The moment their lips touched, it was as if a fire had gone off between them. Her hands reached for the lapels of his jacket, clinging to him as his hands came up to her waist, holding her body to his. That friction between them made a thrill echo somewhere deep within her gut before it spiralled much lower.
He angled his head to the side and parted her lips, making the kiss so deep that Annie felt she practically mewled into that kiss, wanting more of it.
“Wait…” he murmured, breaking the kiss momentarily, before returning to her.
“Wait for what?” she asked, between small kisses.
“I truly was apologising,” he whispered, breaking the kiss long enough to hold their foreheads together.
“I know.” She acknowledged and moved her hands up his chest. That touch seemed to do something to him. He growled in the back of his throat and wrapped his arms completely around her waist, holding her flush to him as he kissed her again.
Seconds later, Annie felt herself being backed up. She collided with a wall, her body pressed between that wall and Lord Yeatman. She loved that energy and the fierceness. It made her hands dance up to his hair and hold him down to her, with the chance to taste more of him and deepen that kiss further.
With her body so pressed against his, she could feel every part of him—the hardness of the muscles in his chest through his clothes and another hardness entirely that was suddenly pressed against her hip. She squealed in surprise, realising what it was.
Lord Yeatman smiled into their kiss before parting, just long enough to look her in the eye.
“At last,” he murmured.
“At last what?” she asked, struggling to catch her breath.
“That is a real smile, Miss Storey.” He nodded his head at her and kissed her again.
Annie lost herself in that kiss with him, pressed against the wall. She knew not how long she was there, indulging in the illicitness, but when he moved his kisses to her neck, kissing and nipping a sweet spot, she began to realise just what she was doing.
Her eyes danced across the parlour,Mr Knight’sparlour. She saw his things and thought of the way they had politely danced with each other.
What am I doing?
Not only was she being inappropriate, but she had thrown away the rules of propriety entirely.
“We cannot,” she whispered. Her words could have been shouted for the effect they had, for Lord Yeatman abruptly stopped. He took his hands off her and braced them on either side of her on the wall, his lips no longer on her.
“I bent the rules again, did I not?” he asked with a wince.
“We cannot do this,” she murmured, “even if we both want to.”
She bent under his arm and escaped before another of those kisses could draw her back into Lord Yeatman’s embrace.
Annie fled the room as quickly as she could, stumbling in the corridor in her effort to be free of that parlour. As she hurried, she placed the back of her hand to her lips, trying to calm the tingling that was still there beneath her skin.
That kiss….
She had never known such a feeling was possible. Even the kiss that she and Lord Yeatman had shared in the garden at the tea party had been nothing compared to this. Part of her longed to return to that parlour, to beg Lord Yeatman not to stop, to show her just how incredible this thrill could be if they took it further, yet her sense of propriety stopped her.
Who have I become?
She barely recognised herself. When she came to a hasty stop beside a hallway mirror in the corridor, she turned to face it, peering through the candlelight to see her reflection. Her cheeks were bright red from the heat of their kiss, and her eyes seemed a little watery, from where she was fighting tears.
“Remember who you are, Annie,” she whispered to herself and lifted her chin higher. She began repeating all her mother’s lessons, all that she needed to know to be proper. “Straight posture, fair smile, quiet and yet engaging conversation when spoken to. One should never be forward or begin an uninvited touch. One should certainly never kiss a man when unwed….” she murmured the latter sentence as quietly as she could, feeling her head hang down a little and her breathing turn heavy.
Once again, she glanced back in the direction she had come from, feeling the temptation of returning to the parlour to finish that kiss. Yet her heart ached as she did so. Had Lord Yeatman not been trying to ward her off him? Had he not pointed out that seducing her was never his intention?
He is doing it anyway.
Huffing loudly with confusion, Annie turned away and fled back to the ball as quickly as she could. When she stepped through the double doors that led to the ballroom, she returned to her old rigid posture and flattened the creases of her gown, stepping in with a polite smile in case anyone glanced her way. Slowly, she moved around the ballroom, abruptly aware every time someone looked at her.
Can they deduce the transgression I have just made from my blush alone?
Seconds later, her gaze moved to the ballroom door, for Lord Yeatman had returned to the ball. Rather than acting the part of propriety as she had done, his eyes went straight to her. The strength of that gaze could have burned her across the room, for it made her turn away.
Moving fast, Annie crossed the room, searching for anyone to find a conversation with, just so that Lord Yeatman would not draw her back toward him. She barely made it three steps when someone stepped into her path.
“Your Grace!” Annie said in surprise, hurrying to curtsy. The Duchess of Bannerman barely nodded her head in acknowledgement of the curtsy. “How are you this evening?”
“Not well, Miss Storey. There is something I must speak to you about. This very moment.”