"You asked me why I was here." He cleared his throat. "I wanted to watch you sleep."
She frowned, confused. "Why would you want to do that?" Lucien Remington, notorious voluptuary, watching her sleep? How much more intimate that seemed than ravishment.
She studied him, noting his hands gripping the back of the chair so tightly his knuckles turned white. It couldn't be possible that he was interested in her. It was so against his known nature, she simply couldn't credit it. He preferred mature, and usually married, women. "Are you feeling unwell, Mr. Rem—er, Lucien?
Perhaps you are slightly in your cups?"
"I am not in my cups!" he growled. "But I am decidedly unwell. I'm coming undone. And damn it, the way you look at me tells me you feel the same. I'm not an honorable man, and I do not aspire to be one. I'll take your innocence and walk away without looking back. You'll be ruined, Julienne. I've been panting after you for weeks. Weeks." He shoved away from the chair and began to pace.
"I wish to God you had not come into my club."
Julienne gaped. From the moment she'd arrived in London at the start of the Season, her life had seemed to turn completely upside down. Her brother was missing, creditors hounded Montrose Hall, and Lucien Remington wanted to bed Sylvia Day - Bad Boys Ahoy!
her. She couldn't decide which event was most disturbing. Her skin grew hot and tight, her body achingly uncomfortable.
"Aren't you going to say something?" he snapped. "Shout at me. Call me a cad, or worse, if you have the coarse vocabulary to do so. Tell me to leave." When she just stared at him, wide-eyed with incredulity, Lucien approached her and grabbed her by the shoulders. He shook her roughly. "Do something! Anything, damn it, to make me go." His fingers kneaded restlessly against her skin, as if he couldn't bear not to touch her.
She stared mutely at the ferocious man who held her. His voice, his words, his countenance—never in her life had she seen such passion. To think she had inspired such a display shocked her to silence.
And thrilled her.
"Tell me to leave," he repeated harshly. "Before I do something we'll both regret."
"Go," she said, her voice so soft it was less than a whisper. But it was enough.
Lucien released her and walked away with angry strides.
As the door closed behind him, Julienne felt an odd panic, as if once he left she would never see him again, which was partially true. She would never be allowed to speak to him, to touch him, since simply looking at him was a grave offense. Once he walked out that door, her time with him would be over. Forever.
And she simply couldn't bear it.
"Lucien!" she cried in dismay, willing him to come back to her.
Instantly, the door swung open, and he was in her arms.
Chapter Three
Julienne La Coeur smelled heavenly. Her skin was like the finest silk, her br**sts full and generously swelled as they pressed against his chest. Lucien didn't understand why she'd called him back, but he wasn't about to ask for an explanation.
"Sweet Julienne," he murmured feverishly against her throat. "You should have allowed me to go."
Her small, delicate hands slipped inside his velvet coat and slid across the smooth satin back of his waistcoat. "I tried."
He rolled to the side and shrugged out of his coat, tossing the expensive garment carelessly to the floor. He turned back to her and then froze in place.
The sheet had slipped down to her waist, leaving her br**sts exposed to his gaze.
Firm and gently swaying from his near-frantic movements, they were more lovely than anything Lucien had seen in his life. "You are more beautiful than I imagined," he breathed.
He watched in amazement as her skin flushed right before his eyes, rosy color sweeping across her chest before rising to her cheeks. His gaze studied her face, and he saw that she couldn't, or wouldn't, meet his eyes. With his fingertips, he tilted the bottom of her chin upward, forcing her to look at him. "Don't be shy, sweetheart. Not with me."
As he searched her face, he wondered at his good fortune. Lady Julienne La Sylvia Day - Bad Boys Ahoy!
Coeur. Julienne, so lovely, laying in one of his beds, bare from the waist up, her rich blonde hair spilling around her creamy shoulders, her dark eyes staring at him with such desire. He was so damn desperate to f**k her, he thought he would burst with it, but the small portion of his mind not presently between his legs wondered why the beautiful, socially esteemed diamond would be so eager to spread her legs for a bastard like him. With a muffled curse, Lucien leapt from the bed.
