Page 29

Taking a deep breath, he exhaled and with a final strain that seemed likely to dislocate his shoulders, he succeeded in getting his arms behind his knees.

With one fluid motion, he eased his bound hands around his feet, then drew them up in front of himself, struggling to a sitting position, a triumphant expression on his flushed features.

“Very good,” Belle said grudgingly. “But now what? I wouldn’t have been stupid enough to leave a knife behind or any sort of a candle for you to burn through the rope.”

“Then I shall just have to do it the hard way.” Raising his hands, he began tugging at the knots with his teeth. Belle folded her arms over her chest, watching him in confident silence. There was no way he was ever going to undo her knots in that fashion. None whatsoever.

It took him less than ten minutes. He leapt to his feet with a self-satisfied flex of his back muscles and dangled the undone length of rope before her eyes.

The chagrin must have shown upon her face for he laughed and said, “There was nothing wrong with your knots, only your choice of rope, Angel. It wouldn’t seem so, but this thick hemp is far easier to undo than say a silken cord from a robe.

Never let your captive dictate his own bindings. ”

“I shall strive to remember that.”

With a mischievous glint in his eyes, he fingered the rope and advanced upon her. “Now it’s my turn.”

“Oh, no.” She shook her head firmly. But he continued to stalk toward her. Belle backed away. Slowly, but relentlessly, he pursued her around the chair. Belle suppressed a ripple of laughter.

“Behave yourself, Mr. Carrington,” she said in as stern a tone as she was capable of. “I would never permit my enemy to tie me up.”

“What would you do to stop me?” he asked in tones of silken menace. He had her nearly backed up against the bookcase, twin devils dancing in his eyes. Well, Belle thought, if he insisted upon pursuing this game of pretense, she was going to make up a few of her own rules.

She startled him by snatching an object from the shelf behind her. It was only the end of an unlit candle, but she brandished it at him.

“I would draw forth my concealed pistol.” With her thumb she feigned cocking the ‘weapon’. “Now you must stop or I will blow a hole in your chest.”

She was not certain if Sinclair would acknowledge the imaginary pistol. His lips twitched with amusement. Still clutching the rope, he raised his hands, such an expression of deceptive meekness upon his face, she did laugh.

It was all so absurd. She did not know why she was enjoying it so much.

Maybe because so many times she had enacted this scene in deadly earnest. There had never been any place in her life for frolic or lightsome behavior.

And maybe it had something to do with the undercurrent of challenge that had existed between her and Sinclair from the very beginning.

She became suddenly aware of how her heart thudded, of a stirring in her blood.

That was her mistake, forgetting one of her own basic rules and allowing her attention to wander when training a weapon upon someone.

Sinclair was quick to sense how she wavered and took full advantage.

With a lightning-quick movement he tossed the rope toward her face.

In the second she took to blink, he pounced, deflecting the hand that held the make-believe weapon.

If it had been a pistol, it would have discharged harmlessly in the air.

Seizing her wrist, Sinclair forced her arm down and the candle end dropped to the floor. He pinned her against the bookcase, his face only inches away, his eyes glittering.

“Checked again, milady.”

Did he truly think so? Belle tilted her face upward, her lips curved in a deceiving smile, Then she trod down hard on his instep.

Sinclair’s smirk vanished, his eyes widening with pained surprise.

“You little vixen—” He had loosened his grip enough for her to hook her foot about his ankle, setting him off balance.

But the maneuver backfired. As Sinclair went down, he pulled her with him.

As they tumbled to the carpet, he still maintained his grasp.

They wrestled for a moment, banging into the chair, until Belle felt her carefully secured hairpins coming free, her tresses falling about her shoulders.

She shook her hair back, clear of her eyes, just as Sinclair pinned her flat on her back beneath his weight, both of them slightly breathless with laughter.

“So you want to play rough?” he asked with a low seductive growl. Her struggles to pull free of his viselike grip on both wrists were futile. She could not match him for sheer strength. Pausing, she panted for breath, staring up at him.

As their eyes locked, the laughter shared between them stilled.

Belle became all too conscious of the intimacy of their position, the hard length of his masculine body trapping her against the floor, just as she sensed Sinclair’s awareness of it, too.

