Nine
Lilly didn’t know whether to scream or sigh. She’d meant to provoke him into releasing her, but the plan had obviously backfired. Now that he was kissing her though she’d be lying to deny that she wanted it, she was rapidly learning what a devastating weapon Davy’s kiss could be.
And devastating was hardly the word.
Mind numbing was more like it.
Much as she wanted to be angry at his last statement or make a mad dash for the door of the cell, she could do little more than dissolve into him. Smoothly corded muscles bunched beneath her hands as she slid her hands up the camber of his chest to loop around his neck. Where did a man learn to kiss this way? His mouth melded against hers soft and moist, and so deliciously delightful it must be a sin. His hands spanned her waist, thumbs rhythmically stroking the area just beneath her breasts. Soon she was little more than a tingling trembling ball of clay beneath his touch.
Slowly his head drew back, and she gazed up at him wondering, hopingthat by some miracle he’d been as affected as she. Her fingers curled around the shirt at the base of his neck.
“Davy?” she murmured, searching his eyes for some sign that he returned even a shred of her feelings for him.
He nestled her a bit closer, the hint of a playful smile rolling across his lips. “Not sure I’ve proved anything just yet. One more taste should do the trick.”
A tiny voice at the back of her head warned Lilly to be angry, but gazing up into his beautiful blue eyes she could muster no anger. For the first time in days—perhaps as long as she’d known him—no hint of haunted despair lurked in the depths. For the first time, he appeared completely carefree. Happy. Playful.
Davy took her lips again, and the whole of her heart moved, sending an eruption of butterflies sailing through her veins. She swayed into him utterly lost and that’s when she knew—the realization rattled to the depths of her soul—she loved him. This big stubborn man who would lock her in a jail cell to keep her safe. She parted her lips, taking all of him. His tongue slid readily into her mouth. The sweet friction inverting her senses until she didn’t know which end was up.
“Oh, Lilly,” he murmured, dragging his lips across her jaw and down her throat to the hollow at the base of her neck. “I want you.” His breath was hot and wet against her skin. “I don’t know how or why it happened, but I want you.” Vaguely she was aware of his hands working at the buttons lining the front of her gown.
I want you.
The words were as thrilling and heady as they were frightening. Feeling wanton, almost brazen, she stood on tiptoe offering him better access to her mouth. Her fingers moved to the buttons of his vest clumsily working them open. Beneath her hands his stomach was flat and taut and oh so very warm through the linen of his lawn shirt.
* * *
Oh, God… Davy groaned. This was heaven unlike he’d ever known. When he’d made the comment a few moments ago he hadn’t actually intended to kiss her so thoroughly. He’d just wanted to shock her into silence. But now that he was kissing her, he had no intention of stopping. He allowed her to push the vest from his shoulders, and set to work freeing the stays of her gown. Her fingers tentatively moved to his shirt fastenings, her soft hands brushed his chest, provoking the sweetest sort of torture. The gentle swell of her breasts peaked over the prim cut of her dress, and he had to see them… taste them. Tugging the dress open with near enough force to rip it, he glimpsed the enticing silk and lace camisole beneath. The sight of her through the sheer silk was surely more erotic than seeing her without the barrier. Like a man starved, a vampire just woken to thirst, he dropped his mouth to the lace overlaying her bare flesh, at the same time stroking a thumb over one perfectly taut tip.
