The Defiant One (7 page)

"Oh, dear God!"

"Yes, that was my reaction exactly.  I tried to pull them off, but the damage was done, they had already ingested some.  A few moments later, they were . . ."

"They were what?"

To Celsie's surprise, he actually blushed.  "They were . . . uh, trying to make puppies."

"Puppies?  Was the bitch even in season?"

His cheeks went even darker at her brazen words.  "No.  She was not."

"And yet they were . . . " She made a little motion with her hands.

"Yes, they were."

"Good heavens, Lord Andrew, you discovered an aphrodisiac!  Have you tried it on anything other than the dogs?"

He stared at her in amazement.  "Are you bloody serious?  What sort of monster do you think I am?"

"Well, I was just curious . . .  Something like that would be incredibly valuable, you know.  Why, just think of all the uses you might have for it!"

"I would rather hope that my carriage or plumbing would enjoy far greater acclaim," he said, somewhat sullenly.

"I'm sorry.  I meant no offense."

"It was an accidental discovery.  I could not duplicate it even if I tried, so therefore it is of no value, really, to anyone."

"Can I see it?"

"It is locked in Lucien's safe."

"All of it?"

"Most of it."

"Oh, Lord Andrew, would you consider selling some to me?"

He stared at her incredulously, looking quite shocked.  "Whatever for?"

Now it was her turn to blush.  "Well, you see, I have a lovely stallion at home who seems to have no interest whatsoever in mares.  He is very handsome, with splendid bone, a beautiful, crested neck, and an uncommon amount of intelligence.  I would like to breed him so that these qualities might be passed on to his get, but since he will not mount a mare, there's not much I can do, really.  I'm thinking that a few drops of your aphrodisiac might just do the trick . . ."

"And you accuse
me
of experimenting on animals?!" he exclaimed, staring at her in disbelief.

Celsie's face flamed.  "I love my horse!  I would never give him anything that I thought would hurt him!"

"No?"

"No!   And — and just to prove it, I dare you to let me try some of your so-called aphrodisiac myself!  Why, I wager that there's nothing in it to cause a . . . a reaction, anyhow!  No doubt your dogs were just feeling amorous that day, that's all!"

"You want to try my aphrodisiac on yourself."

"I want to try your aphrodisiac on myself, yes, if only to prove to you that I would never give my animals something I wouldn't put in my own body!"

He just looked at her, one brow raised, weighing the idea in his mind.  "No."

"And you accuse
me
of being a coward."

"I dare not think of the consequences if I allow you to sample it."

"What, are you afraid that I might attack you?"  She laughed, instantly dismissing such a ludicrous thought.  "Really, Lord Andrew, I hardly know you.  I am in no danger of falling into your arms, I can assure you."

He looked dubious.  She saw his mouth working as he chewed the inside of his cheek, contemplating her challenge, wrestling with himself over whether he should accept it.

"I'll pay you a fortune for those few drops, my lord.  And give you one of Sheik's foals just to show my gratitude."

"You're serious, then."

"Dead serious."

He shrugged.  "Very well then," he said, going to a cabinet and inserting a key into its lock.  "But don't say I didn't warn you."

Chapter 6

Andrew knelt, opened the door to the cabinet, and extracted the tiny, precious vial.  Aware of his unfortunate tendency to misplace things, he had given most of the solution to Lucien for safekeeping, but had retained these few ounces, intending them for further study.  He really did not want to waste them in a challenge with this woman.

Even if she
was
the only female besides his sister who'd shown an interest in his work.

Even if she
was
the only female who hadn't yawned her way through his laboratory-tour after going glassy-eyed with boredom.

Even if she
was
the only female he found he rather
liked
having here.

No, he didn't want to give her the potion.  But on second thought, noting the aphrodisiac's effect on a human was further study in itself, was it not?  The very idea aroused Andrew's scientific curiosity.

His would-be subject was still standing behind him, right where he'd left her.  She did not look worried in the least.  Her head was high, her eyes bright with reckless defiance.  No doubt she was determined to prove him wrong.  No doubt she didn't believe a word he'd said about the aphrodisiac.

