Free The Accidental Mistress by Kate Harper

serious. Marry her ? ‘But there is no need to go to such desperate lengths, I can assure you.’
    ‘There is every need. I have ruined you.’
    ‘Yes, but by your own admission, you ruin young ladies as a matter of course. Why,’ she added indignantly, ‘You made it practically sound like a career !’
    ‘You, however, are different,’ he said softly, ‘Acquit me Sophie - I am not as bad a man as you might think. And we will deal tolerably well together, after all. I’m sure each of us will find compensations, in one form or another…’
    There it was again , glimpsed in his eyes. Desire, hot and strong. Sophie flushed and stood up so abruptly her chair skittered backwards. She could not stand this. Her own desperate response to that desire, the ache that filled her when he looked at her like that… as if he were just moments away from reaching out for her. From pulling her close to that hard, strong body. No matter that they were sitting at breakfast, that it was no more than nine in the morning. No matter that the servants, or Mrs. Chambers, might come in at any moment.
    They were hovering on something calamitous, a descent into the pit, surrendering to desires that demanded action, right here, right now…
    Such feelings could not be right.
    And now marriage. Either he was insane or she was. Nothing was making sense and being in Roxburghe’s presence was only confusing her. He rose slowly to his feet, his eyes fixed on her face. Any moment now he would step towards her and in all likelihood she would meet him halfway.
    This could not be right !
    With a soft cry, Sophie turned and fled the room, running back to her own as if four walls and one door could stave off the inevitable.
    It could not.
    She hadn’t bothered to lock it this time. Even as she’d fled she’d known he would follow and a part of her wanted him to with such quiet desperation that turning the key in the lock had seemed a ridiculous act of self-denial.
    He came within minutes, as she’d known he would. She was standing at the window looking out at the rain-soaked fields and knew the moment he walked through the door. He came up behind her and put his hands on her shoulders and with a sigh she leaned back against him, absorbing his warmth, the hard strength of his body against her back.
    ‘It is morning,’ he murmured, his lips against her ear, ‘and raining into the bargain. Nothing to enflame the passions there, one might say and yet…’ He turned her around to face him and Sophie gazed up at him, helpless with need. ‘I want you just as much this morning as I did last night. More, I think. There is something about you… about us … that makes me forget everything. You, of all women, remind me that I should behave as a gentleman. And yet you, of all people, have the power to make me forget it.’
    His arms around her felt so right. Reaching up, Sophie pulled his head down to her own so she could experience the magic of those lips again. They melded together, mouth to mouth and the fire that had been smoldering burst into flame. Restraint was no longer an option, self-denial an absurd ideal and they shed their clothing, Sophie’s finger’s fumbling, Roxburghe’s as smooth as glass, until each was able to assuage the need to touch naked flesh, flowing over each other like silk, skin on skin.
    As practiced as his lordship was, skill became pure instinct with Sophie. He guided her towards the bed and they tumbled backwards, his arms cradling her, unwilling to release her mouth until he could taste another part of her. Lips leaving her own, he travelled the length of her throat, moving down until he could pull each pink rosebud nipple into his mouth, one after the other as she writhed beneath the gentle onslaught, caught up in emotions she had never experienced before. Dev had experienced them, had done this so many times that the women had blurred together in his memory and yet – incredibly - this felt entirely new to him. He was