They stared at each other, breath uneven, pulses racing.
“So where do we go from here, Ariane?” Chris asked when he was certain he could speak without babbling like a fool.
“I don’t know.” Her teeth worried her lower lip. “I still need help—yours or someone else’s.”
“Mine,” he said quickly, not recognizing the sharp emotion that sliced through him as jealousy.
“Yours,” Ariane agreed. With him, at least, she would know just where she stood.
“Even though I’m the big, bad wolf.” A corner of his mouth lifted.
“But I’m not Little Red Riding Hood.” She smiled, regaining her confidence now that she had seen that this time he had been as moved as she. Surely this had been only a random moment where they had unwittingly gotten under each other’s skin. “Nor one of those imprudent sheep.”
“And the other?” he pressed.
His gaze was so serious, so intense that she felt the dangerous breath lessness return. It occurred to her that perhaps the moment had not been such a random one after all, but she pushed the thought away, unwilling to believe it.
“And here I thought you were a gambler, Ariane. A risk taker,” Chris goaded, the urgent beat of his heart at odds with his flippant words. “A chance,” he said softly. “That’s all I’m asking for.” His voice lowered, grew huskier. “Surely you would not deny a man a chance.”
Ariane’s head made one more attempt to remind her that she was a reasonable person who had never made a decision without carefully weighing both sides of an issue. A sensible person who had never taken a risk that could not be calculated. But now her heart was pounding so madly, so loudly that she heard nothing else.
“All right, Monsieur Blanchard. A bargain. You play the suitor and in return I shall give you a chance.” She lifted her small hand against his triumphant smile. “But not a chance to seduce me. That is just a prettier word for the strong forcing their will on the weak.”
“Then just what is it that you are offering me?”
She took a deep breath and ignored the feeling that she was making a terrible mistake.
“I am offering you the chance to persuade me that a taste of that pleasure you guaranteed personally is an experience not to be missed.”
Because the flare of excitement was strong, he wanted to reach for her, touch her. Because it was too strong, he did not. He had never been a man to be ruled by desire, but for the first time in his life he understood the true temptation of a woman.
“That sounds fair enough.”
“How good of you to think so, Monsieur Blanchard.”
When she held out her hand to him, not languidly as women present their hand to be bowed over or kissed, but thrust straight out like a man’s, Chris’s eyebrows lifted in surprise.
“Is the custom of sealing a bargain with a handshake unknown in California?” she demanded, feeling foolish with her hand thrust out in front of her.
“Of course not” Belatedly, he took her hand in a firm grip. “Forgive me. I have never made a bargain with a lady before.” He grinned wickedly. “At least not a bargain like this one.”
“Monsieur—”
Chris shook his head. “Why don’t we put Monsieur Blanchard to rest? Or don’t you think that we are well enough acquainted for you to call me by my given name?”
“I don’t think—”
“Say it.” Suddenly it was important to him to hear her say his name. Not merely important, but crucial, as if that would, in some odd way, turn a bargain made half in jest into a promise. At the moment it eluded him why he should find promises so desirable, when he had always assiduously avoided them.
Still holding her hand, he took a step and then another until they stood so close together that his body pushed her crinoline back so that her skirt billowed behind her. So close that he could feel the light, tempting press of her body against his.
“Say my name, Ariane.”
She should be frightened, Ariane thought. He was so tall, so broad that her world was suddenly completely circumscribed by his body, whose power was not disguised by his elegant evening clothes. His fingers circled her hand so relentlessly that she might have been manacled to him. But it was his eyes where the true danger loomed—his eyes, so intent that they seemed to consume her.
“Christopher,” she whispered obediently, spellbound by those cool green eyes that held more heat than a thousand fires.
“Chris,” he corrected.
She smiled. “That suits you better.”
“So?”
“Christopher belongs in a stuffy drawing room. Chris belongs among mountains and deserts and beautiful, empty valleys.”
Chris chuckled at the precision of her observation. “Is that a polite way of saying that I don’t belong here?”
“It’s not an insult when I say that. On the contrary.” She smiled ruefully. “I don’t particularly belong here myself.”
“It depends on how you define ‘here.’” Slowly he loosened his grip on her hand and placed it palm down against his chest. Then, using thumb and forefinger, he tipped her face upward. “You belong here perfectly.” He lifted his other hand to lie against the nape of her neck. “Perfectly.”
He remained very still, his touch so light that they both knew all Ariane had to do was step away.
But she did not step away. She had been waiting for this moment, she realized, ever since she had seen him in the theater.
“Now we will seal our bargain my way.”
Despite the command in his voice, Chris lowered his head slowly. Then he touched his mouth to hers.
Not wanting to frighten her and knowing well just how much a little control could intensify pleasure, he reined in the impulse to take her mouth fully. Instead he tasted his way along her lower lip, adding only an occasional flicker of his tongue.
Even when her lips parted beneath the light pressure of his, he did not take the invitation. Instead he continued to tantalize, to tease, allowing himself no more than a brief foray to taste her.
Ariane felt heat blossom within her. It poured through her veins until she was suffused with it. Until she was light-headed with it. And still he did not kiss her, but continued to brush her mouth with his as if he was interested in no more than a casual game.
Her hand was still lying on his chest just over his heart and when her fingertips picked up his quickening heartbeat, she knew that the same heat that curled through her like a living, breathing entity had taken possession of him as well. But he continued with the maddening game, even as his heart began to pound heavily against her fingers.
She opened her eyes to find him watching her. How could he be so controlled, she thought, when she could feel the drumming of his heart? How could he be so controlled when she was melting with the need to taste him?
Lifting her other hand, she threaded it in his hair. She felt the leap of his heart and the answering thud of her own.
“Now,” she whispered against his mouth.
The tug of her fingers on his hair and her breathy invitation had his control crumbling like a house of cards. As he took her mouth fully, he heard a sound that he only vaguely realized came from his own throat. Now that he had surrendered, he plunged into the kiss like a man on the brink of starvation.
For a moment Ariane went still as he invaded her mouth. Voracious, his tongue explored and probed.