She’d forgotten so much in the last eight years.
His other hand slid up to hold her face, turning it toward his. His features remained in deep shadow while torchlight from the main thoroughfare revealed her every reaction.
The contrast should frighten her, underline that this man was a stranger. She was too trapped in craving to do more than strain toward him. She wanted him to kiss her. She wanted him to hitch up her skirts and plunge deep. She wanted him to make her his in a way no other man had.
“Please…” she said again.
Who was this impassioned woman with her untrammeled reactions? Surely not staid Diana Carrick whose idea of excitement was a new book for her small library or the chance to try out one of her agricultural theories on a field at the Abbey.
“Please what?”
She should resent his teasing. But even through the mad tumult of her heartbeat, she heard the edge in his voice.
“Please touch my…my breast,” she whispered. The shock of hearing the words penetrated the fog of arousal like light breaking through a heavy cloud cover.
What was she doing?
She wasn’t here to submerge herself in hedonistic delight. All she’d heard about the Earl of Ashcroft had led her to expect a contemptible, slobbering seducer from a cheap novel. Instead, he drew her like a magnet drew iron filings. And she needed to resist. This visit to London didn’t launch her on a courtesan’s career. Her purpose was clear, and once she achieved it, she meant to do her best to forget her brief fall from grace.
She couldn’t risk letting Ashcroft become more than just a means to an end.
The chilling instant of clarity dissolved as the hand curving around her breast drifted upward in a caress. He dipped beneath her neckline, tightening the lace edging. Then he paused.
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Her skin tautened in aching suspense. What the devil was wrong with the man?
“You’re tormenting me.” Her choppy breathing lifted her breast under his hand and made her aware how close he ventured to her nipple.
“I like to see you desperate,” he said softly.
“Aren’t you desperate too?” Where did she find the courage to ask the question?
His hand flexed but, curse him, slid no lower. “Oh, yes.”
“Then why not touch me?”
He laughed, and the sound fizzed through her blood, heating it to boiling point. “Because your desperation builds my anticipation.”
“Do you always play games?”
“Only when I enjoy them.”
“My lord…”
“Ashcroft.” The undertone of amusement lingered. She wished she didn’t find it so compellingly attractive. “My hand is halfway down your dress. It’s absurd to stand on ceremony.”
Fighting back nerves, she slipped her hand between them and cupped him. She couldn’t contain her astonished gasp at his raw heat and power.
The only other man she’d touched so intimately was William. That felt like a lifetime ago.
Lord Ashcroft was bigger and heavier than her husband. A shudder, partly fear, partly excitement, quivered through her as she imagined that strength pounding into her. It would be like living through an earthquake.
He groaned. “Dear God, woman.”
Tentatively, she curled her fingers, testing his size. When he kissed her this time, his mouth was ravenous, burning. At last—at last—his hand shifted. Time staggered to a stop until his fingers brushed her pebbled nipple.
She jerked. The sensation was beyond anything she remembered—or had imagined in the long lonely nights since William’s death. Her belly clenched, and moisture welled between her legs. A red-hot wire extended between her nipple and her womb, and it tightened with every flick of his fingers.