Wicked Designs (The League of Rogues) (43 page)
Warning: Contains an aggressive Frenchman with extremely loose morals, a determined heiress who can’t refuse a dare, and bedroom games where boundaries were made to be crossed.
Enjoy the following excerpt for
The Corrupt Comte:
“
Bon s-soir
, my lord.” Regardless of the stumble in speech, there was no trace of uncertainty in her husky tone.
Euphoria sprinted along his nerve endings. “Do you have something to tell me?”
She tilted her head to the side but said nothing.
“Oh, kitten, do not test me tonight.”
“And what was t-tonight, if not a t-test?”
How many people had dismissed Claudia as slow because of her stutter? She was quick, quicker than anyone gave her credit for, and a sharp spike of adrenaline slithered down his spine. She was going to fight him, even though she’d already implicitly offered her surrender by seeking out Gaspard in the ballroom and not Sabien.
Not. Sabien.
He inhaled deeply, catching the faint scent of tea leaves clinging to her. He found the fragrance as pure and refreshing now as he had in the linen closet. “Clever girl. But I know you want to tell me something.” Hesitation wrote itself across her face, but Gaspard wasn’t about to allow her to hide in silence any more than he had done at the first moment of their meeting. “Last night, I said to decide,” he prompted. “Did you decide?”
Her gloved hands flattened over her middle. “Yes.”
“Yes, what?”
The muscles at the back of her jaw bunched and flexed. “I p-prefer you.”
It wasn’t exactly what he’d hoped for, in terms of declarations, but it was progress. “Prefer, or choose? We do not want you changing your mind later.” Or ever.
“Fine. I
choose
you.” She rolled her eyes at him, something he doubted she would have dared to do at any other man. It seemed that a couple of orgasms from him had given Claudia confidence.
His body tensed at the thought. “Prove it.”
She frowned. “What?”
“Prove you chose me. I dare you.”
Her glare was full of frustrated heat. “I’m st-standing in front of you, not him. I d-don’t know what more p-p-proof you n-need.” Anger colored her cheeks, turning her pretty blush splotchy with each rise and fall of her chest.
“Simple.” There was nothing simple about it, really, but the euphoria sluicing through his veins had turned him slightly mad. “Return the favor I did you last night.”
“F-favor?”
He raised an eyebrow, waiting.
Realization was not a trickle but a flood across her now-familiar features. “You c-cad.”
“Do not say you have not thought about it.”
She moved to stand at his side, her back to the guests, and turned her head to glance up at him before scowling down at the floor.
With his gaze on the crowd, watching for any undue interest in their conversation, he inched his body closer to hers. Leaning in, he traded wicked, whispered words for the chance to inhale her warm scent, a scent which both comforted and aroused. “Do not tell me you are not curious about licking my cock.
Sucking
it.” Drinking him dry.
He barely stifled a shudder of longing.
Her gasp told him how reckless he was being, and perhaps a better man would have retreated, averse to scaring or intimidating a woman he needed to woo. But Gaspard had neither the time nor the patience for wooing, not with the culmination of five years’ worth of covert efforts taking place tomorrow night.
Besides, Claudia wasn’t scared. Frustrated, yes. Irritated with him, probably. Excited? Nervous? He supposed those were normal reactions for a sheltered virgin raised in a wealthy household. But he didn’t feel fear from her, and Gaspard knew himself to be a master of fear, manipulating it at whim. He brokered in fear, his sense of it as finely tuned as that of taste and smell, and nothing in her right now called to that dark, sick part of him.
He didn’t want her afraid, he realized, his gaze locked on the whirling rainbow of dancing guests. He just…wanted her.
She sighed, and he almost smiled. She stood at the edge of his vision, a miffed pastry frosted in pink satin, and his mouth watered with the urge to nibble at her. “I hate you,” she muttered.
“I am certain you believe you do.”
There was a pause as she pondered that. “Wouldn’t you rather d-dance?”
He bit back a scoffing laugh. “No.” No man, no matter his sexual preferences, would ever choose waltzing over willing lips wrapped wetly around his member.
Though her lips might not be so willing. Part of him—a very small, dusty, hidden-away part of him—hesitated, but when her gloved fingers tangled discreetly, tentatively, with his… She didn’t try to hold his hand, to clasp or grip or squeeze, but satin scraped against the calluses on his fingertips, and the lace at his cuff shifted over his scars as she wandered and explored.
