Page 28 of The Phantom Duke
She spun and pointed her cane at him.
“I am the daughter of an earl. My title is Lady. Just as I have addressed you by your title, kindly do me the same courtesy.”
She whirled, choosing the left and walking as quickly as she could.
“Damnation, titles can go hang!” Damien shouted. “I will call you whatever I damn well please!”
“Then, you will be speaking to empty space because I will not be there!” Maria called back.
He followed, and she hustled around another turn. Suddenly, there was nothing but empty air beneath her feet. In the dim light that seemed to prevail throughout the house, a staircase had been concealed. She cried out in alarm, her balance wavering and an apparently infinite blackness yawning before her. The cane fell from her hand to clatter down the stairs. Then Maria was beyond the point of no return, her balance deserting her. She fell.
An iron grip held her. She was wrenched upright with two strong arms about her waist. Her body thudded into the rigid, stone-like frame of the duke, and her breath caught in her chest. He had moved faster than she could have imagined to catch her. Now, he held her, his face inches from hers.
Their eyes locked. His embrace was the only thing protecting her from the dark gulf behind her. She realized that she felt safe. Her hands came to rest on his arms, and she felt the outline of the leather beneath his shirt, covering the upper half of his left arm and his chest.
“You must take care in this house until you learn its layout,” he said. “I do not like bright light. You must become used to shadow.”
“I am not coming to live here!” Maria gasped.
She felt disgusted with herself because she wanted to. The feel of a man’s body pressed against her was enough to turn her head and make her core clench with unfamiliar need
He is just so different from the Marquess of Landsdowne. To any gentleman of the ton, for that matter. So powerful. So masculine. So… stop it!
“You will,” he said, his words ringing ominously. “You can bring your boy, but you will be solely responsible for him.”
Maria gaped for a moment before she recalled her self-control. Damien had said that she might bring Gilbert to live with them, and that was all that really mattered. She had achieved her primary goal, and she needed to focus on that.
“Kindly unhand me,” she whispered.
“I saved you from a nasty fall,” the duke said without relinquishing his grip.
“And I am grateful. If your house was not so infernally dark, I would not have needed to be saved. Unhand me!”
He smiled. He had the impudence and the arrogance to smile at her.
He is laughing at me! How dare he! I should tell him to take his offer of marriage and do something with it that I do not have the language to express!
She pushed against his chest and then slapped him across the face. The smile vanished, but so did the balance that held them both on the precipice of the staircase. The duke grunted and shifted his footing as Maria pushed against him. She felt herself falling, reached out for a banister, but found only empty air.
Once again, the duke was her savior. As they both fell, he twisted, pulling her savagely against his body, one hand cradling her head, the other planted in the small of her back. As the world spun, she heard him grunt again as he took the impact of the fall, including her body weight pressing down on him.
They began to roll, but he somehow arrested the movement, sliding down the remaining stairs with a series of hard thumps which Maria barely felt, shielded as she was by the duke’s body. They came to a rest at the bottom. Maria lay full length atop the duke, who wheezed from lack of breath.
“Accept before I change my mind,” he growled. You are a bloody danger to be around.”
Maria found herself laughing. A dam within her broke, unleashing tension that had been building since the confrontation with her father. She could not stop, feeling the strength flow from her like water. A gentle hand stroked her hair, and she let her head fall to his chest. Tears rode the laughter. Hysteria was not far behind.
She tried to apologize. Tried to ask if the duke was injured. Tried to lift herself from him. But all were beyond her. His strengthwas a safe harbor, a siren call that enticed her to relinquish her own. Give herself up and be protected.
“You are well and unhurt,” he said softly. “All will be well.”
Finally, Maria lifted her head. He had never been so close. His pale face was handsome, rugged and rough as granite. Suddenly, there was no longer a gap between them. Damien’s lips lunged for and captured hers. Maria’s body tensed; she braced her hands against his chest. But the touch of his lips was awakening. The house fled from her awareness. The situation she was in faded to memory. A story, no more.
Maria’s world became one of pure sensation. His lips were warm, his hands strong and rough. His body was hard. She was being embraced by Michelangelo’s David, except the duke felt more of a perfect specimen of masculinity than that effeminate creation. Pulses of heat ran through Maria, emerging from the core of her being and reaching her fingers and toes. Reaching the ends of her hair and the tip of her nose.
The kiss began as rough and passionate. It became fevered and wanting. His tongue pressed against her lips, and Maria reflexively gasped. Then, his tongue was in her mouth, and her mind whirled. She struggled to form any coherent thought, as previously unknown sensations seized and consumed her.
Maria groaned into his mouth, as he took control of the kiss. She was like a piece of driftwood caught in a tempest, subject to his movements as he ravaged her mouth.