No doubt they were both going to regret this.

Andrew suddenly wished he had changed into decent clothing,
any
clothing, and that he didn't stand before her in nothing but a blanket draped loosely around his hips.  But then, maybe what had happened with the two dogs had been an accident of chance.  Maybe a few days' settling had rendered the solution inert.  Maybe Lady Celsiana Blake would drink the stuff and nothing would happen at all.

Maybe.

He poured some water into a glass, tapped several drops of the precious liquid into it, and handed it to her.

Her fingers closed around it.  She looked up at him and for the briefest instant he saw a flicker of hesitation, maybe even nervousness, in her eyes before she quickly veiled it with a bravado he was sure she didn't feel.  Then, never breaking eye contact with him, she raised the glass to him in mock toast, put it to her lips, and downed it in several quick gulps.

"There," she said, triumphantly handing the empty vessel back to him.  "I've consumed it — and I feel just fine."

"I am glad to hear it."

"I feel no urge to tear that blanket from your loins.  I feel no urge to ravish you.  I feel —"

She paused, blinking, and put a hand to the base of her throat.  Her very white, very pretty, very feminine throat.  She looked up at him, her eyes widening and registering surprise; and then her hand slid slowly downward, her fingertips drifting over the hollow of her collarbone and out over the rounded swell of one snowy breast.

"— very strange," she finished, obviously unaware of where her hand had gone.

But Andrew was all too aware of where her hand had gone.  He was all too aware of where her hand still remained — and what it was currently doing.  He looked at her fingers skimming softly out over her breast, touching it through the lime-green silk that covered it, and now circling the nipple, which was, God help him, very aroused and clearly delineated beneath the fabric.  Andrew swallowed hard.  He could no more take his eyes off the slow, seductive path of her finger than he could have stopped breathing.

Though he did precisely that.

Stopped breathing.

Her lips parted.  Her skin took on a rosy flush, and she gazed coyly up at him from beneath heavy lids in a way that made the back of Andrew's throat go suddenly dry.  Transfixed, he watched as she licked her lips, a slow, torturous tracing of first the top, then the bottom one, leaving a glistening trail of moisture there that did funny things to his insides as her tongue did a slow circle around the perimeter of her mouth.  Her fingers hooked the top of her bodice . . . slowly tugged it, and the filmy chemise she wore just beneath, down.

"Wh-what is in this stuff?" she breathed, faintly.

"I told you, I don't remember."

"Hmmm . . .  I suppose it doesn't matter what's in it . . . only how it makes me
feel
."

"And how does it make you feel?" he managed, trying to remember why he'd let her have the solution, trying to keep his mind on track, trying to give his scientific brain the chance to anchor him in reality when it was obvious that his body — carnal thing that it was — had already given up on the idea.

"It makes me feel . . . tingly."

"Tingly?"

"Warm."  She blushed, coyly.  "I . . . I don't know how to describe it, really.  I have the strangest sensation down between my thighs . . ."

"I —" Andrew swallowed.  "I — see."

"It feels — well, rather wet and warm down there."  She touched her fingers to her burgeoning nipple.  "And warm
here
, too."

Andrew felt a violent erection coming on.  His pulse was starting to pound, his will fading irretrievably into the gray fog of his thoughts.  "I uh, think I'd better get you back to your brother now —"

"Oh, but I don't
want
to go back to my brother," she said, slipping her other hand into her piled-up hair and with a single flick of her wrist, freeing it from its pins.  She tilted her head back, shook it, and sent the thick, shining mass of hair tumbling down around her shoulders, her bosom, her breast.  Then she smiled up at him, her silvery-green eyes dark with invitation.  "I want
you
."

"Lady Celsiana, you are not yourself, you don't know what you're saying . . . what you're doing —"

"Oh yes, I know what I'm saying."  She sauntered closer, her tall, slim body no longer stiff, but fluid and silky and feline as she sidled up to him like a cat begging to be stroked.  "And I know exactly what I'm doing."  She seized his hand and pressed it to the silk of her gown, all that separated his palm, his fingers, from the hard budding nipple just beneath.  "Oh, that feels so much better.  Will you make the rest of me feel better too, Andrew?"  She gave a shy tinkle of laughter.  "Will you touch me in
all
the places that feel so . . . so strange?"

