Wicked Surrender (Regency Sinners)(5)

Pain, because his fingers were holding her so tightly they would, in all probability, leave bruises.

Pleasure, because the mere touch of his hands was enough to send quivers of awareness down the length of her spine before centering at her core.

Bella had been a virgin on her wedding night, which she and Jeremy had spent at an inn in Scotland following the wedding, the two of them having eloped to Gretna Green. Thankfully, her mother had advised her the previous year as to what would be required of Bella in the marriage bed. She had also explained that if Bella was lucky in her choice of husband, she might also know pleasure in his touch.

Bella’s new husband was only two years her senior, and although not quite as inexperienced as she, Jeremy had not had many sexual encounters either. It had been a question of the two of them learning together.

They had done so tolerably well. Sexual relations with Jeremy had been pleasant, if not wildly exciting. Then Jeremy, following the path of several of his friends, had decided to go off and fight in Wellington’s army against the Corsican usurper. After that, his visits to England, and their marriage bed, had necessarily been infrequent. Jeremy had been killed the previous year at the Battle of Toulouse, one of the last battles to be fought before Napoleon surrendered and was sent into exile on the island of Elba.

It felt somehow disloyal to now acknowledge she was experiencing pleasure merely from having the touch of Dante’s hands upon her. Not just pleasure, but a sizzle of excitement she had never experienced in her deepest intimacy with Jeremy.

A realization that instantly caused her to pull away from that disturbing touch, no doubt adding to the possibility of leaving those bruises on her skin. “Please go,” she instructed coldly.

“Bella—”

“Dante,” she came back challengingly.

Instead of the familiarity annoying him as she had intended, those sculpted lips curved into a slow, sensual smile. “I believe I enjoy hearing my name on your lips.”

“I believe I have heard quite enough from you for one day.”

The smile remained. “I am leaving for Huntingdonshire at ten o’clock in the morning.”

“I wish you a safe journey.”

“Then wish one for yourself too, because you are coming with me.”

Her gasp was one of outrage at his arrogance. “I most certainly am not.”

“Oh yes, you most certainly are,” he assured her pleasantly.

“You cannot make me go with you.”

“No?”

“Absolutely not.” She gave a firm shake of her head. “I was a married lady and now I am a widow, and I now make my own choices and decisions as to where I shall or shall not go. I have no wish to leave London at this time.”

“Is that because you do not want to be parted from your current lover? Or is there some other reason you need to remain in town?” He studied her through those slitted lids.

“I do not have a current lover!”

“Then perhaps it is time you did.”

Her eyes widened at the husky tone of Dante’s voice. “You?”

“Why not?”

Bella could not have been more shocked if Dante had sprouted two heads and both of them began to recite the Lord’s Prayer, in Latin.

His arms encircled her waist as he pulled her in close against the unrelenting hardness of his body. “I might have turned down the generous offer of your body seven years ago, Bella, but I would not do so again now,” he said gruffly. “Perhaps we should both look upon this trip into Huntingdonshire as an opportunity to…explore those emotions, you seem so certain I do not possess.”

She pushed her hands half-heartedly against the hard wall of his muscular chest. “I have no wish to explore anything with you.” She glared her frustration at being unable to free herself.

“The yielding of your body says otherwise,” he murmured confidently.

Impossible to deny it when the heat in Bella’s core had now spread to every part of her, creating a tingling sensation in her breasts and causing her nipples to engorge and ache. The heat between her thighs had caused her nether lips to feel swollen and damp.

The fact that the evidence of Dante’s arousal was pressed against the softness of her abdomen was not helping her predicament. “Take your hands off me before I am forced to scream.”

He bared his teeth in a smile. “We both know that’s not going to happen.”

It was truly frustrating to know she could not carry out her threat, not when she would be the one to suffer for it if she did. Gentleman of the ton seemed to be allowed to behave exactly as they pleased, but the ladies were not allowed that same freedom. And a reputation, once lost in Society, was not easily recovered. With no family of her own to speak of—Bella certainly did not count the St. Justs as family—her friends in Society were all she had left. She certainly did not want to risk tarnishing her reputation for this gentleman.

The duke raised dark brows. “Agree to come to Huntingdonshire with me tomorrow, and I will release you now.”

Bella’s heart was beating rapidly and loud enough to be heard, and she would be lying to herself if she tried to claim it was for any other reason than Dante’s close proximity. The warm vitality of his chest beneath her hands. The hard throb of his arousal pressing against her.

If she had understood him correctly, and she believed she had, Dante St. Just was using the lure of the two of them embarking upon an affair as an added incentive to accompany him to Huntingdonshire.