Read Online Her Beguiling Butler by Cerise DeLand - Free Book Online Page A

he wanted to. He circled his hands around her waist and brought her nearer. Her breasts met his chest and she wiggled against him.
    The temptation blasted through him like a typhoon. He hauled her up and into his lap. His arms bound her close, his need for her ravenous, his body iron hard and straining to gain more of her. Bracing her with one arm, he brought her face to his and the kisses that began as tender explorations of her sorrow and his care, turned to hungry feasts. He caressed her lips, nibbled at them and kissed her once more.
    Some shred of decency claimed him. “Alicia, we must not do this.”
    “Wallace, darling,” she said, smiling like a siren, and honing in on his mouth with her luminous eyes, “we are doing this. Again.” She took his lips and ran the tip of her tongue over the lower swell of his. “And again.”
    “You are too tempting.”
    “I wager you have not said that to other employers,” she teased.
    He snorted. “There have been no other employers.”
    “Oh, marvelous.” She settled against him, drawing him down to her with a hand around his nape. “And how many other women have you kissed?”
    “None like you.”
    “I’ve never craved my butler, either.”
    Her sincerity melted him. “Alicia—“
    “Darling Wallace, I want more than fine words and kisses.”
    He shook his head. “No. That’s madness.”
    “Is it? Life is perilous, my dear man. One day you are well and hail and hearty, and the next you are run over by a lorry.”
    “Well, I dare say, sweetheart,” he said, laughing against his better judgment. “That is harsh.”
    “Is it?” She took his lower lip between her teeth and bit him. “That’s how Lucille Dewitt died.”
    “Your governess?”
    “One and the same,” she affirmed. “One day you are alone and lonely and the next, you have a man before you whom you enjoy. His looks.” She ran her long fingers through his hair. “His eloquence.” She licked his upper lip. “His restraint.” She nipped his nose. “If you don’t seize what joys are offered you, how can you say on your last day that you lived to the fullest?”
    “We are not often permitted the pleasures we would like.”
    She stared at him, pouting. “If I am awarded the barony of Bentham, I will take my pleasures where and when I can.”
    Desire sparked in his guts, his groin. His fingers sank into her curls, the strands fine as silken threads. He yearned to taste her. Sanity drifted away and he snatched it back. Although he’d overheard her declare her philosophy to her aunt, he could not condone her plan. “You are not made for defiance of the ton .”
    “Who says I’m not?”
    “My sweet woman, you are a creature of your time and convention.”
    “Perhaps you misread me.”
    “I doubt it.”
    For an overlong minute, she stared at him. “I’ll show you.”
    He grew wary of this budding determination of hers. Askance, he beheld her. “How?”
    “In two ways. Agree to let me prove it to you.”
    He hesitated, scanning the hard set of her features. “Very well. I agree. What are they?”
    “Come with me to Sevenoaks. My governess will be buried in that town day after tomorrow.”
    A day in a coach with Alicia? A night or more in lodgings? He’d never survive the temptation to savor more than her conversation. “A butler does not travel with his lady.”
    “So you go back on your promise already?” She tsked. “Come, come. This is not like you. Besides, if you refuse to go, I will take Grimes.”
    “No.” No other man should sit beside her. Jealousy, sharp as a rapier, cut through his reason.
    She set her teeth. “Then I’ll leave alone.”
    “Absolutely not. The roads are not safe. We’ve had too many riots lately.”
    “Unless you accompany me, I will make the journey by myself.”
    “You can’t! Ladies do not travel unaccompanied.”
    “I have no male relative, distant or close, on whom I may depend. Only you.” She arched both brows to counter him.
    “Your