Pursued By The Viscount by Carole Mortimer Read Free Book Online

alone together in the Walkers’ gallery even more.
    Once she got over the shock, she had even enjoyed touching Lucien so intimately.
    Command him, he now invited.
    She swallowed before speaking. “I cannot.”
    Lucien now stood so close to her, she could feel the warmth of his breath against her cheek. “Command me, sweet Rachel,” he invited again.
    Rachel was finding it difficult to breathe, and her heart was pounding so loudly, Lucien must surely be able to hear it too. Because she wanted to command this arrogant and powerful man. To feel in control. Not of him, but of the situation. In a way she had never been during her marriage to James.
    “I should very much like to kiss you,” Brooketon prompted helpfully.
    James had never troubled himself with kisses. In fact, she had never been kissed by any man—
    Then, perhaps, at the age of five and twenty and with a child in the nursery, it was past time she was?
    And by a man such as Brooketon. Self-confident. Handsome. Experienced in the ways of women.
    There was little gossip in Society about Brooketon’s personal life—who would dare to discuss such an arrogantly powerful man, even in the privacy of their drawing rooms? But the little Rachel had heard indicated he took the occasional mistress. Discreet and quietly conducted affairs with widowed ladies of his own age who had no expectations of remarrying.
    As Rachel did not.
    Some of the tension eased from her at the realization she and Brooketon were both adults, with no hidden agenda and no expectations.
    Only desire.
    Rachel could no longer deny the way her heart pounded whenever she was in Lucien’s company. Or that unfamiliar tingling in her breasts at the thought of having those sculpted lips pressed against her own, and the unfamiliar dampening and blossoming between her thighs.  
    Indeed, she could not seem to help staring at those gloriously sculpted lips.
    “Yes?” It took every ounce of self-control Lucien possessed to keep his voice from sounding forceful or demanding as Rachel took an age, it seemed to him, to decide whether or not she would so much as allow him to kiss her.
    She looked at him beneath lowered lashes. “Yes.”
    Lucien had not realized how tensely he waited, until his breath left him in a relieved sigh at hearing Rachel’s answer.
    “But you will stop if I command it?” She made no effort to hide her lingering feelings of unease.
    But at least it was now only unease rather than outright panic. That bastard Shaw’s brutality had damaged this lady so much, Lucien wanted to hit someone. Or something, as that gentleman was no longer alive to receive his anger.
    An emotion he pushed firmly to one side as he saw the way Rachel looked at him with shy expectation. One day, he promised himself, Rachel would lie naked in his arms after they had made love, and the two of them would be completely and unreservedly satiated after those hours of lovemaking.
    Until that day, he would temper his impatience and accept each part of Rachel as she was willing to give it.
    Rachel forced herself to stand unmoving as Lucien lifted his hands to cradle her cheeks. He raised her face to his before he lowered his head toward hers. Her lips parted as if by instinct to accept the soft pressure of his.
    She closed her eyes as a thrill shot through her unlike anything she had ever experienced before. Warmth. Pleasure. So much pleasure, as their breaths mingled, the firm heat of Lucien’s lips continuing to sip at and taste hers.
    That tingling returned to her breasts, except it was now accompanied by an ache. The dampness increased between her thighs, and the lips there felt plumper.
    A thrill shot through her body as Lucien’s tongue stroked the softness of her lips, causing a tingling excitement. An excitement that rose higher still as that tongue parted her lips wider before entering her mouth slowly, and then claiming, possessing her totally.
    That silken tongue slid alongside her own, stroking, igniting