Page 66 of The Duke Says I Do
She blinked as if fighting tears, which made no sense. Her smile hinted at a tremble, too.
He couldn’t bear the thought of her crying. It made him want to rampage around, breaking the expensive china. Given how carefully she’d washed up, she wouldn’t appreciate that at all.
Then brave, forthright Portia returned. She squared her shoulders and held out her hand. “Did you say you’d take me to bed?”
Her voice sounded normal, with a rich undercurrent of sultry invitation. Relief tinged Granville’s exhalation, although for the life of him, he couldn’t say what had scared him just now.
Portia wanted sex. Sex he could give her. He forced that strange, vulnerable part of him back into the darkness, where he hoped it would fade away and die. He strode past the table and lashed his arms around her, kissing her until she turned into a bundle of molten pleasure. If truth be told, his knees felt a little unsteady, too.
“Have you finished down here?” he murmured, nipping her earlobe.
She gave a start. “I have.”
“Good.” He released her and went around the room, extinguishing every lamp but one. After stopping to kiss her again, he took her hand. He collected the last lamp from the bench and mounted the stairs.
Granville pushed open the door to his suite and placed the lamp on a chest. Before Portia’s arrival, he’d always slept alone in this house. It felt significant that she was the first woman to share the big bed with the carved oak headboard.
Portia gave a muffled giggle. “I feel like a heroine in a gothic novel, lured to her doom by the seductive villain.”
She giggled again when with a fiendish laugh, he pushed her against the door. “There’s no escape, my pretty.”
Placing her hands on his waist, she spoke in an exaggerated tremolo. He approved of a heroine with a heaving bosom. “What shall I do?”
He nibbled a path along her elegant neck. “Yield to my satanic demands, my dear.”
She gave a whimper of pleasure, and her hand slid down to fondle his buttocks, bringing him closer. He stiffened in an instant and groaned, as his lips explored the shoulder bared beneath her stylish blue gown. Her breath changed, and she squirmed against him.
“You’re not supposed to encourage your evil seducer.” His voice was rough and unsteady. He enjoyed the game, but he hadtrouble thinking past the ache in his balls. “They’ll banish you from the league of Minerva Press heroines, if you keep doing that.”
“I’ll have to take up a career as the evil villain’s mistress.” Her words emerged in fits and starts. The game turned serious for Portia, too.
He flattened his palms on the door and pushed back to break the contact. “The evil villain is on board with that.”
Her theatrical pout made him laugh. “So why is my ruthless seducer playing coy?”
“Because this time he wants to savor the experience.” His voice lowered into longing. “I’ve dreamed of seeing you naked more often than you can know.”
“Why do you say things like that?”
“Because they’re true?”
“How on earth can I say no?”
“I hope you won’t.”
She observed him through her lashes. The effect was intoxicatingly seductive. “You know, I’d rather like to see a naked man myself.”
“A naked man orthisnaked man?”
“Do I have another option?”
He laughed and swung her toward the center of the room. “No, you do not, my lovely.”
“In that case, I’ll settle for what I’ve got.”
She rose on her toes and kissed him quickly. Before he got too interested, she stepped back. “What should I do?”
Granville told himself to simmer down. To think, he’d once considered himself a civilized man. He’d certainly believed that he was immune from ever becoming a slave to physical impulse. Portia Frain transformed him into someone at the mercy of animal appetites, someone he had difficulty recognizing.