"God help me . . ."

"God help
you
?"  She laughed, a sound that was low and husky and altogether seductive.  "Why,
you're
not the one who's hot and cold and tingly and warm and — and —"

It was obvious that she couldn't think of the right word.  It was even more obvious that she didn't need to, for now her hand was moving shamelessly, sensuously, over the top of her breast and scooping it free of its silken constraints.  The nipple was huge.  Engorged.  Bright, blushing pinky-red like the trim of her gown and hard as the seed of an apple.  Andrew stared.  Andrew groaned.  And now she was rubbing it between thumb and forefinger, looking down at it in fascination, sliding her palm beneath her breast and offering it brazenly to him.

"Would you look at that," she said, with a funny little giggle.

Andrew looked.  He couldn't help but look.  But oh, if he could only will himself not to
touch
. . .

"Why is the nipple standing up like that, Andrew?"

"Because it . . . it wants — uh, it needs —"

"Wants and needs
what
?"

"Nothing."

"Something?"

He stood frozen, the blanket crushed at his hip in one sweating fist, wondering if he ought to make a run for it before it was too late for both of them.  In another minute he was going to have to peel her off him; no, in another
second
he was going to have to peel her off him, for now she was pressing herself up against him once more, molding her body to his, tilting her head back to look up at him, rubbing her naked breast against the soft, wiry hair of his equally naked chest.

Esmerelda, with a look of canine amusement, got up from the floor, padded across the room, nosed the door open, and left.

Left it ajar.

Oh, God.

And now Celsiana was kicking off one of her slippers, hooking a leg around Andrew's bare calf, and caressing it with her toes.  The sensation of her silk stocking against his hairy leg, the warmth of her flesh against his own, was enough to make his erection feel as though it was going to punch a hole right through the blanket.

Breathing hard, he shot a panicky glance toward the door.

Still ajar.

"Lady Celsiana —"

"Oh, come now, Andrew.  Don't you enjoy this?"

"The damned door is open!"

"No one will come.  Besides, don't you like to live
dangerously
?"

Her hips were pressing against his, pressing against his already straining erection.  And now she was reaching out, dragging her fingers down the cleft of his chest, running her fingernail around his nipple and down over his ribs, following the thin arrow of dark auburn hair toward —

"Madam, please contain yourself!"

"Why?  I've been wanting to touch you from the moment I saw you lying there in that bed.  You have such a splendid physique, you know . . .  Such taut, powerful muscles . . . such a perfectly masculine form.  I think I am very glad that you are not wearing any clothes, after all."

"You must stop this, now!"

"Stop what?  Let go of the blanket, Andrew.  Take it off and let me see if the rest of you is as magnificent as what I can see . . . what I can feel . . ."

"No, this is
not
a good idea," he said, then let out a choked gasp as her fingers brushed teasingly over the blanket, which he clutched to himself like a shield.

Her fingers settled on the upper edge, her knuckles pressing into the point of one bare hip, her smile coy, teasing, a mixture of virginal innocence and pure, female intuition.  "Of course it's a good idea.  Surely, you don't have something to
hide
, do you?"  She tugged persistently at the blanket.  Andrew, his hand shaking, clenched it at his hip.  And then she grinned and sidled closer to him, rubbing her bare breast, her aroused nipple, against the crisp hair of his chest.

"And you accuse
me
of being a coward," she teased, with a little smile.

Andrew groaned.  He was losing control of his will.  Of his body.  He felt his muscles liquefying as Celsiana began kissing his chest, looking up at him through her lashes, her fingers still tugging at the blanket.  He tightened his hold.  And now her knuckles were sliding across his bare, taut abdomen, going out to one hip, and then, agonizingly, back to the other, as she traced the blanket's folded rim.

A blanket that Andrew was clutching desperately against himself.