When he returned to thinking, he would remind himself of all the reasons kissing her was a bad idea.

  But now, those pretty lips parted and Henry deepened the kiss, aligning his mouth to hers and sliding his tongue along her full bottom lip, savoring the taste of her, sweet and sinful, as she leaned into him, sliding her hands over his broad shoulders, wrapping her arms about his neck, and pressing herself close.

  Yes. With a groan of approval, he deepened the kiss, stroking his tongue over hers once, twice, before she broke the caress and tilted her face to the ceiling, baring the long pale column of her throat to him . . . an offering.

  He took it. Knowing he shouldn’t. Knowing a gentleman wouldn’t.

  Knowing he wasn’t a gentleman.

  She sucked in a breath when he pressed kisses along her neck to her ear, where he whispered her name again, “Adelaide,” loving the taste of it on his tongue. The way speaking it made him feel like a thief, undeserving of the familiarity. She loved it, too, in the way her fingers slid into his hair and tightened, the sting of her grip driving him forward.

  He answered the bite of her touch with a bite of his own, taking the soft lobe of her ear between his teeth, worrying the skin there until she shivered her pleasure.

  He couldn’t stop his smile. “You like that.”

  “Mmm,” she said, and the sound, low and rich, was nearly his undoing. He was hard and hot and the only thing that kept him from lifting her in his arms and taking her immediately to bed was the desire to undo her in turn.

  “What else do you like, Adelaide Frampton?”

  Her eyes flew open at the question, her pupils wide with pleasure . . . and something else. As though she wasn’t sure of the answer. As though she was afraid of it.

  He pulled back, his thumb stroking across her cheek, something unexpected tightening in his chest as he waited for her to answer. He would have waited forever.

  She whispered, “I don’t know.”

  He leaned in and pressed a soft kiss to the corner of her lips, lingering there, marveling at her soft skin. “That was the truth. Shall I tell you the next step to opening the box?”

  She gave a little laugh, her fingertips coming to rest on the bare skin of his arms. “Please don’t think less of me if I tell you I do not care about the box right now.”

  He would have laughed if he hadn’t been so damn grateful for her answer. And still, he trod lightly, afraid he might scare her off. “A different game, then.”

  She pulled back, her big brown eyes full of curiosity and nerves, and something tightened in his chest, unexpected and important. He released her instantly, enjoying the way her hands came to his forearms, gripping him tightly. Maybe for balance. He hoped to keep her close.

  He turned from her even as she let out a little, questioning sound, and made quick work of finding his trousers—trading his towel for them before facing her once more. He worked the buttons on his falls as she watched, her gaze greedy and welcome on his still bare skin.

  “Are you—” she started, then stopped, considering the next word. “Through?”

  Christ, no. “Not unless you wish to be,” he said, retracing his steps to her. Slowly.

  She shook her head instantly. “I do not.”

  Good. “I only thought you might enjoy the game more if it was not so . . . urgent.”

  Her attention was back on his body, lingering at his hands at the waist of his trousers. She swallowed. “Trousers make it less urgent?”

  He gave a little, humorless huff of laughter, the hard length of him protesting the garment in question. “They help.”

  That little sound again—the one that suggested she was considering the information and had not yet made up her mind how to proceed.

  Proceed, Adelaide, he willed.

  Her gaze lingered over his torso. “You’ve a wicked bruise. More than one.”

  He didn’t take his attention from her. “They’re fine.”

  “They’re not,” she said. “You might have broken something.”

  “I haven’t.” Even if he had, he wouldn’t have admitted it. Wouldn’t have risked her stopping before they began.

  “How would you know?” she asked, and the question had a bit of wildness in it. She was frustrated. Unsettled. Uncertain. Out of control. She didn’t like that, which Henry understood.

  “Adelaide,” he assured her. “I shall mend.”

  She met his gaze. “You’re sure?”

  “No dead duke on your hands today, love.”

