Practical Widow to Passionate Mistress by Louise Allen Page B

outraged and shockingly aroused. Somehow she got her hands up, clenched her fingers into the cloth and buttons of his uniform jacket and clung on while he ravaged her mouth. He wanted no tender give and take, that was the only thing that was clear to her reeling brain as he freed her arms, clasped her buttocks and lifted her against the rock-hard ridge that was so exciting her.
    Yes, yes, yes, the words chanted in her head as the taste and smell and heat of him overwhelmed every other sensation, every coherent thought.
    There were coloured lights against the darkness of her closed lids, a strange buzzing in her ears. Air. She needed air or she would faint. Meg pulled back her head just enough to breathe and with the air came reality.
    This could only lead to one thing. The clamouring voices in her blood still shrieked yes, but she fought them, got her mouth free, dragged down more air andmanaged to say, ‘No.’ It was a whisper, hardly audible above the thud of her pulse. How could she trust her instincts after last time, after James? How could she risk entangling her life with another man when her future was so precarious?
    Ross did not seem to hear her, but buried his face in the curve of her neck, his big hands sliding round to cup the weight of her breasts. The touch felt like naked skin on skin. ‘No,’ Meg said again, on a sob, and hit him, hard, on the ear.
    Any other man would have reeled. Ross merely lifted his head and looked down at her. ‘No?’ He must have seen the conviction in her face, for he opened his hands and stepped back. ‘Meg, I am not playing with you. Won’t you be my mistress?’
    ‘No! Of course not. What are you thinking of? What am I thinking of?’ she added distractedly. ‘I am not your mistress, I do not want to be your mistress.’ Meg hit him on the chest with her clenched fist, a thump for every sentence as though she could make herself believe her own protestations. Ross was silent, accepting her blows without trying to parry them. ‘You stalked me from the quayside, caught me in a position where I could not refuse to come with you. You know I need money—’
    ‘No.’ He spoke at last, frowning as her final, half-hearted blow faltered and she stood there, one hand on his chest, her breath coming in sobs. ‘It was not like that. I realised, suddenly, that I could offer you a position, one where you would be safe.’
    ‘Hah!’ Meg snatched back her hand. ‘Safe?’ She was not safe from her own desires, let alone Ross’s.
    ‘It wasn’t until just now, when I realised just how bad this felt…Oh, Meg. I don’t want this title, I don’t wantthis life. I don’t want to be here. You are the only thing I know I do want, just at this moment. The only point of reference I’ve got.’
    ‘Then why are you here?’ she demanded. ‘Why come back if it makes you feel like this?’
    There was a long silence while Ross seemed to be asking himself the same question. ‘Duty,’ he said at length. ‘Duty. There have been Brandons at the Court for three hundred years. The land is mine and my responsibility. The people are my responsibility. The damned title is my responsibility. My brother’s dead; I cannot even tell myself I can leave it to the better man any longer.’
    The bitterness shook her out of her own anger and confusion. The better man. Had he really thought that about his own brother? ‘And you reach for me like another man might have reached for the brandy bottle or the laudanum,’ she said, thinking aloud.
    ‘No, I am not seeking oblivion.’ Ross’s dark eyes rested on her face. ‘I want you, not a drug. Did I hurt you, Meg?’ He reached out and ran his right forefinger with surprising gentleness across her swollen mouth.
    ‘No,’ she lied. ‘I was kissing you back.’ She moved away, went to sit at the table near the window. It was easier to manage when she was beyond the possibility of touching him, beyond the temptation of these new feelings surging