His lips twisted. “I didn’t think of that.” Swinging his other leg over, he stood, then leaned back against the balustrade as she stepped near and peered over.
“You didn’t plan awfully well at all—wisteria isn’t very strong.”
Grimacing, he relieved her of the candelestick. “So I discovered. I’m afraid it took rather a beating.”
“How am I supposed to explain that to Hendricks—Geoffrey’s gardener?” Caro looked at him, found his gaze tracing down her body.
“You won’t be here for him to ask.” The words were vague; his gaze was still traveling down. It reached her feet; he hesitated, then slowly started upward again.
“And how would it have looked if you’d got caught? The local Member of Parliament climbing to a lady’s window…” She stopped, intrigued. Waiting with feigned patience until his gaze returned to her eyes, she arched a brow.
His lips eased. “I’d imagined you as a demure cotton buttoned-to-the-throat type.”
Raising both brows haughtily, she turned and walked back into her room. “I used to be. This”—she gestured to the delicate silk negligee gracing her curves—“was Camden’s idea.”
Following in her wake, Michael tore his gaze from the filmy confection that floated, flirted, a translucent sop to modesty, about her transparently naked form. “Camden?”
Even through the dimness, he could make out her peaked nipples, the arousing curves of breast and hip and the long lines of her thighs. Her arms were bare, as was most of her back, the ivory silk shifting provocatively over the globes of her bottom as she led him into her bedchamber.
Camden must have been a glutton for self-punishment.
“He said it was in case the embassy caught on fire and I had to rush out en déshabillé.” Halting, Caro faced him, met his eyes. “But I think it was more a case of what the servants would think. More a matter of protecting my standing than his.” Her lips quirked self-deprecatingly. “After all,” she murmured, fingers flicking the gown, “he never saw them.”
Halting before her, he looked into her eyes. Then bent his head. “More fool him.”
He kissed her, and she kissed him back, but then, one hand on his cheek, drew back to look into his eyes. “Why are you here?”
Closing his hands about her hips, he drew her nearer. “I couldn’t sleep.” The truth, if only part of it.
She searched his eyes; her lips curved teasingly. She let him settle her hips against him, then seductively shifted. “And you expect to sleep in my bed?”
“Yes.” From now until forever. He shrugged. “Once we’ve indulged”—bending his head, he pressed a kiss beneath her ear, murmured even more softly—“once I’ve slaked my lust for you and sated my appetite”—lifting his head, he looked down at her—“I’ll sleep perfectly well.” With you lying sated beside me.
Brows high, she studied his eyes, then the curve of her lips deepened. “We’d better to get into bed then.” Pushing back in his arms, her gaze dropped to his chest; her hands slid down from his shoulders. “You’ll have to take off your clothes.”
He caught her hands before she could embark on any fiendish—and doomed to be short-lived—game. The sight of her in her excuse for a negligee—and it seemed likely all her nightwear was of similar ilk, a point he didn’t at that moment wish to dwell on—let alone the feel of her sinking, then sliding against him, had teased him from mere arousal to throbbing rigidity. He didn’t need further encouragement. “I’ll undress while you take off that creation—if I touch it, I’m bound to tear it. Once we’re both naked, we can start from there.”
Her laugh was sultry. “If you’re sure you don’t need any help?”
“Quite sure.” He released her. She stepped back. Dragging in a breath, he moved to the end of her bed; leaning against it, he reached for his boots.
Hands rising to the shoulder clasps anchoring her nightgown, Caro murmured, “I’d always assumed these garments were designed so a man could remove them quickly.”
“Those garments”—boots off, he straightened, hands rising to his cravat; his tones were distinctly strained—“were designed to drive men into a heightened state of lust in which, beyond the reach of sanity, they rip said garments off.”
She laughed again, amazed that she could, that her heart felt so light even while her nerves were tightening. Two clicks and her negligee was free; the silk slithered down her body, pooling at her feet. “Well, you’re in no danger now.”
Shrugging out of his shirt, he glanced at her. “Much you know.” His gaze felt like flame, caressing, burning. Emboldened, she bent and scooped the negligee up, tossed it on her dressing stool.
He looked away, flung his shirt aside, then, as if desperate, stripped off his breeches. Sending them spinning to join the rest of his clothes, he turned and reached for her.
She went into his arms, all laughter fading as their skins touched, and she felt his heat, felt his need—without thought gave herself up to it. To him.
Gave him her mouth and exulted when he took, sank into him, gloried in his ravenous, ravishing response. His hands roamed, not gentle but with undisguised yearning, with a heated hunger she shared.
That grew with every breath, with every gasp, every wickedly evocative caress.
Burying her hands in his hair, she clutched, arched against him, was only dimly aware when he lifted her and laid her on her sheets; she was caught in the flames, overwhelmed by their greedy heat, empty, aching, wanting.