“I want you, Viola,” he repeated over her lips.

She fought it. “But I don’t want you.”

His fingers hooked in the edge of her bodice and tugged open gown, corset cups, and shift, exposing her breasts. “You will have to produce more convincing evidence.”

Viola looked down. Her nipples stood at aroused peaks. She met his gaze again, sinking inside at her body’s betrayal. “That is only lust.”

His clear irises seemed to melt with heat. “Do you need more?”

More? She needed everything more from him. Everything he would not give her. He was not the sticking sort, Mattie had said. His behavior with her proved it, and Alex’s words that he would leave soon frightened her beyond reason.

“You are an arrogant ass,” she uttered to save her pride, and perhaps even to try to convince her heart. But it had no effect upon him, or upon her heart; his gaze of sheer need did not alter, nor did the gripping pain beneath her ribs abate. “Why have you not spoken with me? Why didn’t you kiss me yesterday at the library?”

“I was trying to be strong.” His hands tangled in her hair, his gaze consuming her so that even her blood sought him.

“And now?”

“Now I have had to endure an entire night of watching Viola Carlyle command a house full of people like she commands a ship of sailors, charming every one of them.” His voice was very rough. “Strong can go to the devil.”

She wrapped her arms around his neck and let him kiss her and touch her breasts, encouraging him with soft sounds of want she could not prevent. She should not do this. On her ship she’d been a sailor and free to do as she pleased. But Fiona Blackwood would never stand in the dark corridor of an earl’s house with a man’s hands on her breasts. A real lady would not allow it.

But she was not a real lady. They both knew that.

His tongue drifting across her lower lip melded with his caressing thumb, darting pleasure low in quick, aching bursts. She gripped his neck and flattened herself against his body. He kissed her harder, his hands sweeping around her rear and dragging her against his arousal. It felt good. Too good. And a little desperate. Because he only wanted her for this. But this was better than nothing, and he truly wanted her, with the same urgency as that first time on her ship. It felt like heaven. Or at least the path leading up toward heaven, never mind the gates remaining fully closed and locked against her.

“Come to my bedchamber now,” he whispered against her mouth as though he did not wish to separate enough to speak.

“I don’t take-”

“Orders. I know.” He kissed her, over and over now, a delectable repetition that despite its simplicity made her cling to him tighter. “Then your bedchamber.”

She pressed to him, aching to be closer than clothing would allow. “It shares a wall with Madame Roche. I cannot-”

He grabbed her hand and dragged her along the corridor. He opened the first door they came to.

“A linen cabinet?” But they had managed perfectly well on a staircase once. Perfectly.

She almost giggled, but he pulled her in, closed the door, and covered her mouth again. His fingers sank into her hair and she returned his urgent kisses; fierce, hungry kisses that filled the famine in her. He wrenched her around and pressed her back against the door panel, bringing his entire hard, perfect body against hers.

“You are yanking me about a lot.” She was breathless.

“I am. Feel free to reciprocate.” His mouth on her neck was delirium, his hands tugging her skirts to her hips sure and focused.

She pulled at shirt buttons and linen and found smooth, hot skin beneath. “Any parts in particular you would like yanked?”

“Whatever you wish.” He kissed her throat, fast hot caresses, to her smiling mouth. “Just don’t stop touching me.” His palms cupped her behind and fused her to him. “My God, you feel so good. I have wanted you in my hands again for weeks.”

Viola suspected she ought to be able to respond, to taunt and laugh. But she could only touch him as he wished, her fingers pulling fine linen up and palms adoring the texture of his hot skin over breathtaking muscle. She let him have as much of her as he wished, his mouth and hands moving intimately over her making her desperate for more. And when he touched her until she could no longer bear the pleasure, she opened her thighs and let him inside. Let him- She loved him inside her, his hard need stretching her and making her wild. With her skirts hiked to her hips and her body yearning, she rode the demand of his thrusts until her breaths fled and she had none left even to cry out the pleasure he gave her.

“Viola.” He whispered her name. His body crushed hers, palm flat on the panel behind her as he bored up into her. Then again, “Viola,” and it moved her inside, the tenor of his voice, urgent and deep and unbound. Because it was different. She felt it in her sinews, her blood, her soul. It rocked through her as she came, moaning and clutching him. He followed, making her his again.

Their frantic pace fell to stillness. For a moment they remained like that, brow to brow, breathing heavily. Then, carefully and with strong hands, he pulled away and set her feet on the ground. She unwound her arms from his neck and smoothed her wrinkled skirts back in place, and her hair. He buttoned his trousers. Without a word, he took her into his arms again.

She had not expected that.

She pressed her face into his shoulder, breathing in his scent shakily.

“Stay with me tonight,” she whispered, already dreading the next moment when he would release her again and she would be obliged to reaccustom herself to distance from him. “Stay with me.”

His hands fell away.

“Viola-”

“Tonight, the party was not- Though I managed it, it was not easy for me. I think you are the only person who can understand that,” she hastened to explain, in truth to pretend. “This one night. Only for comfort. You needn’t make love to me again.” She was begging, and frankly lying. She wanted him for more than comfort and rather forever. “I want your arms around me.”

He regarded her for a long moment, his eyes shining like crystal in the darkness, again distant, and it swept the life from her.

“Were I to hold you in my arms tonight,” he finally replied softly, “I could not prevent myself from making love to you again.”

She blinked back prickling heat, swallowing over her hope. “We could be very quiet?”

“I do not believe that is possible for you. Under any circumstances.”

