Page 32 of For the Duke's Eyes Only

We prefer our operatives never to marry. If you were compromised, a family would be a liability. And if you were killed in the field, as your father was... well you know what agony that causes for a family.

Her fingers moved to his lips and her gaze followed.

She was staring at his lips. Her thumb exploring, claiming territory.

He stayed completely still, not daring to breathe.

Stretched taut like a rope, fraying beneath the weight of his desire.

If he allowed himself to breathe, he would take her lips, as he’d dreamed of doing so many times, with fierceness and certainty.

Learn their lush contours by heart. Delve inside to taste her sweet, tart tongue. Swallow theI hate youand tease his name from her lips.

Say my name. Say you want me.

Raven. I want you.

He should say harmful, hurtful things. Push her away.

A new idea insinuated its siren song into his Indy-addled mind. What if he’d been going about this business all wrong? What if the best way to frighten her into staying in London wasn’t to push her away... but to pull her close?

It could work. He had to trysomething.

He wrapped his arm around her slender waist. Dragged her against him.

And kissed her.

Indy’s stomach flip-flopped and her heart danced in her chest.

She’d goaded him into losing control. Iron-willed Ravenwood. The impassive, mocking, infuriating man who always made her lose her patience, who always reduced her to a quivering mess of nerves and rage.

He was kissing her.

She’d won this round.

She’d won... his mouth pressed lightly against hers while his gold-brown eyes stayed hard and argumentative.

Half of a victory, then. She’d take it.

She’d take everything he gave and demand even more.

Victory tasted... incredible.

His lips moved against her softly, coaxing her lips apart, the sensation like nothing she’d ever known. She gasped into his mouth, betraying her wildly shifting emotions.

His tongue inside her mouth.

Like diving into an icy lake on a hot day in only your shift, nipples instantly tightening, blood pumping faster because of the instinctual threat of the cold stopping your heart.

The shock of sun-saturated heat meeting the freezing water... like tiny pins stuck under your skin.

The exhilaration.

I’m alive. I live. There’s never been anyone else like me.

There’s never been another kiss like this.

His tongue showed hers what to do:stroke and glide, find the buoyancy. Keep pressing deeper until the earth tilts and his eyes are the ground and your toes are hooked in the clouds.

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