ection>
HIS WICKED KISS
The moment he inclined his head, Emma rose on tiptoes. Her arms went around his neck with enough force to bring her body flush to his. His hands at the small of her back held her there. She lifted her face and the distance that separated their mouths ceased to exist. When he whispered her name, it was as if she could taste the sound of it on her lips.
She was delighted to learn her name tasted like warm brandy.
Restell edged Emma backward against the pianoforte, and her hip brushed the keys. Neither of them noticed the oddly discordant accompaniment to their kiss, nor would they have done anything differently if they had.
This kiss would suffer no trivial interruption.
There was little that was gentle in the press of their mouths. Need did not make much allowance for tenderness. There was heat here, and passion. Nothing about the movement of his lips across hers was hurried. He drank slowly, tempered by the knowledge that he had been thirsting for just this end for a very long time and desiring that the end should not come too quickly. Emma’s desire matched his own.
Her fingertips brushed the damp, curling ends of his hair just above his collar. The color and texture of it was so light she might have been threading sunshine. She felt him shiver, then knew a like response in herself. His tongue swept across the ridge of her teeth. She opened her mouth wider and her own tongue tangled with his…
Books by Jo Goodman
The Captain’s Lady
Crystal Passion
Seaswept Abandon
Velvet Night
Violet Fire
Scarlet Lies
Tempting Torment
Midnight Princess
Passion’s Sweet Revenge
Sweet Fire
Wild Sweet Ecstasy
Rogue’s Mistress
Forever in My Heart
Always in My Dreams
Only in My Arms
My Steadfast Heart
My Reckless Heart
With All My Heart
More Than You Know
More Than You Wished
Let Me Be the One
Everything I Ever Wanted
All I Ever Needed
Beyond a Wicked Kiss
A Season to Be Sinful
One Forbidden Evening
If His Kiss Is Wicked
Published by Zebra Books
IF HIS KISS IS WICKED
Jo Goodman
Kensington Publishing Corp.
For Mark Irvin and the Vilgas
Terrific neighbors
Flamingo commandos
I surrender
Contents
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Epilogue
Prologue
June 1822
London
“Be a dear, won’t you, and fetch my bonnet?” Marisol looked past her reflection to where her cousin was standing at the foot of the bed. “You look at sixes and sevens, Emmalyn. It is not at all becoming. Dithering never is. You might at least occupy yourself with some small task.”
Emma knew that she had never dithered in her life, but she offered no rejoinder to refute Marisol’s observation. Experience taught her that a denial would not serve. Marisol remained firm in her views and such evidence that could be mounted to sway a less rigid mind was regarded as a nuisance.
Emma glanced at the window. The damask drapes were drawn back so they framed a rapidly graying sky above the rooftops. “You realize it is going to rain, don’t you?”
“That is of no consequence to me.” Marisol shifted her chair closer to the vanity and examined the pearl earbobs she had chosen. “Are these all the thing, do you think? I cannot decide if I prefer the studs or the ones that dangle.”
Emma did not offer an opinion. Marisol’s discourse was not truly intended to elicit a comment. Her cousin was merely speaking to herself. “Will you want the black leghorn bonnet?”
“What?” Distracted from her fashion dilemma, Marisol frowned. Her perfect bow of a mouth disappeared as she pursed her lips. She regarded Emma, exasperation and impatience bringing her eyebrows together until only a slender crease separated the pair. “My new leghorn? I should think not. Why the satin quilling would be ruined. You said yourself it is going to rain. And the feathers? They will droop to comical effect. That is not done, Emmalyn, even by you.”
At this inkling that it would be she, not Marisol, who would be stepping out in the rain, the fine, dark hairs at the back of Emma’s neck rose slightly. She touched her nape with her fingertips, gently massaging her hackles. “The satin straw bonnet, then.”
“Yes.” Marisol’s frown eased. “I confess I had been thinking of something else, but the satin straw is the best choice. You are so clever to think of it.” She turned away from the mirror entirely and looked up at Emma. “You are always so good to me, Emmalyn. I do not tell you often enough, I’m quite certain of it. I am resolved that I must tell you at least once a day how very dear you are. You’ll remind me, won’t you?”
“If you like,” Emma said, her features perfectly schooled. She hurried into Marisol’s dressing room before she surrendered to the almost violent urge to laugh.
The satin straw bonnet was several years out of fashion, although only the most slavish devotees of the Paris style would know. Marisol recently purchased a striped Barcelona handkerchief, which she used to replace the bonnet’s original blue satin ribbon. Emma had to admit it was a fetching confection—on Marisol. For herself, Emma preferred something less likely to draw eyes and comments.
Marisol had settled on the delicate, dangling pearl earrings and was admiring their effect when Emma returned with the bonnet. The pearls lightly brushed the slim stem of her neck as she twisted her head to one side, then the other. “It is the most delicious sensation to feel them touch my skin.” A small shiver accompanied this observation and she looked immediately to Emma for her reaction. When Emma merely regarded her without expression, Marisol was moved to add, “It puts me in mind of a kiss, you know, just there, against my neck. Do you know such a feeling, Emmalyn?”
“I