Desired by a Lord (Regency Unlaced 5) by Carole Mortimer Read Free Book Online Page A

work in yesterday. He leaned back in his chair. “You do not think I am the one who owes you an apology?”
    She gave him a startled glance. “Oh no, my—Whitney.” She lowered her gaze again. “I should not have reacted so…so childishly to what was, after all, only a kiss.”
    His brows rose. “You are accustomed to receiving ‘only a kiss’ from your employer?”
    “I have never had an employer before you,” she admitted. “I only ever accompanied Edmund in the past. I… You must think me something of a hysteric to have reacted so irrationally.”
    Xander did not believe Emily wished to know what he thought of her.
    He had given much thought to that kiss during the night, and to Emily, when the continued and heated throbbing of his cock had kept him from sleeping.
    He accepted that their kisses should not have occurred, but he was equally sure Emily had not been repelled by the depth of them. On the contrary.
    And yet neither had she responded like a woman who had been married for five years. Her responses had been tentative, almost shy to begin with, becoming more emboldened only when she had felt the physical evidence of Xander’s arousal pressing against her.
    Admittedly, Emily was nothing like the sophisticated and experienced women he had bedded in the past, but she had been a married woman. What sort of lover had Marsden been that the heat of Xander’s and her own arousal could send her into such a panic?
    All questions Xander required answers to. But not from Emily; he knew better now than to expect her to confide in him. That being the case, he had already written to Brooketon this morning, and he hoped to receive word back from his friend as soon as possible.
    In the meantime, Emily was still waiting for his answer. “Please continue with your work, Mrs. Marsden.” He rose to his feet. “I shall be out for the rest of the day, seeing to estate business.”
    Emily’s eyes widened. “You wish me to continue cataloguing the books in here?”
    Whitney eyed her haughtily from his superior height. “Have I not just said so?”
    Well. Yes. He had. But she had felt sure, after last night, he would want her to remove herself from his house.
    Emily now had another Before and After in her life.
    Before Xander kissed her, and After Xander kissed her.
    Before that kiss, she’d had only her blackmailer to worry about. Only!
    After the kiss, she had all these strange and unfamiliar passions awakened inside her. An ache, a longing, to have Xander kiss her again. To do more than kiss her.
    She had looked like a wild thing the previous evening, when she glanced at herself in the mirror once she reached the privacy of her bedchamber. Her hair loose and in disarray. Eyes fevered. Cheeks flushed. Her lips swollen.
    It had been even worse once she undressed and washed before going to bed. Everywhere she touched seemed sensitized. Her breasts felt heavy, and the merest accidental brush of her hand against her nipple had caused her to groan as it swelled and engorged to the color of a small ripe strawberry. Between her thighs had been slick, the little button above swollen to twice its normal size as it peeked out, red and throbbing, from beneath its protective hood.
    The merest touch of her fingers there had resulted in pleasure beyond description. Another gentle stroke only increased that pleasure.
    Once begun, Emily could not seem to stop, the slickness between her thighs acting as lubricant to the increasing fervor of her stroking fingers. Until the nubbin swelled and pulsed, and the juices flowed copiously between her legs as she rocked into the intensity of what was a euphoric release that engulfed her whole body for several long and intense seconds.
    Her whole body shook and quaked in the aftermath, her legs trembling as she moved to the bed and dropped down to sit on the side of it, before they refused to support her.
    She wondered how much more intense that pleasure might have been if it had been Alexander