Elizabeth Thornton by Whisper His Name Read Free Book Online Page A

liked his mouth. It was full lipped, firmly molded, and made for kissing.
    A shiver of feminine awareness rippled through her. Dear Lord, where had that thought come from? This was Hugh, her best friend. She was doing it again, letting her imagination run away with her.
    His lips settled on hers, and whatever she’d been about to say was swept away in a flood of sensation. He angled her head back, and the pressure of his mouth increased, opening her lips to him. She felt his handskneading her waist, the flare of her hips, her back, then his arms wrapped around her, bringing her hard against the full length of his body. He left her mouth to kiss her brows, her cheeks, her throat. She sucked in a breath when he nipped her ear with his sharp teeth, then she moaned when he bent her back and kissed the swell of her breasts.
    He kissed her again and again, each kiss more desperate than the last. Abbie had never known such passion. Her skin was hot, her blood was on fire, her whole body shivered in anticipation. She wanted more, more, more.
    The kissing ended as suddenly as it had begun. One moment she was in his arms and the next he had set her away from him. Dazed, she stared up at him.
    “How was I this time, Abbie?” he asked.
    “What?” She steadied herself with one hand on the desk.
    “Did I put enough feeling into it? You did say to put a little more feeling into it, didn’t you?”
    She looked around that small candlelit room as though she’d never seen it before. It was like awakening from a dream. As she gradually came to herself, she touched her fingers to her burning lips, then looked up at Hugh. If he was affected by that shattering kiss, he gave no sign of it.
    She stilled the tumult of questions that rushed into her mind. She’d made a fool of herself with Giles. She wasn’t going to make a fool of herself this time around.
    She cleared the huskiness from her voice, but she could do nothing about her burning cheeks. “Hugh, what can I say?”
    His eyes anxiously searched hers. “Was I so bad?”
    She blinked slowly. “No. You were … very good.”
    “Oh, I can’t take all the credit,” he said modestly. “You’re quite the accomplished actress, Abbie. But I think I managed my part quite well too.”
    It was a graceful way out of a tricky situation, and she didn’t know why she felt so disappointed. She cleared the worry frown from her brow and gave him what she hoped was a brilliant smile.
    “You did very well, Hugh. Very well indeed. In fact, you were quite convincing.”
    “And so were you.” He smiled. “So were you, Abbie.”
    He kept up a flow of small talk as he ushered her out of the room, but he didn’t know what he was blathering about, and he doubted that Abbie knew either. He’d given her something to think about and could tell from her surreptitious glances that his strategy was paying off. It was beginning to register with Miss Abigail Vayle that there was more to old stick-in-the-mud Hugh than his prodigious brain.
    “Abbie,” he said, “what do you think about asking Major Danvers to be the speaker at our regular meeting of the Antiquarians’ Society?”

CHAPTER 4
    A bbie was still thinking about Hugh when she climbed the stairs to her bedchamber. She replied mechanically to all Olivia’s observations on the ball, but she could hardly wait to be alone with her own thoughts.
    Once she was in her chamber and had closed the door, she wandered over to the long cheval mirror with a candle in her hand and studied her reflection. The gown she had chosen to bolster her confidence now made her cringe.
    Is this what had brought on Hugh’s kiss? Did he imagine that she’d worn this flashy gown to tempt him? Why had she worn it, anyway? And why had he kissed her?
    She set the candle on the mantelpiece, wandered over to the bed, and hoisted herself up. Maybe it was just as Hugh said. Maybe all he wanted was a little practice.
    She sniffed. She was naive about men, but not as naive