Page 38 of Her Devil of a Duke
“Yet there is much kindness in you. A lot more kindness than I have faced from anyone else, ever. Is it all right to confess such a thing?”
“Yes.” Rafe blinked, stunned at the warm feeling that grew inside him at her words.
No one had ever called him kind before. Never. Not even the many women he had spent nights with had ever done so.
I was supposed to have left my rakish ways behind, but with Evie, how can I resist?
“I’m beginning to think you’re the one who is too kind to me, Evie.” No more words passed between them as she raised herself on her toes and kissed him.
CHAPTEREIGHTEEN
“What’s the game tonight?” Evelyn asked as she sat on the edge of Rafe’s bed, wearing nothing but her night rail. Strangely, she didn’t feel embarrassed to be so unclothed before him these days. It felt natural instead, as if there was no better way for them to be together.
Rafe climbed out of the bath and draped a towel across his body. He faced the other way, so Evelyn only caught a glimpse of his rear and his shapely legs. It was clear that Rafe looked after himself from the carving of the muscle that stretched down those legs and then up across his rear and into his back. So distracted, she stared at him with her head cocked to the side, imagining what it could be like to trail her fingers across that toned skin.
“Evie?” He wrapped a towel around his waist and the pleasant image abruptly disappeared. “Did you listen to what I said?”
“Hmm? Oh, sorry. I was a little…”
“Distracted?” He had a mischievous smile in place as he turned to face her, his length hidden beneath the towel. She couldn’t hold back her sigh. He had seen so much of her, yet there was still a part of him she had yet to see, and her curiosity was getting the better of her.
Surely to seduce any man, it was an area she had to know about? Though Evelyn was beginning to question her endeavors completely now that she had been here a few days.
She may have initially come to Rafe with the plan of finding the masked man from the ball, but now, all her thoughts were only ever of Rafe. When she went to sleep at night, she pictured him. When she woke beside him, she trailed a hand down his chest, thinking of how she wanted each moment with him to last forever. She was even starting to dread the day she would have to leave his side.
Is this what it feels like? To start… falling in love? To be so attached to someone?
“You really are caught up with your thoughts.” Rafe laughed and stalked toward her from the other end of the room. Her gaze snapped to his face, away from his body as she chewed her lip, thinking of how she had been ogling him. “What are you pondering so intently?” he whispered as he stopped in front of her beside the bed and laid his hands on the mattress on either side of her, closing the distance between them.
“Nothing,” she lied, her voice squeaking. He laughed once more and peppered kisses down her neck. She loved the sensation so much, she reached for him, but her hands slid off his wet shoulders all too easily when he took a step back and released the mattress.
“Now, would you like to know my answer to your question? What lesson, orgame, as you put it, we are playing tonight?”
“Yes.” She adjusted on the mattress, sitting tall and primly. “You have your pupil’s full attention.”
“Excellent.” That mischievous smile only grew wider. “I’d like to play a game of commands.”
“Commands?” She wrinkled her nose in confusion. “What is that?”
“We each take it in turn to command something from one another. We must do so, or we face a forfeit.” He gestured between the pair of them.
“What sort of forfeit?”
“What kind do you think?” He leaned over the bed again. Her eyes shot to the towel where she could clearly see the bulge of his length beneath.
“Maybe I’d enjoy the forfeit…”
“Don’t tempt me.” He chuckled and kissed her once more. He clearly intended it to be a chaste kiss, but she lingered, her hands sliding up his chest, and he stayed with her, angling his head and parting her lips, an expert at it by now. Their tongues tangled together, making the tremors of excitement pass up Evelyn’s body. When Rafe pulled back, she whimpered in disappointment, her eyelids fluttering.
“It will not be for long,” he promised her. “Right, I shall go first.” He gestured to himself. “I command you to…” He seemed to debate his decision, his brows furrowing. “Tell me a secret.”
“A secret? What sort of secret?”
“Any secret.” He waved toward her once more. “Something that no one else in the world knows.”
“As you wish.” She nodded and shifted on the bed, deciding what to tell him. She had one great secret. It was the reason she was so afraid of the dark, and she had never told it to anyone before. Oddly, it didn’t seem wrong to tell Rafe. He already knew so much about her, things that no one else knew. “When my parents died, I was locked in my chamber.”
Her opening words clearly caught his attention. His expression shifted to one of sincerity and he knelt before her, in front of the bed.
