Good heavens. Her lungs squeezed behind her ribs. This man was her family. Only a distant cousin on her mother’s side, but still. Family. And he had sought her out on the balcony, which meant he obviously knew who she was. But why?
She could barely formulate a reply as he offered her his card. “It would please me if you called upon me at Lockhart Manor sometime.”
His manner wasn’t overtly friendly, but it wasn’t curt either. In fact, the whole exchange was remarkably bland, albeit unexpected, like a bolt out of the blue. With an awkward nod, he took his leave, and Sarani tucked the calling card into her reticule.
What were the odds that he would seek her out? And again…why?
Did he mean to expose her? Embrace her? Convince her to go away?
Her throat burned from a tight combination of thirst and confused emotions. She reached for a glass of champagne from a passing footman and downed it in one swallow, putting up a finger for him to wait. She replaced the empty glass with a new one, only to have it snatched from her fingers.
“Champagne is supposed to be sipped, not gulped,” the duke of her fantasies said.
“I am not a child, Your Grace,” Sarani tossed back. “And why aren’t you inside the ballroom? Don’t you have a wager to fulfill?”
“Do you enjoy being groped, my lady? Poked and prodded as though you were a stud bull on display for breeding?” he asked, his raspy voice doing all kinds of unnatural things to her unruly senses, and Sarani nearly let out a shocked laugh. His lips lowered to graze her ear as a firm hand gripped her elbow and steered her toward a hidden alcove behind a potted fern. “Because I assure you, it is quite tiresome. I am not a piece of meat.”
Her suddenly agreeable tongue wanted to point out that he was indeed a fine piece of meat, but she buttoned her lips firmly. Sodding champagne—she’d never had much tolerance for the stuff. “Welcome to the ugly world of courting, Your Grace, and what we women have had to endure for centuries.”
His large frame tensed beside her in the gloom. “Someone has touched you without permission?” His voice was almost a growl…and now the tingling sensation had turned into something more scorching.
“No.” She laughed. “And besides, no one dared to touch me but you, even at the risk of the maharaja’s wrath or my kukri.”
Sarani almost sensed him smile and then felt him shift closer, though he did not touch her. She was grateful. If he did, she was likely to go up in a shower of indelicate sparks. “Do you have your blades on your person right now?”
“Why? Does that scare you?”
“No,” he said, his breath feathering over her face. Gracious, he was close. So close that she was aware of every inch of him, even in the shadows. “But I don’t wish to find myself on the business ends of them.”
“Why would you—?”
But the rest of her words were blanketed by the warm pressure of his mouth bearing down upon hers. Every nerve in her body pulsed like lightning in a storm. Sarani couldn’t help herself—her hands reached up between them to clutch the lapels of his tailcoat, dragging him closer. He’d looked so sinfully handsome tonight. She’d practically salivated when he’d been announced on arrival. Rhystan in full ducal dress was clearly her Achilles’ heel.
And him naked… That might be the death of her.
Body on fire, she melted into his mouth. His lips were soft and firm as they explored the contours of hers, his tongue tracing the seam before plunging inside. Sarani moaned. She’d forgotten how good he tasted, how skilled he was at kissing, how right she felt in his arms. She didn’t care if he had an ulterior motive. She just needed him.
His mouth dragged down her jaw, peppering small kisses along its edge. When he reached her sensitive throat and bit lightly, her knees nearly buckled. A finger traced the edge of her bodice and Sarani froze, reason returning in between the bouts of utter insanity. They were on a very public terrace at a very public ball.
“Rhystan…”
He licked at her skin, and her eyes nearly rolled back in her head, protests all but forgotten. No, no, no. She was saying something…something important. Sarani tried to get her mutinying brain under control, but that was hard when the dratted man was treating her body like it was his own personal banquet.
“People will see,” she whispered.
“No, they won’t,” he murmured thickly against her collarbone, the sinful rasp of his voice making her skin leap.
“But—”
But nothing else came out as her words turned into gibberish as his fingers yanked at her bodice and his mouth closed around the aching bud of one taut nipple. Sensation rioted across her in hot rippling waves, arrowing down her belly, straight into her hot, yielding core. A low groan escaped him as he shifted to suck the other breast into his mouth.
“Your skin is like velvet,” he rasped.
Grasping her hips, Rhystan sank to his knees—heaven help her wicked thoughts—gathering her hem and reaching down beneath her crinoline to trace her stockinged legs up over her calf, past the hem of her drawers, his fingers freezing on the leather straps of her kukri sheaths crossing each thigh. He lifted a brow, glancing up. “You are armed.”
“A girl can’t be too careful,” she said.
“How do you retrieve them?”
“Pockets,” she panted as his wandering hand left the straps and climbed higher. “Cleverly stitched holes, really.”
With a growl at her words, he moved toward the slit in her drawers to caress her bare, trembling thighs. His knuckles grazed over her heat before she felt his finger slip between her slick folds. A groan tore from him. “So wet, so perfect. Is this all for me?”
“Rhystan…” she whispered, too far gone to be embarrassed about her arousal, her own hands winding into his hair.
This was madness. What they were doing was madness. And yet she did not want him to stop. She never wanted him to stop.
“I’ve wanted to touch you for fucking weeks,” he muttered. The vulgar oath only made her burn hotter. “Teach that tart mouth a lesson, grasp this tempting arse.” His hand left her briefly, reaching around to grab a handful of her derriere, and she squeaked. Oh! She saw his mouth curve into a dissolute grin before he returned his palm to her core. “Discover all of you.”
When his fingers began to move again, aided and abetted by a disconcerting amount of wetness between her legs, Sarani nearly fainted. Sensation built and built, his free hand reaching up to pinch and roll her nipple while his clever fingers toyed with her damp flesh, until it almost became too much, blindingly bright, before shattering. A scream gathered in her throat, but then Rhystan was standing and his mouth was there, kissing her and swallowing her soft cries as her sated body settled into a boneless state against his.