Page 27 of Her Rogue to Ruin
“Seduction.” The word slipped over her tongue with shocking allure.
“Why have you never taken a lover, Portia?”
Each time he spoke her name, something in her thrilled at the small intimacy. But the question was a mortifying one to discuss with a man who’d just intimated that he’d seduced another with ease.
Fiona had spoken of her first lover as a kind of education—that he’d taught her things about herself, about pleasure. Portia had never thought to ask her how she’d initiated the arrangement.
“Perhaps I haven’t learned how to attract one.” Laying her brush on the lip of her easel, she drew in a deep breath, and then turned to face the only man she’d ever imagined as her lover. “Would you teach me, Phin?”
“Teach…you.” He drew out each word slowly as if he wasn’t certain he’d heard her correctly. “Teach you?”
“Perhaps it’s a brazen thing to ask.”
“It is.”
Portia felt herself deflating, wishing to take back the words.
Then he stepped down from the dais and strode toward her. “It is brazen,” he said with a husky rasp, “and I quite adore it.”
A warm breath of laughter burst from Portia, and he grinned in his bone-melting way.
“When do we start?” he asked eagerly. Without giving her time to answer, he added, “Now. Let’s start now.”
He drew closer and tipped his head as if studying her.
“Seduction starts with the eyes.” With his free hand, he reached up and hesitated, his fingers near her temple. “It’s rather convenient for you that you have the most beautiful eyes I’ve ever seen.”
“You needn’t flatter me.”
He took a single step closer, slid a finger under her chin, and tipped it up until they were eye to eye.
“Words can be a powerful aid in seduction, I admit. But if I praise you, it’s because I wish to. And I vow that I will only ever tell you the truth, Portia. Understood?”
“Yes.”
“So I’m confessing to you now that those lavender eyes of yours have quite enchanted me.”
His words heated her blood until she felt dizzy. She reached out to steady herself and her hand found his muscled chest. He was furnace hot, and his heartbeat thudded fiercely beneath her palm.
“There,” he whispered, “now you know it’s true.”
“So how do I use my eyes to seduce?” She almost addedyoubut stopped herself.
“The way you look at someone can say as much as words. A gaze conveys desire, interest, invitation. Our eyes can tell a whole tale.”
“What do my eyes say?” For the first time, she wanted him to see every bit of the wild yearning she’d felt for him since the day they’d met.
“That you…” He swallowed and licked his lips. “That you desire me.”
“Last night,” she confessed, “I wanted to kiss you on that balcony.”
He swept his fingers up along the curve of her jaw, skimming up over her chin, and then dipping feather light to trace the seam of her lips.
“How would you have done it?” he rasped. “Show me.”
“Are you not supposed to be teaching me?” she teased, pressing against his chest.
He ducked his head in amusement and when he looked at her again, his amber eyes glinted with mischief. “Well, if you show me, I can better advise you on your technique,” he told her with mock seriousness. “A standard educational method, I’m sure.”
