and that caressing thumb against her lip, made it difficult for her to think, let alone breathe.
‘And the matching camisole,’ he continued softly, his breath a warm caress as he lowered his head, his lips a light caress against the warmth of her throat. ‘Are you wearing them both tonight, Georgianna?’
His feather-light kisses burned an arousing path down the length of her throat to the sensitive hollows beneath. Georgianna was barely breathing at all now, her hands moving up to grasp his muscled shoulders even as she arched her neck into that sensuous caress. ‘Zachary, you have to stop,’ she attempted half-heartedly.
‘Why must I?’ His hands moved down to her hips, moulding the softness of her curves against his much harder ones as his tongue dipped moistly and then withdrew from those hollows at the base of her throat, sending shivers of pleasure down the length of her spine. ‘We are neither of us is involved with anyone else. Are we?’
‘No.’ The heat coursed through her body, tightening her breasts under her gown and camisole, warming between her thighs beneath her drawers, only the soft sighs of their ragged breathing now to charge the air. It made it impossible for Georgianna to think of a single reason why Zachary should stop.
That Zachary was equally affected was apparent by his ragged breathing and the throbbing length of his desire as his thighs pressed along the welcoming softness of her abdomen.
‘Are you wearing them, Georgianna?’ he pressed gruffly.
‘I am, yes,’ she confirmed softly, her legs feeling so weak now she was sure that if she were not clinging to the firmness of Zachary’s shoulders she might find herself sinking down on to the carpeted floor at his feet.
She truly felt in danger of doing exactly that, as Zachary continued to lick and taste the length of her throat even as one of his hands slowly skimmed along the length of her hip and waist before cupping beneath the firm fullness of her breast. Her nipple instantly responded, swelling, engorging beneath the thin material of her gown and camisole in reaction to that caressing heat.
This was madness.
Complete madness.
And yet Georgianna had no strength to stop it. No will to pull away from Zachary. From the pleasure created by his lips and hands. From the closeness of him. From feeling wanted, held, for the first time in months.
And that was all this was, Georgianna told herself firmly. A need, an ache, to feel wanted and to be held. ‘Have you forgotten I might be a spy?’ She sought desperately for a return to sanity.
Zachary raised his head to look at her with mercurial grey eyes. There was a flush to the hardness of his cheeks and the darkness of his hair was dishevelled. ‘I have forgotten nothing, Georgianna,’ he assured huskily. ‘If anything, I find that edge of danger only makes you more intriguing. Besides which, if you are a spy, then you are currently an imprisoned one. My imprisoned spy.’ He smiled his satisfaction with that fact.
Georgianna drew her breath in sharply as she once again felt the soft pad of his thumb caress across the hardened tip of her breast.
‘Perhaps that was my plan all along?’ She tried to fight the sensations currently bombarding her senses: pleasure, arousal, heat. ‘Has it not occurred to you that maybe my plan is to stab you at the dinner table with a knife from your own ducal-silver dinner service?’ she persisted breathlessly even as she found it impossible not to arch once again into that marauding mouth as it continued to plunder the sensitive column of her throat.
‘No.’ Zachary smiled against the fluttering wildness of the pulse in her throat. He might have become slightly blasé these past few months, but he was nevertheless positive his self-defence skills were still as sharp. ‘Because I very much doubt you will find the opportunity. Or, if you did, that my strength would not far outweigh your own.’
‘Then perhaps it is my intention to hide one of the knives and take it back upstairs with me, so that I can stab you later, while you sleep?’ There was now an edge of desperation to Georgianna’s voice; she simply couldn’t allow this to continue.
Zachary deftly released the first button at the throat of her gown. ‘Then I will have to ensure that the door between our two bedchambers remains locked at night.’
‘I do not believe you are taking me seriously.’
‘When I am holding you in my arms and about to kiss you? No, you may be assured I am not taking your threats seriously at all, Georgianna,’ he acknowledged gruffly.
‘Zachary!’
‘Georgianna,’ he chided gently as he released the second button and revealed the top of the silky smooth skin above the swell of her breasts.
‘I cannot... This is not—’ She broke off abruptly as Zachary claimed her mouth with his and silenced her protest.
She tasted as delicious as she smelt, of honey and roses, and everything that was so sweetly, temptingly Georgianna.
Zachary groaned low in his throat as he deepened the kiss, his hands sliding down the length of her spine to cup the sweet curve of her bottom and pull her closer against him, the length of his arousal nestling into the heated welcome of her abdomen.
Georgianna could not think, could only continue to cling to the strength of Zachary’s shoulders as the firmness of his mouth now claimed, devoured, her own.
She felt dizzy, light-headed, as her body burned, a heated dampness moistening between her thighs as Zachary cupped the rounded globes of her bottom and held her firmly into and against him. Her breasts were crushed to the hardness of Zachary’s muscled chest, the length of his erection pounding, pulsing, to the same rhythm as his heart beating so erratically against hers as his hands now roamed restlessly up the length of her spine.
A need, a want, a desire Georgianna became totally lost in. Until she felt the warmth of one of Zachary’s hands against the bare skin at her throat and then lower still as he cupped the bareness of her breast beneath the material of her gown.
Her emotions immediately turned to one of panic as she realised that Zachary must have unfastened all the buttons down the front of her gown as they kissed, the material now gaping wide and revealing everything.
She wrenched her mouth from beneath his, both her hands moving up to push him aside as she pulled the sides of her gaping gown back over her chest, before glaring up at him accusingly. ‘You will stop this immediately!’
His eyes narrowed to silver slits, that flush still to his cheeks and his hair dishevelled on his brow. ‘Why?’
‘Because I cannot allow this. It is...’ Georgianna gave a shake of her head, feeling as if she were floundering, much like a fish newly hooked on the line and brought to shore. A fact Zachary was wholly aware of, if the mocking challenge in those silver eyes was any indication. And she had no doubt that it was. ‘Because I do not want you,’ she spat out determinedly as she hastily refastened the buttons on her gown.
‘All evidence to the contrary, my dear Georgianna.’ Zachary’s insolent gaze moved slowly over her flushed face, slightly swollen lips, and then down the length of her throat and chest to where her nipples still pushed against the fabric of her gown.
Geogianna’s lips firmed as she determinedly refused to follow the direction of that insolent gaze. ‘That is purely a physical reaction
