Stranger in Camelot by Deborah Smith Page A

than he’d learned when he’d researched her past. He sensed that,just like him, she’d been hurt badly by the people in her life. She was desperate to trust somebody, and she wanted to trust him.
    And he wanted to deserve that trust.
    “You’re thinking too hard,” she teased gently.
    “Trying to decide which corner of your mouth to kiss first. You have sexy lips, Agnes. I can’t tell which lip is nicer. I think it’s a tie.”
    She grinned. “Kiss me, and I’ll help you decide.”
    When he lowered his mouth onto hers she mewled softly and opened her lips, at first playful as she kissed him, then so intense it was all he could do to keep from snatching her into his arms. John shuddered with delight. A sudden and vivid rush of emotion made him feel like a teenager again. Because kissing was the only intimacy he and she could share, restraint heightened every erotic sensation.
    He could hardly keep his hand still on her stomach, and underneath it her body flexed like the swells of the ocean. He pictured her giving in to that strong force. He pictured himself riding her currents.
    When she moaned into his mouth and he shuddered in response he knew it was time to stop, before he gave in to an urge to seduce her. He already wanted to lead her deep into the sand dunes, where no one could see what they did next.
    He couldn’t let himself do that. When they were naked and he was making love to her with wild abandon she might doubt his gentlemanly talk about being patient, to say the least. He wanted her to trust him, not wonder if he were manipulating her.
    Quickly John pulled back. Looking down into her half shut eyes and flushed face, with its charged expression of desire, he was amazed at his self-control. Maybe there was a little of Sir Miles’s chilvalry in his blood, after all. “You’ve been alone a long time,” he whispered, “and I don’t want to take advantage of that, Agnes.”
    She frowned and raised a shaking hand to her forehead, as if trying to remember where she was. “No, I don’t want to be careless. I know better than to move too fast.” Her lips were damp and dark red from the pressure of his mouth. John stared at them in fascination, aching to kiss her again. “Kissing each other is not such an innocent thing, after all,” he admitted.
    “Not the way you do it.” She looked regretful. “I’ve been alone because I wanted it that way. But maybe it’s time I took some risks again.”
    John brushed his lips over hers. Her low sigh of pleasure and the flavor of her mouth nearly made him forget his troubled thoughts. “You taste like those orange slices from breakfast.” He caught her lower lip in a quick sucking motion then released it. “What a meal I could make of you, my lady.”
    Her tiny moan of delight made him kiss her again, and their tongues met in a slow, devastating dance inside her mouth. But she began patting his shoulder almost frantically. He knew what she meant and forced himself to move back.
    Sitting up, he faced the ocean and propped his arms on updrawn knees. He took deep breaths of ocean breeze and concentrated on the squawking white gulls constantly patrolling the beach. She sat up also, hugged her knees, and stared silently toward a distant horizon where tiny ships crossed the line between ocean and sky.
    John still felt as if she were kissing him. It wasn’t only the desire crackling between them like tendrils of static; it was knowing they had something special, a closeness hinting at shared dreams and shared problems.
    “Agnes, there are a thousand subjects I want to discuss with you,” he said slowly, still looking straight ahead so he wouldn’t break down and kiss her again. “Everything from your favorite flavor of ice cream to your lifelong ambitions and deepest fears. Everythingyou want, or love, or hate. But right now there’s one thing I have to ask.”
    “I don’t think I’m going to like it,” she warned softly. She ran a hand through her hair