  She gave a little laugh at that, and he warmed at the sound, before going hot at her next words. “Then I think you should tell me about your game.”

  Yes. “We discover what you like.”

  Her eyes went wide as saucers. “What I like?”

  The squeak in the words was more appealing than it should be. “Is it so foreign a concept?”

  “No,” she replied, the word dragged out so he didn’t quite believe it. “But . . . no one has ever . . . that is . . . I’ve never really . . . I don’t . . .”

  “Miss Frampton,” he teased. “Imagine my surprise that it is possible to render you speechless.”

  Her brows shot together. “I am not speechless.”

  Henry reached for her then, the mad, mad world beyond the room fading away as he slipped one hand around the back of her neck, his thumb settling to the line of her jaw and tilting her face up to his as he closed the distance between them. “Then I must do a better job of it.”

  The chit opened her mouth to argue and he stole the words from her in a slow, sinful kiss that had them both breathing heavily when it ended. “The fact that no one has ever asked you what you like is an unforgivable wrong. I intend to see it righted.”

  “I thought you didn’t like kissing me.”

  He froze. He’d surely misheard. “What?” Her gaze flickered away, past his shoulder. He leaned into her view. “No. Don’t do that. What did you say?”

  “You . . .” She hesitated, and he forced himself to be patient. “You said I wasn’t worth kissing.”

  What in . . . “When did I say that?”

  “Last night.”

  “I most certainly did not.” He was affronted by the very idea.

  “Well, you apologized for it.” He watched her as those beautiful brown eyes turned downward, between them. To his chest. Christ, the woman had lashes that would wreck a man.

  Not that Henry had ever given much thought to eyelashes.

  Back to the matter at hand, however. “I apologized because it wasn’t gentlemanly,” he said. “It wasn’t the time. You were being chased, and I took advantage of you.”

  She looked to him. “You didn’t take advantage of me.”

  “I assure you, I did.”

  “No,” she said. “I kissed you.”

  “And I kissed you back.”

  “Because . . . you wanted to.”

  He nodded. “Very much.”

  She gave a little, secret smile at that, one he liked very much. Even more when she said softly, “Good. I know I’m quite plain, but . . .”

  There were a dozen things he wished to say in reply. But he started with the most important. “Adelaide . . . who ever told you that you were plain?”

  She started at the question and shook her head. “Everyone. No one. No one has ever had to. I know what is beautiful and what is not and . . . I have other attributes.” He was having trouble finding the words to simultaneously tell her she was wrong and also not have her leave him in that room forever, and she must have taken his pause as encouragement to enumerate her attributes. “I am strong and I am quick and I am clever . . .”

  “You are all of those things,” he allowed. “But you are also . . .” He paused, searching for the proper description. “. . . Christ, there is nothing plain about you. You are . . . magnificent.”

  She blushed at the word, dipping her head, and he knew she did not believe him, which left him deeply frustrated. He cupped her face in his hands and said, firmly, “I told you—I do not lie.”

  She searched his gaze for a long moment. “And you think I am worth kissing.”

  He let out a little disbelieving laugh. “I assure you, Adelaide; there are few things more valuable than kissing you.” He stroked the soft skin of her cheek. How was it that she was so soft? “Right now . . . I’m not certain there’s anything more valuable than kissing you.” He waited for her to look at him and said, “Shall I prove it?”

  “Please,” she whispered, and he grew impossibly harder at the soft word—a wicked temptation that made him resolve to hear it again and again that night.

  He began with a kiss, slow and deep, until she sighed and leaned into him, her lovely long fingers tracking up his bare chest, leaving fire in their wake as he lifted her, carrying her to the chair and settling her on his lap. She gasped at the movement, as he lingered at her sweet, full bottom lip for a moment. A little bite. Delicious. When he released her and met her delighted eyes, he said, “What of this? Do you like this?”

  Another little smile, which he kissed quickly from her lips before she said, “I do.” Her long fingers slid over his skin, barely there. “But are you not cold?”

