Page 66 of The Lady is Trouble

“How many chapters did we complete?”

His lashes lifted, revealing smoky, intense regard. He turned the question over in his mind as his heartbeat skipped beneath her ear. “Some,” he whispered, leaning in as his lips covered hers, “but not all.”

Chapter 17

Who, being loved, is poor.

~Oscar Wilde

The dream lingeredat the fringe of her consciousness. Julian. Hands seeking, mouth demanding. His body atop hers, creating a molten web of whispered words and ardent cries.

Stretching, she encountered nothing but twisted sheets.

Alone. Blast it, she wasalone.

Had it only been a dream?

Then, very faintly, she heard the sound of a pencil skating across paper.

She blinked, expelling the last vestiges of sleep from her mind to find Julian sprawled in a massive leather chair he’d pulled close to the window. The spill of light from the lamp perched on the ledge washed over him, throwing him into an intriguing mix of shadow and illumination. His aura shimmered, also an intriguing mix. Jagged spikes of joyous orange, red and blue, energy and happiness.

And…cautious, glaring yellow.

Oh, Julian, she thought and gave the counterpane a rough yank. Which only served to remind her how she’d nearly ripped the bedspread apart in her enthusiasm. Piper tussled with the sheet, pulling it to her chest and sliding high against a headboard Julian had gripped as he plunged into her.

Engrossed, he worked madly, head bowed, those incredible eyes trained on the sketch before him. She looked to the window, gauging the time to be an hour, maybe two, before dawn. The rain had ceased, but the curtains shook with the force of a fierce wind. A modest fire burned in the hearth, cutting the chill. Piper appreciated the time taken to compose herself if a battle was brewing. Preparation was essential with this man, and she was weakness personified. Imprisoned by desire, sensation still pulsing through her well-loved body.

Imprisoned by his bloody honor and her need to challenge it.

Time had, in actuality, changed little.

Paintings filled every spare inch of this room she noted for the first time, proving how crazed she’d been when she stumbled in hours ago. Leaning against the walls, the mahogany bureau, the velvet settee. Julian unleashed the chaos of his mind on his canvases.

The previous night, she had unleashed his passion.

The drapes danced with another gust, and she welcomed the frigid rush across her flushed skin. Her body throbbed as she recalled what they had done to each other.

Shockinganddelicious.

“I knew it would be like this,” he growled as if the words had been obtained at the end of a blade. His sketching intensified, his hand a blur across his sketchpad. His hair looked damp from bathing, curling with abandon, or conceivably—knowing Julian as she did—he’d stood in a ripping downpour and cursed the heavens. His spectacle lenses glittered, obscuring his eyes as he glanced up. Telling her little. A dark wash of stubble covered his jaw, calling her hand and, now, with more experience, her lips.

The notion sent a sweet zing racing between her thighs.

Holding her words until she figured out the best approach and was sure they would be steady, she instead took note of his bare chest, the wonderfully decadent line of hair trailing his flat belly and slipping into the paint-spattered trousers hanging low on his hips. She circled her arms about her knees and hugged them to her. He was long and lean, like an athlete, nothing like any man she’d ever encountered in the ton.

At least he wasn’t fully dressed, set to deliver her to the main house as if nothing had occurred between them.

She’d rather endure a skirmish than that bit of hypocrisy.

So what if he wore a glower instead of a delighted smile? This was usually, as she imagined it, where the man offered his excuses and bolted from the bedchamber.

She wasn’t distressed.ThisJulian she had loads of experience dealing with—lovingly resistant and a tad cross. He tended to react in this manner when something, or someone, didn’t follow his blessed plan. As if life ever followed a plan. She held her smile because joy on her part would tilt his temper in the wrong direction.

But, oh lord, was he a gorgeous brooder.

“You have the look of a silk stocking found dangling from a chandelier,” he muttered in a charmless tone.

Truthfully, she had never found Julian Alexander charming, nor had anyone else he’d run across. Honest, intelligent, principled, compassionate, so handsome it made her eyes burn, he made no effort to beguile—and she loved him more for it.