Wicked Temptations by Patricia Watters Read Free Book Online

and chew and smile, and he'd brush a crumb from her lips and curve his hand behind her neck and pull her to him and kiss her soundly, just like in her Dime Novels....
    She fanned her face, realizing she'd broken into a sweat. Silly, foolish woman. Why on earth would Adam Whittington bid on her basket? With his wealth, and his vast land holdings, and his handsome face, he could have any woman he wanted. But she would not be packing a picnic basket to lure Adam Whittington onto her blanket. She'd be doing it to help raise funds for the church, and that was what mattered most. That, and getting her newspaper started.
    She looked at the press and tried to envision Jim pulling the first edition of The Town Tattler off the type bed. But the only image that came was of Adam's lips moving toward hers. But this time their lips came together in a fiery kiss that sent her sprawling backwards and her petticoats flying up to expose her legs as before. But instead of pulling down her skirt as he had, Adam would put his hand on her leg and push her skirt up further, until he'd be looking at the full length of her bare leg. And she'd make no move to stop him. Then his fingers would come up to undo her dress, and she'd be wearing nothing under it. He'd look at her breasts, which were as free of freckles as a new-born babe's. God had done a good job with them, so she'd be proud for Adam to see them.
    Tingles rushed up her body, settling like pinpoints of pleasure in the pointy tips of her breasts. God had blessed her there as well, giving her small pretty nipples as soft and pink as flower petals, except for now. Odd how they grew hard and pebbly when she had naughty thoughts. Deliciously naughty ones like she was having now, thoughts that also made that area between her thighs start to quiver and tickle.
    And those were the thoughts she took with her when she curled up on her mattress pad later that night.... And they were there the next morning when the first light of dawn fell on her eyelids. Before long, she found herself considering the contents of her picnic basket. A basket that would be filled with delicacies that included pastries, and meat pies, and custard tarts, and other British delicacies intended to attract the notice of a certain British lord.

CHAPTER THREE
     
    'The hardest thing to govern is the heart.'
    — from Elizabeth 1
     
    Priscilla stared at herself in the mirror, scarcely believing what she saw. The women had transformed her into someone she barely recognized. Someone she actually liked . Abigail and Libby had all but covered her freckles using a mixture of bases and powders that they prepared. Then they focused on her eyes, plucking her blond brows and darkening them with pencil, brushing green eye shadow onto her eyelids, dusting her blond lashes with oxide. For a touch of color on her face, they applied a trace of rouge to her cheeks and a lip-stick to redden her lips. When her face was done, Edith and Mary Kate took over, sweeping her hair atop her head and catching it with tortoiseshell combs, then pulling out ringlets to frame her face and tickle the back of her neck. In place of a hat, they tucked silk flowers into the upsweep of her hair.
    Although she'd originally planned on wearing a simple tailor-made, the women were adamant that she wear a dress belonging to Libby, and she reluctantly agreed. It was a Surah silk in alternate stripes of glossy lime and dull-surfaced olive green, with a high ruffled collar, rows of tiny tucks running down the front of the bodice, and great bouffant sleeves that drew together at the elbows and hugged her forearms. Below the wasp waist, the skirt gathered at the small of her back and rose over one of the new braided wire bustles. And below the sharp point of the bodice, it flared over her hips and tapered in at the ankles, giving her figure the sought after hourglass look. She wasn't sure how she was going to sit on the ground on a blanket during the picnic, but she'd worry