A stroke down his middle finger, and he instantly hardened, as if she had given the same slow, purposeful touch to his cock. “Claudia.” His fingers clenched around hers.
“You sh-should know…I’m choosing th-this. You.” He heard her swallow. “You’re not f-forcing m-me, and it’s not a game, like the c-c-closet.”
“This is no game to me.” With his hold on her hand, he led her away from the partygoers, walking backwards and keeping an ever-watchful eye on their surroundings. It wouldn’t do for people to notice. This dare was for her alone, and voyeurs were not invited.
She followed, and he felt her stare on him as they trod a course plotted in his mental schematic of Max’s home. He backed silently through a doorway, listening for chatter and laughter and instinctively rerouting them away, until they reached a secluded corner—a dead-end, darkened hallway that was nothing more than useless architectural space between two rooms. Frivolous, wasted footage, he’d always thought.
Until now.
Gaspard’s shoulders hit the rear wall, pulling Claudia with him as the shadows cloaked them. “So this is your choice.”
The faint glow of lamplight from the sconces in the main hall crept through into their dark corner, glinting in the facets of her bourbon eyes. “Isn’t that what you w-wanted?”
It was, but he was greedy over her, constantly wanting more—the next splintered confession, the newest sensual discovery, the higher leap and greater fall. He needed to push her further with each word from her hesitant lips, his gut whispering,
Nip her, and she’ll bite back. Swipe a paw at her, and she’ll claw your world to shreds.
His justification in singling out Claudia Pascale was nothing elegant or calculated, after all, and it was time he admitted that to himself. This was the bestial, desperate instinct that had kept him alive in the bowels of hell. Instinct called him to action the very first moment he saw her, and instinct had him by the balls now.
This is how you survive.
She tugged at her hand, still caught in his, but he didn’t release her. “M-my lord—”
“Tell me what you did in your bed last night. After I left.”
She glanced over her shoulder, as if worried someone lurked nearby, someone who would overhear. But she was safe in their corner, and she couldn’t escape his demand. A huff of air left her nostrils in a rush. “D-don’t m-m-make m-me.” Her stutter grew more pronounced as her frustration mounted.
“This is your choice, yes?” She hated talking, had every reason to hate it—but as he’d told her in the linen closet, he would never accept silence from her. Not when he could see she had so much to say.
“I thought I was g-going to…” She gestured toward his groin.
Christ.
“You are. But first, I want words. Your words.” Where once desire had stemmed from his need for dominion over her—and what heady power it was, turning a mute into an orator—now he livened to the sound of her voice. Husky from lack of use, vibrant with checked emotion, with painfully precise Englishness rounding every consonant.
Each word from her was special, because each word belonged to him. Gaspard. He owned them.
Wicked Designs
Lauren Smith
The League of Rogues takes what they want—but have they taken on too much?
For too long Miss Emily Parr has been subject to the whims of her indebted uncle and the lecherous advances of his repulsive business partner. Her plan to be done with dominating men forever is simple—find herself a kind husband who will leave her to her books.
It seems an easy enough plan, until she is unexpectedly abducted by an incorrigible duke who hides a wounded spirit behind flashing green eyes.
Godric St. Laurent, Duke of Essex, spends countless nights at the club with his four best friends, and relishes the rakish reputation society has branded him with. He has no plans to marry anytime soon—if ever. But when he kidnaps an embezzler’s niece, the difficult debutante’s blend of sweetness and sharp tongue make him desperate for the one thing he swears he never wanted: love.
Yet as they surrender to passion, danger lurks in Godric’s shadowed past, waiting for him to drop his guard—and rob him of the woman he can’t live without.
Warning: This novel includes a lady who refuses to stay kidnapped, a devilish duke with a dark past, and an assortment of charming rogues who have no idea what they’ve gotten themselves into.
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This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locale or organizations is entirely coincidental.
Samhain Publishing, Ltd.
11821 Mason Montgomery Road Suite 4B
Cincinnati OH 45249
Wicked Designs
Copyright © 2014 by Lauren Smith
ISBN: 978-1-61921-745-4
Edited by Noah Chinn
Cover by Kim Killion
All Rights Are Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
First Samhain Publishing, Ltd. electronic publication: January 2014
www.samhainpublishing.com
Table of Contents
Dedication
Acknowledgments
League Rule 4
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Epilogue
About the Author
Also Available from Samhain Publishing, Ltd.
Back Cover Copy
Copyright Page