gazing down upon her made her shiver.
“I … want to know you. Everything about you.”
Her lips parted, yet nothing came out. She was shocked. Mesmerized.
“Would you let me, Isabella?” His voice dropped as he pressed closer, the moment intimate and wildly exciting. “Would you let me learn everything about you? Discover you as I want?”
His gaze, blistering with intensity, burned through her skin, warming her to the very core of her being. Inside, her body seemed to bloom, to open like the petals of a rose in the sunlight. She knew what he wanted, the innuendo of his words. And she admitted that somewhere deep inside her, she wanted to know him, too.
There was a strange, almost magnetic pull between them. They were strangers, yet he spoke to her familiarly—not at all gentlemanly. She should be shocked, outraged. They had just been introduced, yet Isabella felt as though she had known him forever. As if her soul recognized him from another time and place.
Gathering the edges of his jacket around her shoulders, she luxuriated in his scent, which wafted up from the fabric, mingling with her perfume. It made her think very dangerous thoughts—thoughts that did not entail running from him.
This was much too dangerous. She should put an end to it, and opened her mouth, but the words still would not come. Instead, she said, “Quid pro quo, then?”
His smile was slow and sensual, and she saw the glint of victory shining in his eyes. “Very well, you go first.”
“What is the real reason you are out here?”
His gaze flickered to hers. “As I said earlier, I needed to clear my head.”
“You don’t seem the sort to run away from something, which I think was what you were trying to accomplish by coming out here.”
His eyes lit with something like admiration. “How in tune we are. Indeed, I was running. I detest society, and much prefer my life as an enigmatic recluse. Is that the answer you desire?”
“I believe it more to the truth than your original answer.”
“And what of you, Miss Fairmont, what is your true motive for being here?”
To escape you, and the effect you have upon me. “The same, I’m afraid. I am new to society and have not yet learned to give up the craving for solitude. I am used to being on my own and sometimes the crush of the ballroom is just too much.”
He nodded and she saw that he was running his fingertips lightly over the grain of satin. He was watching as his fingers traversed her skirts, and she found the gesture the most romantic thing she could ever imagine.
“My turn.” He tipped his head and looked down at her. “How do you do it, suffer through it, the monotony of balls and all the insipid, shallow conversation that reveals nothing of a person’s soul but the fact they are vacuous, spiritless followers?”
She smiled and lifted her gaze to a sky that was filled with stars. “I write.” Closing her eyes, Isabella inhaled deeply of the damp grass, listening to the sway of the crisp leaves as they rustled in the trees and smelling the acrid odor of coal burning in the chimney. “I pretend I’m elsewhere—anywhere else.”
She felt him move, his thigh brushing against hers. “Where do you go?” he whispered, and she felt it as a caress along her body. She savored it, that haunting, alluring voice, and the queer sensation it gave her.
“A place where I can be myself. Where no one cares who my parents were, or the circumstances of my past. Where even I can forget.”
Her eyes opened as she felt the thrilling shiver of his fingers trace the contour of her cheek. He was looking at her so deeply that she felt the need to put space between them, but she couldn’t move, she was immobile, lost in his lovely pale eyes. “You never have to be anyone else than who you are, Isabella. Especially with me.”
She swallowed and he rubbed his thumb along her chin, tilting her head, studying her in the moonlight. “If someone doesn’t want you as you are, then they aren’t worth the time.”
He was far too perceptive, and familiar, and she was falling much too eagerly to his experienced, silky tongue.
“I think you are perfect, Isabella.”
“My lord—” she warned as he angled his head, lowering his mouth to hers.
“Black,” he murmured, his lips brushing her cheek. “Just call me Black.”
His breath caressed the shell of her ear; her body went languid and hot all over. She felt his nose against her temple, followed by the satiny smoothness of his lips. Oh, this was temptation!
“Black,” she whispered, but didn’t know if was a plea to continue or stop.
“Tell me, what do you write about, Isabella?”
Her lashes fluttered closed as she swayed closer to him. “I … I do not care to share my writing with others, my lord.”
“You can trust me. I would never betray your confidence.”
She sensed that she could, indeed, trust him. “I am a lady novelist.”
“Fiction,” he murmured, his voice deepening. “For women?”
“Yes,” she answered, her cheeks heating with warmth. What must he think of her? First her writing, and now this, sitting here in the dark, allowing him to brush his mouth against her cheek. He would think her fast and immoral. A harlot to enjoy in a dark garden. And why not? She was acting as such.
“An escape from the world so full of rules and restrictions,” he whispered, “to a world where you are free to think and feel as you will, regardless of your sex and the convention put upon you.”
“Black,” she murmured, but this time it sounded like a plea. But a plea for what, she could not tell.
“Tales of love,” he drawled as his lips moved along her jaw. Her head tipped back of its own accord, and his fingertips smoothed down the column of her throat, to her necklace, which he traced with the tips of his cool fingers. “Stories of passion, desire …”
She exhaled through her parted lips, her heart hammering heavy in her breast. She could not answer that. To do so would be too damning. She could not admit it, even though it was the truth.
“Will you tell me a story, Isabella?” He pulled her closer, till her bodice was against his chest, and his breath rasped against her ear. “A story of burning passion and forbidden desire.”
“Please. I …”
“I know.” His fingers toyed with the curls that had begun to cling to her neck. “You mustn’t tarry here—with me.”
“N-no,” she stuttered, reaching for the starched pleats of his crisp white shirt. “I shouldn’t.”
“I’ve never been very good at resisting things I know I should,” he murmured as he inched his mouth to hers. “What of you, Isabella?”
She had always been good. Always fearful of ending up like her mother.
“Bella?” He brushed his lips, featherlight, against hers. “Can you resist?”
Her lashes fluttered closed. “I must,” she said, and moved away. His jacket slipped from her shoulders and puddled onto the bench. “Good night, Lord Black.”
He watched her rise from the bench, tracking her progression. The wind rose, weaving through the branches. An owl hooted, and she chanced a glance back over her shoulder only to find him standing where they had seconds ago sat.
Their gazes locked, and a voice, beckoning and seductive, whispered to her. The first time I met Death, it was at a ball and we danced a waltz, and I feared him, feared the things he made me feel, made me want. That night I ran from him, but Death was right behind me, chasing me and I wanted