Free The Duke's Deceit by Sherrill Bodine Page A

softly yielding sweetness, made him dizzy with pleasure.
    When she finally broke free of his embrace she was trembling, so he steadied her with hands at her narrow waist.
    “I’ve soaked you to the skin,” she whispered, a telltale blush staining her cheeks and flowing down her throat, disappearing beneath her nearly transparent shirt.
    Laughing huskily, he dragged her closer and lifted her from the water. “I need cooling down,” he drawled with deliberate meaning, and was rewarded with another of her delightful blushes. Today was a day of discovery after all.
    Today was a disaster, Mary groaned inwardly, as Richard set her carefully on the blanket. She was without shame! And a coward to boot! Everything she most despised. She must tell him the truth at once!
    But she couldn’t ignore Dr. McAlister’s dire warnings. And now Richard’s admission of pain proved that the moment was not at all ripe for her to unburden herself. After all, she must think of his welfare above all else.
    She gathered up bunches of her skirt and began to wring them out, trying not to notice Richard on his knees before her. Determined to take the situation in hand, she dropped the hem of her ruined skirt and lifted her eyes to his face.
    “Richard, really we must…” Her voice faltered, as she realized her mistake at once. She should have continued to ignore him, for his mesmerizing eyes were lit with delight, and his long supple mouth was curled in a smile of such luxurious charm, she literally ceased breathing.
    “Another memory returns. I adore the way you lift your chin just so when you mean to be firm with me.”
    His hands meandered along her shivering flesh, catching her shoulders in gentle palms, and suddenly she was inside his embrace. Their mouths searched for and found each other with a caressing intensity that left her leaning limply against the hard muscles of his chest.
    She must stop. Stop this charade. Stop these feelings causing her to lose pace with her breath. Stop the needs spinning shocking delight through her veins, igniting embers of newly discovered desire. They had no place in her life. Particularly with this man, especially when all was revealed to him.
    It was that bitter truth which finally gave her the strength to push herself out of his arms.
    “We must stop,” she said in a husky little voice she hardly recognized as her own.
    “Yes…” he agreed, but his hands continued to stroke her hair down her back in a slow pattern that made her heart pound so loudly, she was certain he could hear it.
    “We must stop. It is late, and Lottie will need help with supper. Isn’t that what you were about to say, my sweet Mary?” he asked with a gentle kiss on her mouth, and a tender, almost wistful, smile.
    Unable to find the breath to utter a word, she simply nodded.
    He stood, pulling her up with him. When he turned away to gather up the basket, she had one brief moment to control the feeling that pierced her heart like a shaft. She feared it was already too late for her.
    The Duchess of Avalon sat quietly as Lord Frederick Charlesworth paced the library with long quick strides.
    “Bit of a worry, Your Grace. Long promised he’d be back for Alvanley’s card party last night. Don’t mind telling you the bets at White’s are heavy that he’s fled the country.” His enormous eyes, a Charlesworth legacy, gazed at her with compassion.
    In response she smiled, patting a spot beside her on the brocade chaise longue.
    “My dear Frederick,” she said gently, touching his hand. “You of all people know that beneath Richard’s sardonic exterior there is much hidden kindness. Do you really believe he would simply desert Lady Arabella so cravenly? Or us for that matter?”
    “Dash it, no!” he grinned quite openly, obviously struck with her perspicacity. “Then where the devil has he gone off to?”
    It was a question that haunted her, and for which she had yet to find the answer. She was saved from attempting by