  “Christ. No.” He was on fire. Scorched by her. He licked at the place where her neck and shoulder met, where the gold chain she kept hidden in her bodice lay hot against her soft skin, shielding her pulse, strong and fast. Satisfaction thrummed through him at the proof of her response. “And neither are you.”

  “No, I am . . . on fire.”

  “Mmm. That, I like.” He growled his pleasure and tilted her chin up. “But this game is about what you like.” He pressed his lips to the underside of her jaw, loving the way she shivered in his arms and sank her fingers into his hair.

  “This,” she whispered. “I like this.”

  He rewarded the confession with a long, lush stroke over her back, pulling her tighter to him before sliding one hand around to the edge of her breast.

  They both froze, Henry using all he had to wait for her approval.

  Her fingers tightened in his hair and she looked down at him with that secret smile once more—not so secret any longer. Not so demure. A woman who suddenly knew precisely what she wanted. “I think—”

  He let his thumb move, a slow slide along the outer swell of her breast.

  She gasped, her hand finding his. Holding it firm. Pressing it tight.

  “What do you think?” He growled, unable to stop himself. Christ, he wanted this woman.

  “I think . . .” The words trailed off, and he thought he might lose his mind.

  And then she moved, her grip tightening. Moving his hand. Using it. Using him.

  Putting him where she wanted him.

  Where he wanted to be.

  “Here?” He barely recognized the word that came out low and broken as his fingertips teased over her breast, finding the tight, pebbled nipple beneath her bodice. Worrying it until she squirmed in his lap, and they both were gasping. “Do you like this?”

  “Yes,” she answered. “Yes, I like it.”

  He rewarded her with a kiss. “What else would you like?”

  “I want . . .” He hung on the silence after the words. Whatever she wanted, he’d give it to her.

  And then she stood up, dammit.

  He reached for her. “Where are—”

  But before he could finish the question, she was working at the tie of her skirts, magically, magnificently untying something and unbuttoning something else and they were gone, leaving her in nothing but the bodice of the dress and a pair of fitted trousers in a lush green silk. She climbed back onto his lap, as though she’d done it a hundred times before, and he said, “I find myself immensely grateful to your dressmaker.”

  She laughed, her knees tucking into the chair beside his hips as she sat back on his thighs.

  He gripped her hips and pulled her closer, stealing another kiss, leaning down and tracing the line of her bodice with his tongue, sliding his hands up over the long line of her torso until her hands found his once more, moving them to capture her breasts, to test the delicious weight of them.

  Her beautiful eyes slid open. “More.”

  “More, what?” he teased.

  “More, please.”

  It wasn’t what he expected, but good God, it was what he wanted. It made him desperate to give her anything, everything she asked for in that breathlessly needy voice. He found the front lace of her bodice. Worked the ties until they barely kept her covered. Grasped the edge of the garment, the backs of his fingers stilling against the hot skin of her breasts. Torturing them both.

  “Henry,” she gasped, and his given name was almost enough to send him over the edge.

  Almost.

  “Ask again.”

  She looked to him. “Please.”

  “Mmm,” he growled, and gave her what she wanted. What they both ached for, pulling her bodice down and finding her nipple with his mouth, soothing the straining tip with soft licks and lingering sucks, reveling in the whispers she couldn’t keep from him.

  “God, yes, please.”

  And every time she said that word—that delicious, decadent word—every time she asked for him, he sucked again, licked again, gave her what she wished, until she was panting her pleasure, her nails in his shoulders as she rocked on his lap, the heat of her a gift and a punishment against his straining cock.

  Releasing her, he yanked the half-tied bodice up, over her head, wanting to touch her, to gain access to more of her skin. She lifted her arms and let him, and he held them there, in one hand, high above her head, tangled in the fabric and ties, while the other stroked down over her skin, testing its heat, marveling at its smooth perfection.

