throw her out on her delectable rump. Solving the puzzle of her presence was impossible when the wicked urge to have his way with her jammed his brain. He wasn’t used to his head and his instincts being at odds. His head should be winning.
It wasn’t.
“I give you points for trying,” he said, the hint of savagery directed mostly at himself. Her flinch stabbed him with guilt, although heaven knew she’d asked for trouble.
“I’m sorry.” Her slender throat moved as she swallowed. “If you tell your mother I kissed you, she’ll let you dismiss me.”
He was surprised that his mother had mentioned his attempts to send Miss Trim away. “If she knows you came to my room, that’s enough,” he snapped and felt guilty again when she flushed with humiliation.
“So you’ll win.”
More easily than he’d expected. He wondered why he wasn’t happier. He should be dancing a jig, now that this conniving baggage had overreached herself. But his lips tingled from the pressure of hers. His head flooded with the lemon perfume of her soap, more familiar than it should be. Just the sound of her voice made him yearn.
He didn’t believe that she wanted him. But by God, he wanted her. Except she hadn’t claimed to want him, had she? She’d claimed a silly schoolgirl infatuation.
It would serve her right if he showed her what risks she took. Tossed her onto his bed and flung himself on top of her.
Except …
Except in her face, he saw secrets and mysteries. But he also saw innocence. Whatever else she was, she wasn’t experienced with men. That one awkward, incendiary kiss betrayed Miss Trim as a novice.
She played dangerous games.
He should send her away with orders to pack.
His hands tightened on her shoulders, holding her in place.
“Why don’t you tell me to go?” she asked wonderingly. For once, she sounded like a bewildered young girl, not the woman whose actions tormented him with questions and whose presence banished his sleep.
“You want to kiss me?”
“No,” she said quickly, then less certainly, “Yes.”
She struggled to keep up the pretense of girlish adoration. Except that after she’d kissed him, he’d caught arousal stirring in her eyes.
“Which is it?”
She bit her lip and before he could stop himself, he bent to kiss her, to stop her torturing that luscious mouth. Her shocked gasp was a whisper of warm breath on his face.
His hands slid around her back, holding her as a lover holds a woman he intends to kiss. Thoroughly.
Knowing he’d pay, knowing this was absolutely the last thing he should do, he brushed his lips across Miss Trim’s.
Nell still shook with reaction from her first kiss. The experience had left her confused and strangely frustrated. She wasn’t sure she’d enjoyed it, although it had been … interesting.
She hadn’t expected the heat and intimacy and sheer physicality of placing her lips on a man’s. His mouth had been firm and he hadn’t responded. Not that she was sure what she wanted him to do.
For a long moment, Leath watched her with an unreadable expression. His hands dug into her shoulders and she feared that he was about to shove her out the door. She was bizarrely reluctant to go. She braced for a summary ejection from his room, then tomorrow a summary ejection from Alloway Chase.
His hold softened in a way she couldn’t describe. She stared up at him, transfixed, afraid. No wonder poor silly Dorothy had fallen under his spell. He was the most compelling man she’d ever known.
Her skin tightened with anticipation. Slowly his lips skimmed across hers in a caress as different from her allout assault as satin from iron.
The kiss lasted no more than a second, yet flooded her with such longing that her knees buckled. She leaned back against the door.
He still looked uncompromising. His features were all hard planes: strong bones, jutting nose, adamantine jaw.
Yet his lips … His lips had been softer than a feather.
She snatched a jagged breath and struggled to speak, but before she could, he gave her another of those sweet kisses. Did he linger a little this time? Taste her as delicately as he’d sample a fine claret?
Her breath caught as he raised his head and regarded her with familiar concentration. To steady herself, she hooked her hands around his neck. “That was …”
Lovely? Wrong? Frightening? Beguiling?
Heaven help her. Heaven condemn her. She’d started this. Now she’d opened the gates to destruction on a level she’d never contemplated.
One thumb trailed down the line of her jaw, leaving a tingling wake. His lips quirked in a faint smile that set her heart cartwheeling. The huskiness in his voice stroked across her nerves like silk. The clean, male scent of his skin surrounded her, too familiar in a man who should be a stranger. “You’re not usually lost for words, Miss Trim.”
She’d never been kissed before. She’d always imagined that whoever the lucky fellow was, he’d use her Christian name. Still, something about the way his lordship said “Miss Trim” made her shiver with excitement. And God forgive her, lately when she’d imagined kisses, the man kissing her had been Lord Leath.
Nell felt as if she toppled over a cliff. She should flee, forsake her quest for vengeance, forget that however unacceptable the attraction, she found this man so appealing. She should scuttle back to Mearsall and her dear, kind stepfather, and her dull existence, and be grateful that dullness promised safety.
“You shouldn’t have done that,” she said shakily.
“You kissed me first.”
“Two wrongs don’t make a right.”
She wasn’t surprised when he laughed. Even she thought that she sounded absurd.
“You seem new to the activity. I merely offered an alternative technique.”
She thought she’d blushed before, but this critique set her cheeks on fire. “I don’t go around kissing random men, my lord. I refuse to apologize for my inexperience.”
“I’m glad.” He caught her loosely by the waist. She was overwhelmingly conscious of those large hands holding her.
“For my inexperience?”
“That you made an exception to your rule.”
“I suppose you’re used to women throwing themselves at you,” she mumbled, knowing she made a fool of herself. A man like Leath probably couldn’t step outside without tripping over eager young ladies wanting to kiss him. Wanting more.
The idea of him doing more to her sent Nell’s heart hurtling
