thin fabric of her dress. Still Nicholas teased, a determinedly slow onslaught on her mouth that licked and sipped and kissed with seemingly no intent but to tantalise.
She was suffused with a warm glow. A hotter flame flickered low in her abdomen, and yet she shivered too, goose bumps rising on her neck, her waist, her arms, everywhere their bodies touched. So different. So lovely. Unfurling.
His breath was warm on her cheek. She wanted to melt into him. To drink deeper of him. To feel more of him. Instinctively she returned his kiss, relishing the myriad of sensations flooding her senses, blocking out all thought, building so slowly from warmth to heat that she hardly registered the change in temperature, the intensifying ache becoming a need for more.
Nicholas’s hold on her tightened. The pressure of his mouth increased. His tongue touched hers, or hers touched his, and everything changed. He pulled her so close that even through their clothing there could be no mistaking his arousal. His hand left her waist, trailing lower, gripping the soft flesh of her thigh, cupping and moulding the rounded flesh of her bottom. A throbbing pulse inside her responded to his hardness. Heat sparked.
His mouth became demanding. His tongue penetrated deep, tangling with hers, his lips no longer gentle, no longer sipping, but drinking, driving her towards a place hotter and wilder than any she had been before. She was trembling. Would have fallen were it not for the strength of his grip on her. ‘Nicholas,’ she said, though what she meant she had no idea. Her voice sounded ragged.
He released her abruptly, breathing heavily, his lids hooded over eyes that were almost black with desire. Serena slumped down on to the bench, her head swirling.
‘If I’d known the response I’d get I would have waited until we were indoors,’ Nicholas said with a grim attempt at humour, taken aback by the strength of passion that had erupted between them.
‘You said you were going to kiss me, not ravish me,’ Serena flashed in return, desperately struggling for a modicum of composure. Just a kiss! Well, now she knew there was no such thing!
Nicholas turned away, taking his time to adjust his disarrayed neckcloth, allowing himself to be distracted by this small task in order to give them both time to compose themselves. He had intended no more than a teasing kiss, something to test the waters. That they had plunged immediately into the depths was most unsettling.
Serena sat on the damp wood of the seat, wrestling with the tangled strings of her bonnet. Desire and heat warred with shame and guilt as she realised what she had done. What must he think of her? What was she to think of herself? For even as she sat here, trying to compose herself, she was distracted by an unfulfilled yearning for more. She barely recognised herself. Perhaps she had become infected by Nicholas’s spirit of recklessness.
But it was done now, and she could not regret it. She would put it down to experience—at least, she would at some point, when she was gone from here, somewhere far from this man’s disturbing, bewildering presence. In the meantime the best thing she could do was protect her dignity. She was damned if she would let Nicholas Lytton see how easily his kisses overwhelmed her. Serena straightened her shawl and smoothed a wrinkle from her glove. ‘We should go back.’
Nicholas ran a hand through his hair, smoothing it into something resembling its former stylish disorder and tried to decide what to do. Apologise? No need, surely—he had given her every chance to repulse him. He had done nothing wrong, yet still he felt he had. But then why was she sitting there, looking annoyingly calm, when he was on fire with need, and just moments before he could have sworn she was too. Baffled, he helped her to her feet.
‘Thank you, Nicholas.’
Deliberately misunderstanding her meaning in an effort to rouse her out of her irritating self-possession, Nicholas bowed mockingly. ‘It’s more customary for the gentleman to thank the lady. It was a pleasure, I assure you.’
Serena blushed, and was annoyed at having done so. ‘I trust you are suitably refreshed,’ she said tartly.
‘You’re anxious to resume your search, I suppose. You know, Serena, the papers are just as likely to be lost as hidden.’
‘I’m perfectly well aware that you don’t believe in their existence,’ she snapped. ‘I am also perfectly well aware that I am simply a distraction for you. You’re helping me because you are bored. You kissed me for the same reason. Why the sudden need for honesty—are you feeling guilty? You needn’t, it was just a kiss, as you said. You need have no fear that it raised false expectations.’
‘If we are to talk of false expectations, I think you have raised a few of your own! Dammit, Serena, you said it yourself, that wasn’t a kiss, it was a ravishment.’
The implication made her temper soar, hot words pouring from her like lava from a volcano. ‘There is no need to take your frustrations out on me, Nicholas. You had the good grace to comment yesterday on my enlightened attitude. Would that you had the same. Instead you are behaving all too typically of your sex, happy to blame mine for arousing your desires, equally happy to berate us when they are not fulfilled.’
His voice was steely. ‘I think I am not the only one to be suffering from frustrated desire.’
They stood glaring at each other on the narrow track. Behind them the weak spring sunshine glittered, casting dappled shadows on the lush green verge. In the brief silence her temper abated as quickly as it had risen. ‘You are quite right, I beg your pardon.’
Her simple acknowledgement took the wind from his sails. Nicholas lifted her hand to his lips. ‘You are far more gracious than I. I accept your apology unreservedly, and offer my own in turn.’
She snatched her hand back. ‘Forget it, there is nothing more to be said. Let us return to the Hall, shall we?’
Nicholas nodded in grudging agreement and, linking Serena’s arm through his own, turned back on to the path and led them towards the house.
In London, Mr Mathew Stamppe entered the office in the city of Messrs Acton and Archer, attorneys at law. He was welcomed by the senior partner Mr Tobias Acton, and ushered into a comfortable room at the front of the premises facing out on to the bustle of Lombard Street.
Waving aside the offer of a glass of canary and ignoring Mr Acton’s polite enquiries as to the health of Mrs Stamppe and his son Mr Edwin Stamppe, Mathew cleared his throat and got straight to the point. ‘What is this urgent matter that requires my presence post-haste? It had better be good.’
Tobias Acton assessed the man sitting opposite him with a lawyer’s shrewd gaze. His client was a tall man with