His eyes hazed a smoky shade of green, his dark hair tumbled over his brow, his pulse beating at the base of his throat.

“Surrender, Angel.” His light taunt came out somewhat unsteady.

“Never,” she said. “You gloat too soon, Mr. Carrington.”

She allowed herself to go limp beneath him and cast him her most sultry look from beneath the thickness of her lashes, then slowly undulated her body against his.

He regarded her with astonishment that soon became a flash of some more heated emotion.

When he released her wrists, she insinuated her hands between them, caressing his shoulders.

Undoing the top button of his shirt, she slipped her fingers inside the linen, the crisp fabric in marked contrast to the warm pulsing flesh of his chest beneath.

“You don’t fight fair, Angel,” he said.

“Alas, sir,” she whispered. “I am but a poor weak woman. I haven’t a gentleman’s notions of honor.”

“The problem is, neither have I.”

His arms closed roughly about her, his mouth seeking hers, claiming her with a searing kiss. He shifted onto his back, pulling her on top of him, but Belle felt no rush of triumph, for she was no longer in any more control of the situation than he.

Like a reckless child, she had played amongst the embers, and fire is what she had found. She tasted of it on Sinclair’s lips, felt it in the heat of his body beneath her. As her lips parted, inviting the probing sweetness of Sinclair’s tongue, those same flames flickered to life inside of her.

She should stop him, but how she had needed this. Last night had been so endless, she still felt the chill of it in her soul. Sinclair was all that was warmth, all that was life, stirring in her desires she had too long ignored.

He made an effort to put her from him, although she could tell from the tremor coursing through his arms what effort it cost him. “Angel, I am sorry?—”

“No!” Recklessly she pressed herself atop him. “Don’t stop. Please. I have been alone for so long.”

Her plea dissolved whatever resistance he had mustered.

With a low groan, he reclaimed her lips.

She buried her fingers in his hair, clutching him to her, prolonging the heady sensation of the kiss, for once casting caution to the winds.

Her whole life had been a gamble, so why was she so afraid to take one more risk—that perhaps with Sinclair, this time might be different.

The apartment fell silent except for the crackle of the fire, the more raging inferno Belle felt building inside her.

Sinclair was just beginning to undo the braided loops of her spencer when they heard the click of the latch on the outer door.

The sound, soft as it was, seemed to crack through the apartment with the force of a pistol shot.

She and Sinclair exchanged a startled glance. The clatter of footsteps on the marble floor of the antechamber beyond terminated their mounting passion as effectively as if the casement had been flung open, dousing them with chilling rain.

Sinclair was the first to react. Cursing under his breath, he scrambled to his feet.

Grasping Belle by the wrist, he hauled her up after him.

She had time to do no more than draw in a composing breath and attempt to smooth back her hair before Paulette peeked into the drawing room, rainwater yet beading upon the covered basket in her hand.

Paulette’s lips rounded in momentary surprise, then her insolent gaze swept from Belle’s disheveled hair to the undone buttons of Sinclair’s shirt. Belle was annoyed to feel a wave of heat course into her cheeks.

“I hurried to finish the marketing, chérie , for fear you might need me for something else,” Paulette said, “but I see that my return is most out of time.”

Sinclair glared at her, but Belle straightened, gathering up the ends of her dignity.

“Not at all. It is fortunate you are back so soon. I will be going out tonight and need you to help me with, my hair and gown.”

“ Certainment .” There was mockery in the curtsy Paulette made. She raked Sinclair with a hungry gaze. “My congratulations, chérie. You have the bon chance . Do not allow me to disturb you. I will be in the kitchen.”

Smirking, Paulette backed out of the room, leaving an awkward silence behind her.

Belle turned to face Sinclair, but there was no question of resuming her place in his embrace.

Paulette’s return had effectively shattered whatever longings had pulsed between them.

They regarded each other for a moment, both feeling somewhat foolish.

“Good fortune, indeed!” Sinclair said, echoing Paulette’s remark. “The pert trollop! Though perhaps we ought to thank her for the intrusion. We appear to have gotten somewhat carried away with our role-playing.”

“So it would seem, Mr. Carrington.” Belle managed to force a smile.

“I am sorry, Angel. I usually have a little more finesse than to attempt to make love upon the drawing room carpet. I don’t know what the devil got into me.”