Free Pleasured by Candace Camp Page B

payment from a man. There are some ways, you see, for a woman to make money without lying on her back.”
    “Miss Munro,” he said somewhat stiffly. “I do apologize for impugning your character. I did not intend to insult you, I assure you.”
    “I know.” Again she shrugged, her voice light and careless. “It is not the first time I have been accused of selling my body rather than my remedies.”
    He felt a twinge of guilt, perversely strengthened bythere being no complaint in her voice as she said it. He should not have acted so quickly, he thought, should not have relied on the word of his housekeeper, whose nature, he had known from the way she spoke, was sanctimonious. He had been, he thought, all too eager to have Mrs. Ferguson brand as licentious the woman for whom he lusted. If he had approached Meg himself, if he had played the game of discovery and desire, he would have realized how little she was like any other women he had known.
    She baffled him. What, he wondered, would it be like to pursue a woman who was not angling for some form of payment, whether marriage, a carte blanche,or coins in her hand? A woman who could choose to let a man into her bed without considering what he would give her in return. How would it feel to kiss lips that sought pleasure instead of doling it out? How differently must her moans of passion ripple through him when she had no need of anything from him except himself?
    He had never considered this before, and the notion stirred him—a response, he suspected, amplified by the sight of Meg’s form in front of him, the curves of her body delineated by the wet garments that clung to her. His eyes dropped to the movement of her hips beneath the material, the muslin rendered almost translucent by moisture. Her enticingly rounded bottom flexed and contracted as Meg walked up the rising path.
    His gaze slid down her legs, ankles bared as she held up the skirts to walk. Meg’s feet were bare, her shoes having been torn off in the roiling sea. Her pale feet were long and elegant, like her hands, and he thought how it would feel to glide his fingers over her legs, to take that narrow, archedfoot in his hand, to drag his thumbnail along the sole and watch the shiver run up her body.
    Damon realized that despite his good intentions a few minutes earlier, he was once again tempting a lust that was all too easily aroused by Meg. Blast it, he normally had more control. But when it came to Meg Munro, nothing seemed to be as normal.
    He tried to concentrate on his surroundings. They passed through tunnels and caves, some cavernous, some so narrow it felt as if the walls might close on him at any moment. In minutes he was turned around, with no idea how to retrace his steps. He sincerely hoped Meg’s confidence was not misplaced.
    The walls oozed moisture, their surfaces rippled and slick in the lantern light. He saw stalactites and stalagmites, some thick and others no larger around than his wrist. Here they might appear as dry and grainy as a salt pillar; there they resembled a melting candle; still others looked like a sheet of water frozen as it ran. Most were varying shades of white and tan, but in one low-ceilinged cave, the rippled sides were a muted rainbow of colors. It would be a wonderful place to explore . . . when he was not wet and filthy. And cold.
    Inside the caves, out of the sun, the temperature was constantly cool, pleasant enough if one was dry, but enough to make one shiver when covered in sodden clothes. Still, even the chill could not thwart the lust rising in him. Indeed, everything about their circumstances seemed to arouse him. Their situation was intimate, alone together in the quiet dark. He could not drop back lest he lose the narrow circle of light cast by her lantern. Her scent teased at his nostrils; he could feel the warmth of her body. If he stretchedout his hand, he could slide it down her back and over that tempting derriere. Once thought, that vision was