He dealt, his hands not entirely steady, but her gaze was as skittish as a filly’s. Idiot that he was, when the set presented itself, Leam could not lay it down.
“My lord, you hold an ace.”
“Be ye shuir, lass?”
“Fairly. But—” She blinked rapidly several times.
“But?”
“But if you lead the trick as I imagine you will now, I shall be at something of a loss.”
“Aye.”
“I don’t mean the gown, which I have already told you I intend to recover.” Her cheeks were afire.
“I mean that I cannot remove it by myself. A number of the buttons are beyond my reach.”
Leam laid down an ace, followed by a king, queen, jack, and ten. She had nothing to suffice.
“My concentration is somewhat off,” she mumbled. She stood and turned her back to him.
Leam was glued to the chair.
She glanced over her shoulder, slender brows arched. “I will not renege. I haven’t the courage for it.” The words seemed to slip from her lips like water and her shoulders dipped as though she released a sigh. She smiled, a smile of girlish delight and simple pleasure.
Great God in heaven,
He stood and moved to her.
Her hair, pinned into a thick satin twist, draped just above the gown’s neckline. Leam set his fingertips to the tantalizing arc of pale skin at the base of her head, a silken pulse resonating beneath, and allowed the thick tresses to lean heavy upon his palm.
“What are you doing?” she whispered.
“First things first.” He released one gem-studded comb, then another. Her shining hair fell like a wave over his hand.
She sucked in a breath. “I had not intended—”
“Whit did ye intend, lass?” Her fragrance tangled in his senses, wood smoke and ripe, dark cherries, and he leaned closer. Closer to divinity. Closer to the damnation of a soul already once damned. He breathed her in.
“I—Honestly I don’t know.” She spoke quickly. “But I think you should unhook my gown while you are here. Then you may go back to your seat.”
Leam grinned. This woman beguiled with her very breath.
“Ye think A’ll win the next trick?”
“Of course.”
“Whaur be the confidence in yer game nou?”
“In my shoes on that chair, I daresay. Unbutton me, please.”
He spread his hand across her back, then his other around her shoulder, and drew her to him, brushing his cheek against her satin hair.
“Or we coud say ye’ve already lost the trick.”
She seemed to hold her breath. “That would not be playing fairly. Again.”
He set his fingers to the top button and pried it loose. Then the next and the next. The gown gaped beneath her fall of hair. With all his might Leam resisted sweeping the tresses aside to touch her.
“That should be sufficient.” She spoke very quietly, standing still as a statue. “I can unfasten the remainder should I have need.”
He backed away from the woman with her gown hanging open and her hair tumbling in glorious abandon over her shoulders. He nearly fell over his chair.
He lowered himself gingerly. She sat down and took up her hand again. He produced another unbeatable card.
Watching her silently unfasten the remaining buttons, he dared not speak, or move, or breathe. She stood and peeled the sleeves down her arms without any attempt at seduction, seducing him beyond his imaginings. She pushed the gown over her sweetly curved hips, stepped out of it, and laid it on the chair.
“I am thoroughly weary of it anyway.”
His throat was tight. “’Tis a fine dress, lass.”
“I thought you didn’t like it.”
She was beyond exquisite, from her blushing cheeks to the delicately ruffled hem of the petticoat that revealed a hint of slender ankle.
“A’m a lout tae hae suggested it.”
She grinned and finally lifted her gaze to him.
Would that she had not.
Excitement animated her eyes, and hunger he had only dreamed. He dealt. She reached for her hand, but a glance at his cards told him he’d already won. He deposited them face up, stood, and moved around the table. Wrapping his hands around her shoulders he drew her against him. She sighed, her lashes fluttering.
“I can remove it myself.” The words barely sounded from her parted lips, lips that Leam could write ten odes to and another dozen sonnets. If she would but open her eyes again he could compose an epic in verse to their raincloud depths alone. She was hot against him, the soft touch of her silk undergarment on his skin like fire.
“As ye wish.” He brushed the backs of his fingers across the laces binding the thin silk across her breasts. Through the fabric the deep cleft between showed like an invitation to heaven. She inhaled, tightening the fabric.
“Or perhaps you can,” she whispered.
The laces came undone beneath his hands, the fabric gathered, the garment discarded. He held her arms above her head and brushed his body up hers, hearing her pull in breaths and feeling her fullness with his skin. Her head fell back.
“Tell me this is not real,” she whispered. “Tell me this is my imagination.”
He drew her arms down to her sides and buried his face in her hair.
“Aye. An mine.” He set his hands on her waist and the stiff barrier of stays between him and perfect woman. He squeezed. “Except for the whalebone.”
“You haven’t won it yet.”
“A will.” His fingers worked at the corset’s lacing up her back.
“You don’t know that.”
He drew back and something made him speak, something unwise and impetuous as youth.
“Ye dae.”
Her mouth worked, but no sound came forth. Then finally, “This is not typical, is it? I mean to say, this—this between us, so swift and—and unsuitable.”
He touched her chin, lifting her face so that she must meet his gaze.
“Yer nae a typical lass.”
“That is not an answer to my question.” She looked so direct once more, sincere amid her quivering. “I haven’t done this, you know. You might imagine I had because of—” He captured her exquisite mouth beneath his and she ceased speaking, as he wished because he wanted to know nothing of what she had or had not done. He wanted only to feel her wanting him.
But the kiss was merely the slightest caress, the borrowing of her lips for a moment. He deepened it, urging her lips apart, and she gave him what she had earlier in the day, her sweet tongue and the hot, damp insides of her beauty. He kissed her until she clung to him with both hands on his shoulders, fingertips pressing into his skin, until he was weak with need and very hard. Then he slid his hand up and cupped a perfect breast.
She moaned, a soft utterance of pleasure and invitation. His fingertips smoothed upward, brushing her skin and she was like cream, silken and smooth and beautifully full. He swept his thumb beneath corset and shift.
She gasped, then: “Yes.” The barest whisper.
Gently he stroked, teasing. She was beauty in his hands, tight as he could wish and swollen with pleasure. Her breaths came stuttered, her body responding with sublime feminine eagerness to his touch, little movements revealing her need, and Leam could not catch his breath. Beneath her hands his muscles hardened, his entire
