My Dangerous Duke by Gaelen Foley Read Free Book Online Page A

of young, feminine vulnerability.
    And of an excess of wine.
    Damn. The toasty fire in the hearth must have warmed her into a lull, but the liquid courage that Doyle said she had imbibed appeared to have been her undoing.
    Someone’s going to feel pretty dreadful in the morning , he thought with an ironic tilt of his mouth. She was so still, it occurred to him he had better make sure she had not drunk herself to the point of danger.
    “Kate, it’s Warrington. Are you all right? Can I get you anything?” he inquired as he slipped his fingers past the soft wavy fall of her light brown hair and pressed them gently to her neck, feeling her pulse.
    Normal. Glad you didn’t drink yourself to death, my girl. “Hullo? Anyone in there?”
    No such luck. Impatient to find that his hunger to sample the tantalizing beauty had been so inconveniently thwarted, he studied her for a moment longer. “Very well, then. We’ll play tomorrow,” he whispered. “Up you go.”
    He moved forward and gently, ever so carefully, scooped her limp body up off the chair, fur throw and all. He shifted her in his arms, and still, she did not stir.
    When her head fell onto his shoulder with an almost child-like innocence, a great wistfulness came over him. He wondered how such a lovely creature could have come to such a life—but then, noting the disturbing direction of his own thoughts, he quickly girded himself against these tender sentiments. Her misfortunes were not his affair.
    He was too good an assassin ever to wear his heart on his sleeve. Carrying her over to his bed, he slowly laid her down on it. She sank into the mattress with a dreamy murmur of a sigh.
    Though the protective impulse he had felt toward her earlier had returned full force, the soft and sensual moan from her lips filled him with a moment’s blinding lust.
    Dear God. A tremor of hunger ran through him. His stare traveled over her lax face and down her white neck to her creamy chest. He swallowed hard, gazing at her breasts.
    Somehow, he became fixated on them again.
    Heart pounding, he moved slowly and with caution sat on the edge of the bed. Desire slammed through his veins, but he only meant to look. She was a harlot, she wouldn’t care, as long as he had money, which he did, lots of it. Yet it amazed him that such beauty could be purchased for the taking. She was exquisite, with the dusky fringe of her lashes fanned above her cheeks in sleep.
    The thick and wavy cloud of her satiny brown hair flowed back from the pale oval of her face and spilled across his pillow.
    He marveled at the creamy shimmer of her complexion by the firelight, her flushed cheeks like delicate pink-tinted porcelain. His gaze traveled over her smooth forehead, the delicate twin arches of her light brown eyebrows, and her small, prettily formed nose.
    He would not have guessed her any common sort of wench. Then his attention strayed to her pink lips in ever-growing desire, a gathering smolder darkening his eyes.
    She had a very charming chin, slightly pronounced, and hinting at a firm stubbornness of character. He wanted to nibble its smooth rounded curve.
    With the drift of his imaginings, Rohan found he had to shut his eyes for a moment. He swallowed hard, took a breath, then exhaled it slowly. He chased away an all-too-vivid fantasy of loving her gently while she slept.
    Trying his best to pull himself back from the hinterlands of lechery, he pulled the coverlet up over her with a dutiful motion and cleared his throat a bit. “Do you need anything, Kate,” he asked loudly, “or will you be all right?”
    But his fingers grazed her shoulder as he tucked her in, and won from her lips another blissful sigh.
    It was more than he could take. Needing one small touch, he let his fingertips alight on her shoulder, merely admiring the delicate bone structure.
    “Kate?” he uttered hoarsely. She slept on, more temptation than he could bear. Cursing himself, he glided his fingertips from her shoulder