He looked around wildly. "Is this a trap?" he bit out. "Is your brother hiding somewhere, waiting to jump out and catch me compromising you?"
"Beg your pardon?" She looked genuinely confused.
"What are you doing? Lying in bed nak*d? Giving yourself to me so easily?"
A frown marred the smooth area between her brows. "I was sleeping," she answered crossly. "I didn't ask you to come in here. I didn't even want to spend the night here. You insisted." Julienne rubbed her forehead, pulling the sheet up once again to cover herself. "Get out," she said coldly.
His hands clenched into fists.
"Leave, Mr. Remington. Before I take up your suggestion to scream."
He watched in amazement as she threw herself into the pillows and turned her back to him. It would damage her more than him to be caught, but why else would she offer herself?
"This is fantastic," he muttered, more to himself than to her.
She gave a disdainful little grunt and punched the pillow.
Lucien wandered around the room, looking behind the thick sapphire velvet drapes and dropping to his knees to look under the bed. Finding no one lurking in the room, Lucien strode to both doors and locked them. He shrugged out of Sylvia Day - Bad Boys Ahoy!
his waistcoat.
Julienne sat up again. "You're mad if you believe I would allow you to touch me now!"
Lucien yanked his shirt out of his trousers and drew it over his head. He smiled grimly when she gasped at the sight of his chest. He knew he was considered too muscled, the result of many hours spent engaged in fencing and pugilism. But the glimmer in her eyes wasn't fear or revulsion. It was desire.
"Why me?" he asked.
She rolled back onto her side. "Go away."
"Why me?" he repeated.
"Why do you find it so hard to believe?" she mumbled into the pillow. "Women throw themselves at you all the time. Why should I be any different?"
He moved toward the bed. "Am I something to boast to your friends about?"
Julienne tucked tighter into the pillows, pulling the sheet with her. "As if I would ever tell anyone that I'd succumbed to your charms. Which I won't!" she added hastily. "Succumb, that is. Now, please leave!"
"What if I spread the tale?" he asked. "What if I tell every member of my club that I rode between your thighs? That I ruined you, and you screamed with pleasure while I did it?" His mouth curved in a predatory smile. "And you will scream with pleasure."
She snorted. "I'll do no such thing."
"What if I tell everyone, Julienne?"
"You wouldn't."
"You don't know me well enough to say that."
"You don't know me well either. For if you did, you wouldn't be so fearful of my Sylvia Day - Bad Boys Ahoy!
intentions."
Turning away, Lucien stared into the dying fire. "You are distraught over your brother."
"I am," she admitted, her clear voice telling him as she faced him again. "I will have to bail him out of this mess, just as I've always done."
He sighed. "If I touch you, you'll be ruined, and the marriage you require to save your brother will be jeopardized."
"I'm aware of that. My actions tonight were foolish at best, but I knew the possible consequences and I weighed them carefully. I'd planned to sit in a quiet corner and observe. I wanted to watch you in your element, a place where the rules are completely yours and you are not bound by the strictures that suppress you in Society. It is unfortunate that Ridgely chose my table to share, but not unexpected."
"Lady Julienne. If you'd been found out—"
"The scandal would have destroyed all chances of an advantageous marriage, I know. But perhaps that would be best for Montrose. I don't care much for the thought of being a sacrifice on the matrimonial altar. Facing the consequences of our actions is the best way to learn responsibility, but I am to blame for shielding him too well. As for this moment, is it so wrong to want the pleasure other women experience? Is it so terrible to steal a little passion in a life that will be bereft of it? There are ways… ways to… ways that would leave me a virgin—"
Lucien turned in stunned amazement. "How would you know of such 'ways'?"
She flushed from the top of her br**sts to her hairline. "I read… things."
"You read 'things'?" His eyes widened. " Erotica?"
Julienne's hair was a golden curtain around her. With her bared shoulders and flushed face, she looked every bit the wanton seductress and nothing like the Sylvia Day - Bad Boys Ahoy!
genteel virgin he knew her to be.
And yet it was the unabashed tilt to her chin and the defiance so evident in her silence that most affected him. An innocent who wasn't quite so innocent. His c*ck had been aching before. Now the throbbing was downright painful.