Page 53 of His Arranged Duchess
When they were about halfway into the empty alcove, Lucien abruptly spun her around, hands on her shoulders, and gently pushed her back to lean against one of the pillars. Her back was to the crowd, and the candlelight filtered through onto Lucien’s face.
She stared up at him, chest heaving. Hot desire filled her belly, and Frances wished, not for the first time, that she knew what todoabout it.
“What a fascinating story,” Lucien murmured, his eyes intent and unblinking. “I should love to hear more about it.”
Her breath stuttered in her throat. “As I said, you… you will have to wait until it’s finished.”
He held her gaze, a slow smile spreading across his face.
“Good things come to those who wait, I suppose?”
And then, quite without warning, he leaned forward and kissed her.
His lips were soft, faintly tinged with whiskey—when had he been drinking whiskey?—and they were warm, so warm. In fact, the heat from them seemed to surge through Frances’s mouth, down her throat, where it burned around her heart. She gave a little, involuntary gasp, which he swallowed. His fingertips brushed the side of her neck, a feather-light touch, but just enough to ignite her skin.
Tentatively, Frances lifted her hands to his broad shoulders, feeling the smooth material of his jacket. Desire engulfed her, tightening her insides andpulsing.
The kiss deepened, and Lucien pulled her firmly against him, his arm winding around her waist. The tip of his tongue brushed against the seam of her lips, and Frances, quite without thinking, slackened her jaw, opening her lips to allow his access. His tongue gently touched against her lower lip, sending thrills down her spine.
Just as abruptly as it had begun, the kiss ended, and Lucien pulled back. Frances sucked in a ragged breath—had she not breathed since it began? No wonder her lungs were burning—and blinked up at him.
“Lucien?” she whispered, eyes wide. He was looking at her so very strangely, his eyes dark and hungry. The fingertips against her neck lifted to graze the side of her jaw.
“You really do look beautiful tonight,” he murmured. “Now, shall we create another scene for your story?”
Her heart fluttered. Before she could respond, Lucien leaned in to kiss her again. This time, Frances was ready, tilting up her face to meet his lips. However, the kiss lasted only a couple of seconds before he angled his head, fitting his lips to the space beneath her jaw.
Thismade Frances gasp aloud, and she remembered just in the nick of time that a whole crowd of people stood only ten feet away, and clapped a hand over her mouth.
She felt, rather than heard, Lucien chuckle against the side of her neck, the vibrations making her shiver. He pressed againsther, and Frances found that she wanted more of that pressure, of his body against hers.
The hand that was not lingering at her jaw slid downwards to cup her hips. Frances shifted, wondering hazily what that touch would feel like without the layers of clothing and fabric in the way.
She did not have to wonder for long.
Lucien’s hand bunched and twisted in the fabric, and Frances felt a cool rush of air around her ankles.
He is lifting my skirt,she thought dizzily. This was the time when aproper heroine, the sort described in the more respectable novels, would have done something to extricate herself from the situation. In fact, aproper heroinewould never have allowed herself to get into a situation like this in the first place. Cecilia had spurned Lord Malevonte, hadn’t she? Quite firmly.
Aproper heroinewould never have come to an underground ball where such shocking poems were read. She would have run away screaming ages ago, or swooned, or done something dramatic.
Frances did nothing of the sort. Instead, she wound her arms around Lucien’s shoulders, digging her chin into his shoulder. His lips caressed her neck and cheek, but she sensed that his attention was elsewhere now. At the first brush of his fingertips on the bare skin of her thigh, Frances’s breath hitched in herthroat. She pressed her mouth against the material at Lucien’s shoulder, desperate to stay quiet.
Fingertips danced higher and higher, until his knuckles grazed the join of her legs. Frances squeezed her eyes shut, tightening her grip on him.
“Are you quite well, Duchess?” Lucien whispered in her ear, sounding amused.
“Y-Yes, quite well. Thank you for asking,” she added, as it seemed polite and there were no formal rules for behavior in this setting.
Lucien’s fingers moved in a lazy stroking motion, sliding against her. Sensations peaked with every pass of his fingertips, andsomethingbuilt inside her until she could scarcely breathe. It was not enough and entirely too much all at once, and Frances squeezed her eyes closed so hard that she saw fireworks behind her eyelids.
“Will you write about this, I wonder?” Lucien breathed, continuing to stroke his fingers up and down against her.
Her climax seemed to rush upon her from nowhere, a maddening, chaotic bundle of sensations that left Frances gasping and her vision blurring. Somewhere in the distance, a poetry recitation ended, and she was aware of muffled applause.
Lucien let her skirts fall back into place, but stayed pressed against her as her heartbeat returned to normal. When he finally stepped back, Frances’s legs had turned to jelly.
“Steady,” Lucien murmured, his voice a little thick. “Are you well, Frances?”
