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She brought her lips to his chest as her hand pleasured him, exploring his skin with her mouth, relishing the taste of him.

An instinctive, primal part of her urged her to her knees; she wanted to taste all of him, just as he had tasted her.

“Anna—” Hugh’s voice broke, caught somewhere between protest and plea as she sank to her knees. “You don’t have to—”

“I want to.”

That stopped him. He looked down at her, eyes wild with raw and reverent desire. His polish and control had disappeared, leaving in its place pulsing, masculine need.

She leaned in, lips brushing the tip, tasting salt and skin. When she took him into her mouth, his whole body shuddered and he swore an involuntary epithet.

She explored him carefully, learning the rhythm that made him groan, the pressure that made his hips buck. She wasn’t practised, but she was determined to unravel him.

“Christ, Anna…” he called out her name like it hurt, his hips bucking, his thighs rigid with tension.

His hands gripped her hair, pulling her closer, as he spilled into her mouth.

He held her there for a second, his entire body shaking. In that moment, she felt gloriously powerful.

She pulled back slowly, lips swollen, breath unsteady. She rose, calm and quiet, smoothing her night-rail as she stood.

He pulled her toward him again, into an exhausted embrace. His head rested against hers, his mouth pressed against her hair.

“What am I to do with you?” he whispered into her ear, his tone almost anguished.

“Nothing,” she shrugged; tonight she had been the one to act.

His thumb brushed her lower lip, his eyes searching hers. "I would very much like to return the favour."

Anna felt desire stir in her belly, but she resisted.

"Not tonight," she stated, stepping back from his embrace with resolve. "Tonight was about proving a point."

He watched her retreat, desire and respect warring in his expression. "And what point was that, precisely?"

At the door, she paused, glancing over her shoulder. "That you are not the only one with power, your Grace."

She left then, cherishing the look of astonishment on his handsome face.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

THE DRAWING ROOMof White’s hummed with chatter, as Hugh nursed his second glass of brandy. The afternoon sun filtered through the club’s famed bow-window, casting a warm glow on the members celebrating the narrow passage of Thorncastle’s abolition bill. Hugh was present only in body, for his mind insisted on repeatedly wandering back to the night before—to Anna.

"To progress," the Duke of Thorncastle, seated opposite him, interrupted his reverie with another toast to their success. As the bill’s passage had come down to just two votes, Thorncastle was rather elated—and already a little inebriated.

"And to Graystone,” Hugh added, for word had broken that morning that the duke had finally succumbed to his injuries.

The two men clinked glasses, downing the amber liquid within with appropriate gravitas for their fallen peer.

“Do you know,” Thorncastle leaned in, his voice lowered. “The more that I think on it, the more suspicious I become of how Graystone met his end.”

“Then try not to think on it,” Hugh advised, his voice a warning. It would not do for their friend Lord Nathan Lewisham—the newly minted Duke of Graystone—to be plagued by rumours about his brother’s death, upon his return to England. Grieving a brother was difficult enough without that, as Hugh well knew.

“He was a ruddy fine whip,” Thorncastle mused, the alcohol buffering his ego from the harshness of Hugh’s reply. “It makes no sense to me.”

“Who would have cause to want Graystone dead?” Hugh countered, “The only person set to benefit is Nate, and—apart from being away on the continent fighting a war—he did not want the title.”

“It’s just odd,” Thorncastle surrendered, with a hopeless shrug. “That’s all. If Nate wasn’t to inherit, then I would suspect the young Lord Lewisham had a hand in the accident. There’s something unlikable about the lad.”