Page 27 of Drawn to the Duke
“Selina, where are you going?”
Selina paused as she was about to leave the bedchamber sent her brother an enquiring look. “For a walk.”
“Lady Rushworth has her sitting in five minutes.”
“And you can do an admirable job on the preliminaries. You don’t need me for that.”
“I do.”
Selina tensed at the belligerence in his tone. Carefully, she said, “It will look odd if I am there when you begin. Far better that I pretend to pass by to see you at work. That way, while you and she are engaged in conversation during which she is more relaxed, I can rustle up a likeness. You know I work better when the subject is animated.”
Fortunately, her suggestion found fertile ground, and Selina managed to get away with a heavily beating heart and increasing excitement.
For soon she would be in bed with the duke. Yes, he was a handsome, commanding man who excited her senses but, she was increasingly discovering, there seemed so much more to him.
The sun was creeping through the window and dappling the rich Aubusson carpet when Selina slipped into Lord Chauncy’s lavish bedchamber.
Selina and Edward, by contrast, had been allotted a tiny room at the end of a dim corridor, which Selina suspected had belonged to the governess. The lowly Boothes had, after all, been invited only because of Lady Rushworth’s sudden fancy to have her likeness drawn.
Not that Selina cared where they were accommodated. Edward had said he would carouse for most of the night as it was only chivalrous to allow his sister the bed. However, Selina knew she was just as likely to find him passed out and snoring on the uninviting iron bed, meaning she’d be allotted the chair. Well, what did that matter? She had a far more comfortable bed in which to spend the night.
And this afternoon was just the preliminary.
Selina had barely time to observe her surroundings before she was seized by the hand and jerked into Lord Chauncy’s tight embrace.
“Do you know how much I’ve been looking forward to this?” he murmured against her lips before he rained kisses along her jawline.
“Careful of my hair,” she whispered. She was unwilling to drag her mouth from his but needed to remind him that she had little time between their tryst to get herself ready for the grand ball.
And to do her sketch of Lady Rushworth. Not that he would ever know that.
“My tender—and respectful—ministrations shall imbue you with such a golden glow, my love, that no one will notice a hair out of place.”
They both chuckled at his salacious tone as he worked quickly to undo the buttons at the back of her pink netgown which he quickly and expertly whipped off her while she obediently raised her arms.
Selina already had her stays unlaced by the time he’d removed his breeches, bending to seize the hem of her chemise and raise that up and over her head.
“Oh my,” he murmured, as his eyes raked her naked form from head to toe. “I carried about a vision of your loveliness during the past fortnight, but I have not done justice to the reality. No, don’t move.”
Selina hesitated. No man had ever looked at her with such raw desire. Her nipples tingled, and she closed her eyes in ecstasy as he kissed her, reverently at first, before his ardor brought them tumbling onto the bed in a tangle of limbs and hot desire.
“By God, you are a tasty morsel, my darling Anna.” His mouth was against her ear as he held her tightly, his manhood pressed against her side.
The clock on the landing chimed the hour, and Selina tensed as she whispered, “And yours for but twenty minutes, Your Grace, before other considerations intrude.”
She’d thought her words would spur him into a bout of much anticipated, heady lovemaking, but instead he stilled, regarding her thoughtfully as he bent his elbow and rested his head on one hand.
“Perhaps for now, Anna. But what about later?”
“Later?” The air seemed to disappear from her lungs. He wanted more of her? Not just the opportune pleasures he could snatch now?
Lord Chauncy nodded, a twist to his lips that did not make him look sardonic or assessing. No, he looked kind. And fond. And full of genuine wanting.
Selina’s heart beat faster. Her mouth felt dry.
“I take it there is little affection between you and your husband, else you’d not be here now.”
Selina nodded. “That is painfully true, Your Grace,” she said, thinking not only of her own lonely life, but of the contempt with which Edward treated all the women of whom he was custodian.