  “Look at you,” he said softly, turning her toward the firelight, reveling in the swells and curves of her. He set a finger to the heavy pendant he’d finally revealed, a brass cylinder between her breasts. He looked up at her. “Full of secrets.”

  “I shall trade them for yours.”

  He almost agreed. But he had other plans that evening. “You are beautiful.”

  She shook her head. “You make me think I could be.”

  She was wrong, of course, and he set about proving it, kissing and licking and sucking his way across her body, stroking over the dip at her waist, the soft skin of her side, the pretty swell of her belly.

  And she let him, stretching long in his grip, sighing her pleasure when he licked at the underside of her breast, squirming when he teased her. She was so responsive, he forgot everything beyond that room in the long minutes she let him explore her.

  He felt the scar before he saw it, a two-inch-long raised line at the bottom of her ribs on her left side.

  He didn’t mean to linger on it. Indeed, as soon as he realized what he’d found, he told himself to leave it. To ignore it. It was old and healed and not his business.

  Maybe he could have, if she hadn’t flinched, as though his touch had brought back a memory. Someone had hurt her. And though the scar might have healed, she was not through with the pain.

  Henry released her from the binds, tossing the bodice across the room as she wrapped one arm over the mark. Who hurt you? How? When? He bit back the questions and the insistence that she give him a name. He did not need to ask to know that she would not like it.

  And he wanted her to like it.

  He wanted her to like him.

  The shock of the thought had him looking at her again, capturing those eyes that saw everything—that followed every path, calculated every risk. He knew enough of Adelaide Frampton to know that she spent her days facing risk. And he did not want to be risk. He wanted to be all reward.

  He met her eyes. “Adelaide?”

  “Yes.” An answer to a question he had not yet asked.

  “Take down your hair.”

  She did not hesitate, reaching up to pull pins from their tight moorings. There were a dozen of them, maybe more, and it was not a quick process. But Henry reveled in every slow, lingering second of it, loving the way errant curls began to tumble down over her shoulders, teasing her curves, wrapping themselves around her breasts, and then . . .

  There was so much of it, wild and free like a cloud of fire. He cursed, low and wicked, reaching for it, sliding his fingers through it, reveling in its soft, silky texture.

  “This,” he growled. “Christ, Adelaide, this hair was nearly the death of me today . . . and I think it might be again.”

  He picked up a long, red lock and used it to paint circles around her nipple, his cock hard as steel as she writhed against him, giving herself over to him. When he couldn’t keep his mouth from her any longer, he leaned forward to scrape his teeth across the straining pink peak before soothing it with the flat of his tongue. She cried out, and he released her, backing away again.

  “I like that,” she said. “All of it.”

  “I know.”

  She gave a little laugh and reached for him—her touch a gift—leaning down to kiss him, her glorious hair falling around them like a curtain. “You are exceedingly arrogant.”

  She made him so. Made him want to crow to the wide world. “You say that as though I don’t have cause to be.”

  A pretty red brow arched high in challenge. “You’re also exceedingly certain of yourself.”

  In answer, he moved, lifting her, turning her, reversing their positions and setting her to the chair as he fell to his knees in front of her. A tiny sound of delight came from her as he leaned in and kissed her. Her fingers tangled in his hair as she met him. Matched him.

  He tugged at her hips, pulling her down the chair, to the edge of it, as she stroked over his chest and torso to the edge of his trousers, where it was her turn to grasp fabric. To tug closer.

  She opened her thighs and Henry thought he might lose himself then, at the look of her, bare to the waist, gazing up at him with delight and desire and that bold, beautiful assessment that made him want to show her all the best parts of him.

  “Shall I tell you what I would like?” he asked.

  “Please.”

  That word again. It would be his undoing. “I would like you naked.”

  Her eyes widened in surprise. “I—you would?”

  “Very much,” he said, his hands falling to the fastening of her trousers. “And in this particular case, the trousers are not helping.”