The Taste of Innocence by Stephanie Laurens Read Free Book Online Page B

caught her eyes, held her gaze for a moment, then asked, his voice deep, quiet, “Wouldn’t you like to be mistress of all this?”
    He meant the house, the grounds, the estate. His home. But she wanted to be mistress of so much more.
    She searched his eyes, their regard unwavering. Inwardly she quivered in reaction to his tone, and to his question. The answer rang clearly in her mind, but how to voice it?
    “Yes.” Lifting her head, she stiffened her resistance against the temptation being this close to him posed. “But…that’s not enough.”
    He frowned. “What—”
    “What I want…” She blinked, suddenly seeing a way to explain. “Consider—when you invest, you require both the risky and challenging as well as the safe and secure to feel satisfied, to feel fulfilled. When it comes to marriage, I want the same.” She held his gaze. “Not just the conventional, the mundane—the safe and sure—but…”
    She ran out of words, had no words, not ones that would do the concept justice. In the end, she simply said, “I want the excitement, the thrills, to take the risk and grasp the satisfaction. I want to experience the glory.”
    Thanks to years of maintaining an unreadable expression while engaged in business dealings, Charlie kept all trace of surprise from his face. She was an innocent twenty-three, untouched; he knew that to his bones. Yet unless his ears had failed him, she’d just stipulated that were she to marry him, in order for her to be satisfied, their marriage would need to be a passionate one.
    And, by extension, if that point was influencing her decision, then presumably part of her “getting to know him better” involved assessing whether a liaison between them would spark such passion, resulting in the glory she sought.
    He hadn’t been expecting such a tack, but he certainly wasn’t about to argue. He let his lips curve. “I see no impediment in that.”
    She frowned. “You don’t?”
    He assumed the question derived from lack of self-confidence, from lack of conviction that she—her fair self—could fire his passions in that way.
    Given his reputation, all of it entirely deserved, that wasn’t, perhaps, such a nonsensical uncertainty.
    It was, however, as he was perfectly—indeed painfully—aware, entirely groundless.
    He reached for her, careful not to seize, not to give her nerves reason to leap too much; sliding his hands around her waist, he encouraged her nearer.
    She came, hesitantly. What he sensed in her…his instincts saw her as wild, skittish, untamed—unused to a man’s hand. Untouched in the truest sense. And he wanted her, desired her with a passion remarkable in its sharpness, unique in its strength.
    Ruthlessly he held it down, concealed it, suppressed it. He held her gaze. “What ever you want in that regard, I’m willing to give you.”
    She searched his eyes. Moistened her lips. “I—”
    “But of course you want to ascertain the prospect before you agree.” He had to fight to keep his gaze from fixing on her sheening lips.
    Her eyes widened; relief slid through them. “Yes.”
    Smiling, he lowered his head. “As I said before, I see no impediment in that. None at all.” He breathed the last words over her lips.
    Her lids fluttered, then fell. He brushed her lips with his, lightly, tantalizingly, then swooped and took them in a long, easy, unthreatening kiss, a caress specifically designed to ease her trepidations, to calm any maidenly fears. To gently, so gently she wouldn’t notice it, sweep her away.
    He tempted, lured, and she came, hesitant but willing, following his lead as fraction by tiniest fraction he deepened the caress. Her lips were as pliant, as delicate as he remembered; he held his breath as with the tip of his tongue he traced the lower, then gently probed…her lips parted on a sigh and she let him in.
    Let him slide his tongue into the warm haven of her mouth, find hers and stroke.
    Tantalized, fascinated, enthralled.
    Her,