Pursued By The Viscount by Carole Mortimer Read Free Book Online Page A

nerves with each slow caress. Rachel was clinging to the width of his shoulders by the time his lips left hers to trail hotly to her earlobe. His marauding tongue was a sensuous rasp against that sensitive skin before moving lower to her bared throat and the dips and hollows at its base. All while still only holding her with those gentle hands cradled about her cheeks.
    Nevertheless, Rachel sensed the control he was exerting, the turmoil of his emotions, and the raw need churning beneath the surface of that iron will.
    Emotions she also now recognized inside herself.
    She wanted more of the pleasure this man was giving her. More of his power and self-assurance. More of Lucien.
    All the barriers she had erected to protect herself came crashing down in that moment, until all Rachel could feel was Lucien’s lips against her skin and the wildness of the emotions surging through her own body. Everything she had once been, that younger woman so full of expectations, returned at that moment. It wiped away the disillusionment and years of pain, until all she craved was the pleasure Lucien said he wished to give her.
    “More,” she pleaded, overwhelmed with that need. The wanting . God, how desperately she wanted!
    “Rachel…?”
    She opened her eyes to gaze up at Lucien, her breaths coming more quickly as she saw the raw desire in his eyes.
    “Will you leave with me now?” he pressed. “Come home with me and allow me to pleasure you in private and at our ease?”
    She blinked. “Come home with you…?”
    “Unless you would prefer we go to your own home?”
    Would she? Did she wish for the two of them to go to Shaw House, the home she had once shared with James? “No,” she answered firmly.
    “Wait here.” Lucien’s hands were gentle on the tops of her arms. He squeezed them lightly before crossing the room to open the door. “Lady Shaw wishes to leave now, if you will find her cloak.” The maid he had instructed to guard the door slipped quietly back into the room. “Order my carriage to be brought round immediately,” he instructed someone else standing out in the hallway before stepping back into the room and once again closing the door.
    Rachel fought to keep her panic from rising as the maid assisted her with her cloak. She felt unable to look at Lucien as he remained standing across the room, sure that if she did so, she would change her mind and refuse to go with him.
    Her lack of experience in these matters made her unsure of what would happen once they reached Lucien’s home, but she wanted it anyway.
    She wanted Lucien.

Chapter 6
    “I will be only a matter of minutes making our excuses to the Walkers,” Lucien assured her once they were in the entrance hall. “You will need to put up the hood of your cloak. It’s raining outside.”
    Rachel watched him stride off in the direction of the ballroom before she turned to look out one of the windows at the falling rain, feeling inwardly warmed by his caring as she arranged the hood of her cloak over her hair.
    Even so, she had no idea if she was doing the right thing in going home with Lucien. Could she do this? What if her panic returned? Would Lucien—
    “My, my. Viscount Brooketon. You are aiming high,” a familiar voice taunted from close behind her, at the same time as she was enveloped in that equally recognizable—and unpleasant—cologne. “No, do not turn around.” His voice hardened in warning. “Whatever happiness you might think you have found with Brooketon, know this: it will last only for as long as I allow it to do so.”
    “Why are you doing this?” Rachel trembled inside the warmth of her cloak. “I have done nothing to you except endure the torment and brutality of your lover for years.”
    “And now he is dead, and you are very much alive.”
    “James has been dead for over a year—”
    “And you have been playing the merry widow. Dancing on his grave,” he added harshly.
    She gasped. “That is untrue. I duly kept to my