Page 7 of A Trickster’s Temptation

‘Oh, yes?’ She wasn’t good at games like this. She’d never played them, had always assumed that no-one would want to play them with her—but Mr. Hart, as always, was different. ‘And… and if I was?’

This hadn’t been her goal a moment ago. But now that Mr. Hart was standing in front of her with that singular look on his face—that slightly moonstruck look, as if she’d hit him with a rock—kissing him again felt like the most natural possible conclusion.

She took another step forward. Mr. Hart, after a long pause and an even longer stare into Mary’s eyes, stepped forward to—and before Mary could move, he covered his mouth with hers.

This kiss was deeper than the first. More sensual, even if Mary didn’t have enough experience of kisses to make an exact comparison. As if Mr. Hart had seen the need for pleasure burning at her centre and decided to draw it out, play with it as one played with a naked flame. The slightest increase of pleasure, the proximity of his body; it was a question rather than a possession, and one that her body was eager to answer in assent.

So eager, in fact, that she slid her arms around Mr. Hart’s neck without realising that she was doing so. Only once she was playing with Mr. Hart’s hair, wrapping her fingers in the curl at the base of the man’s neck, did she realise quite how far she had gone; Mary paused for a moment, considered stopping, but didn’t.

She didn’t have to stop. No-one was going to storm into the room and demand that she stop kissing Mr. Hart, unless Mrs. Bates grew suspicious for some unaccountable reason. No stern governess was going to appear out of thin air and remind her that she, Mary Fine, had no business doing something quite so enjoyable.

Because thiswasenjoyable. Deeply, powerfully enjoyable, and all the more intoxicating as a result. It was as if she had taken some new, delicious drug, and the resulting effects made her want to take more, more and still more of it.

‘Oh!’ She couldn’t help but gasp as Mr. Hart softly coaxed her lips apart with his tongue. Such a brazen thing to do, but welcome all the same; her body hummed with pleasure at the sensation, the sweet shock of Mr. Hart stroking the roof of her mouth with his tongue as he brought his hands to the curve of Mary’s waist. Mary slowly, gently tugged at the roots of Mr. Hart’s hair in response, rewarded with a shiver that made the spark at her core grow into a quick, hot blaze.

How had she known how to do that? Tease him that way, following the instincts of her body? Had she always known how to do that, or had Mr. Hart somehow imparted it without words?

Oh, it didn’t matter. All that mattered was the slow, sensuous stroke of Mr. Hart’s thumbs over the curve of her waist, the taste of his kiss as he expertly explored her mouth, and the desire to go still further that had crept up on her by degrees.

When Mr. Hart pulled away, her first instinct was to moan in frustration. Every ounce of self-restraint Mary possessed kept her silent; she brought a hand to her chest, surprised to find herself panting.

Mr. Hart was breathing hard to. More to the point, he was still holding her waist—and Mary, despite her sudden unease, didn’t want to pull away from his touch.

‘I suppose I’m lucky you didn’t wear a false moustache.’ It was the only thing she could think of to say that wasn’tkiss me again, now, immediately. ‘It would have tickled dreadfully.’

Mr. Hart’s answering laugh felt like a caress. It was warm, intimate, as if he had ushered her into a secret group that consisted of the two of them and no-one else. As Mary laughed too, leaning giddily against him as her head span, the kitchen seemed more luminous than it had before.

If anything, the laughter felt even more dangerous than the kiss. And just like the kiss, the danger felt considerably less important than the pleasure contained within it. Even though Mary was eventually the first to draw away, Adam easily releasing her, it was with a reluctance that she hadn’t expected.

‘So.’ Kissing was quite intuitive, but talking afterwards was not. Now there was a fierce awkwardness that only lessened when she looked into Mr. Hart’s eyes, that had a curiously comforting air despite the strangeness of the situation. ‘I—I don’t believe I can call you my enemy any more, Mr. Hart.’

‘I don’t wish to irritate you, Miss Fine, but I barely considered you an enemy before. An annoyance, perhaps.’

‘Of course.’ It was almost a relief to return to their normal pattern of conversation. ‘How big-headed I was.’

‘But… but you’re considerably less of an annoyance now.’ Mr. Hart’s smile faded. For a moment he looked lost, doubtful; Mary looked away, embarrassed by the honesty of his gaze. ‘And I’m dashed if I know what that means.’

‘Nothing.’ Mary spoke quickly. ‘Nothing at all.’

As soon as she said the words, she regretted them. This moment, this sudden discovery of one another, deserved more than an abrupt verbal brushing-off. But the alternative, actually speaking to Mr. Hart about some sort of development between the two of them beyond this deeply unwise kiss, was too silly to even contemplate.

Not silly. Silly wasn’t the word. The word was frightening, deeply frightening in a way that Mary could barely comprehend.

When she turned back to Mr. Hart, his easy smile was back in place. Still, there was a sense of something having been lost: a prize snatched away. ‘Forgive me. That was rude.’

‘No, it wasn’t. You’ve been much ruder to me in the past.’

‘I—I feel as if I’m a different person. Or that a different person made the decision to… well. Kiss you.’

‘It’s a good feeling, no? A compelling one, pretending to be someone else.’ Mr. Hart shrugged, the devilish gleam back in his eye. ‘I do it often enough.’

‘Don’t try and claim a parallel between this feeling and your own disregard for the law.’

‘It’s not even about disregard for the law, Miss Fine. Not really.’ Mr. Hart paused. ‘There’s comfort in being someone else sometimes. Don’t you think? You can make decisions you’d never normally make… do things you’d never normally do.’

How irritatingly correct he was. There really was comfort in taking these feelings, this sudden rush of desire, and putting it into the container of another person. A woman more impetuous than Mary Fine, more deliberate and decisive in her pursuit of what made her happy rather than what made the rest of the world content.

‘You could even give her a name, if you like. A costume, too.’ Mr. Hart’s voice was as skilfully erotic as his kiss had been. ‘Doesn’t that sound fun?’

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