Page 33 of Lady Mary's May Day Mischief
“Is what?” he asked while he trailed little kisses down her temple across her cheek down to her lips. There, once more, he claimed her, his mouth hard against her, his tongue invading, giving and taking. Until he broke away and stared at the ceiling.
“I have no words,” she murmured, stunned, when he began to chuckle.
“A good thing, my lady. You have too many words far too often. Best to enjoy this, silently, eh?”
At that, he cupped her jaw with one hand and ravished her mouth. The devastation was glorious, her whole body tingling with a rash new need to have him, his mouth, his arms, his everything again and again. “How many times I wanted to do this.”
“Me, too,” she confessed.
He squeezed her tightly. “But I had no right.”
“Why would you say that?”
“Everyone told me I was not your equal.”
She shook her head. “But I never thought that.”
“I knew it. That’s why we were friends.”
She stared at him, wistful. “And now?”
“Now there is this.”He ran his hands up her back and curled her near so that her breasts brushed his frock coat. He was delectably warm, his muscles rippling beneath her fingertips. “When I was nineteen and came home one summer, I knew I wanted you in a new and intriguing way. When I returned again one Christmas, I saw you as the lovely woman you were becoming,” he said and trailed little kisses up across her chin to hover over her lips. “I’ve loved you since we were children, I’d say. And you were a scamp. Precious to me.”
“I learned courage from you. Always you urged me on.” Her declaration gave him pause, as if he marveled at her words. She laughed and brushed her lips on his. “Oh. Don’t stop. I’ve wanted a thousand kisses from you, and you’ve hundreds more to go.”
He cupped her cheek, his gaze a smoldering black in the dim garden room. “I’d like to deliver them all as your husband. Tell me I can.”
She wound her arms around him, never to let him go.
The doors from the hall banged open against the walls. A woman marched in, scolding someone.
Mary startled.
Blake tensed.
The woman’s shoes clacked on the tiles as she argued.
Blake pressed Mary and himself further to the wall and the fronds of the palms closed around them.
“I told you that’s not true.”
Mary stared up at Blake. The woman who’d entered was Fifi and she was positively irate.
“But I understand this is what you do,” declared an angry man. “Pretend to care for someone.”
“I don’t. I haven’t,” Fifi fumed.
“Six years ago in London, you didn’t pretend to care for me?”
Mary’s mouth fell open.The man fighting with Fifi was Charlton.
Blake frowned and cocked an ear.
“Pretend? No! I thought you the most charming creature. But clearly,” Fifi ranted, “I was wrong.”
“You promised to meet me in Green Park the next afternoon.”
“I was there!”