Her throat caught. “Ass.”

“Harpy. Where is your bedchamber?”

“I am not quite certain. I was actually lost.”

He threaded his fingers through hers. “That is apparently what I am here for.” He opened the door a crack. “All clear.” He drew her into the corridor and released her and she started back the way she had come, bemused, shaken. She wanted him to make love to her again, yes-but even more keenly for him to again hold her hand. She reached back and found his. He curled his strong fingers snugly around hers and her heart thudded madly.

But after only moments of that unmitigated pleasure, his hand slipped from hers. Then voices came to her. Good Lord, he had acute hearing. No wonder he had been such a successful criminal.

A gentleman appeared, then another.

“There he is.” Sir Tracy gestured. “Seton, our host has sent me to find you to make up even numbers at our table.” He turned a bleary smile upon Viola. “Evening, Miss Carlyle. How do you do?” He flashed a grin at his friend. “Hope you’re jealous of me, Hopkins. Isn’t every day a fellow inherits a stepsister pretty as can be. Though I suppose it happens to me more often than most. Least once a decade.”

They laughed.

Jin smiled slightly.

Viola wished them at the bottom of the ocean, which was not very sisterly of her, to be sure, but she saw how this would go.

“What do you say, Seton? Care to lose a few guineas to a good cause?” Mr. Hopkins smacked his waistcoat pocket meaningfully, tilting like a schooner at full sail.

Sir Tracy leaned forward confidentially and said sotto voce, “He’s got his eye on Michaels’s matched pair coming up for auction week next. But he can’t afford ’em yet. I told him you’re a sure steal at the card table, Seton. Want the pair myself, don’t you know.” He winked. “Give a friend a hand and fleece him, will you, old chap?”

“Pollywog,” Mr. Hopkins exclaimed at large.

“Miss Carlyle has mislaid her quarters.” Jin’s smooth voice at her shoulder nearly sent her to the floor. She needn’t even look at him to become jelly at his feet. “Allow me to escort her there and I will join you shortly, gentlemen.”

“Actually.” She flicked a glance at him, heart sinking; there was no getting around it. “There is my door.” She pointed. “Thank you, Mr. Seton.” That was it. No being held in his arms and making love to him now. He would not return. He had already gotten what he wanted.

He bowed. “Good night, Miss Carlyle.”

She nodded to Sir Tracy and his friend, and went into her room. She closed the door, pressed her brow against it, and tried to breathe. Probably just the tight stays. Or not. She climbed onto her bed and stared at the canopy, blinking in time with Madame Roche’s snores in the next room.

It was better this way. Jin always caused her to make all sorts of inappropriately intimate noises when he made love to her. There could be no privacy here.

She stared at the canopy a little longer, then wiggled back and forth a bit. The bed knocked against the wall. Madame Roche’s snores halted. Silence reigned. Suddenly a great huffing snort cut through the wall and the snoring took up its regular cadence again.

Viola sighed and closed her eyes. Even if he were to come, they could not make love. The bed would not allow it. But he would not come anyway. She must rest content with the lingering warmth in her from their adventure in the linen cabinet.

She cracked her eyes open and peeked at the rug before the hearth. She’d sat on it quite comfortably picking kitten hairs out of her shawl the other day after she visited a new litter in the barn. She supposed the gossiping ladies had gotten one thing right; she always liked barn kittens. She always loved barns, so full of adventure and messiness. The April Storm reminded her a little of a barn. A floating barn. Perhaps that was one reason she hadn’t yet scrapped it.

She slid off the bed, dragging the top coverlet with her. A servant had made up the fire; the rug was warm and soft. She knelt, then curled up on her side and pulled the coverlet over her. As she drifted off she allowed herself to imagine a handsome pirate making love to her all night long.

She slept like a sailor, hard and motionless. But she looked like a lady, slender hands tucked beneath her cheek and hair sparkling with bejeweled pins. She still wore the glowing gown that caressed her curves and had every man between the ages of eighteen and eighty staring at her all night. Now her breasts pushed against the low neckline, soft rose-colored areolas peeking out.

Jin’s mouth went dry even as he told himself he had seen her body already, had enjoyed it, and should not be so affected by a mere glimpse of it now. But he could stand about all day and night trying to convince himself that she was just another woman. He would never succeed.

He crouched and touched her cheek. Her breaths hitched, black lashes flickering. He slipped his fingertips through the tangle of dark curls straying across her brow, imprinting upon them the texture of perfection.

Her eyes opened. “You came back.”

“You did not wait long for me. I think I am disappointed by your lack of eagerness.” He smiled and stroked the graceful column of her neck.

She blinked, sleep clinging. “Not long? I am eager.” She stifled a yawn. “How long?”

“Perhaps thirty minutes.”

“That was a quick game.”

“I threw it.”

“Mr. Hopkins will have his matched pair, then.”

“I couldn’t give a damn. Viola, I will leave you to your sleep.”

Her fingers clamped about his wrist. “Don’t!” She pushed up to sit, her thick hair tumbling across a shoulder and half-exposed breast. “Don’t leave.”

Never, if it could be. “I shan’t now.”

The tip of her tongue stole over her bottom lip, moistening it, then flicked upward. Jin could not look away. Remaining aloof from her had been the most difficult challenge he had ever met. He didn’t need Carlyle’s disapproval to remind him that he was not a suitable suitor for this lady; he had known that since the first. But she wanted him, and he would not deny her what little he could give her, tonight.