Claimed by the Rogue (40 page)

Most recently, Hope launched
Scribbling Women and the Real-Life Romance Heroes Who Love Them
, a charity anthology of twenty-eight essays by popular romance authors on how they met, wed, and love their real-life spouses and significant others. Net proceeds are donated to Win.

Hope lives in Manhattan with her real-life romance hero and their rescue cats. Visit her online at
www.HopeTarr.com
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Desire as essential as breath…deception as fragile as sanity.

Beauty and the Earl

© 2014 Jess Michaels

The Pleasure Wars, Book 3

Liam, the Earl of Windbury, had everything when he held his secret lover in his arms. Until a feud between their families left her dead, his body broken, and his sister married to his bitterest enemy.

Wracked with guilt, simmering with rage, he’s spent a year in seclusion, seeing no one except a few servants as he does his best to forget the past and patently refuses to think about any kind of future.
 

When courtesan Violet Milford enters Liam’s lair, she’s on a secret mission to gather information for Liam’s desperate sister, who fears for his sanity, even his life. What she finds is a man scarred inside and out, whose dark, controlling sensuality hides the kind, wounded man within.

Violet awakens a sexual desire more powerful than Liam has ever known, and her stories weave a spell that begins to work its way past his defenses. But when the truth inevitably comes out, it could well destroy the love that is saving them both.

Warning: This book features a sexually experienced woman who will use every trick in her book to save a man from himself.

Enjoy the following excerpt for
Beauty and the Earl:

Liam sank up to his chin in the steaming waters, letting the supposedly healing waters of Bath seep into his injured shoulder. The warmth of the natural spring helped, but he wasn’t certain he retained any miracle cures beyond the few moments of pleasure in the water.

And yet here he was, thanks in great part to the insistence of his…well, what would he call Malcolm Graham anyway? Assistant, sometime secretary, occasional estate manager…
friend
. Possibly the only one he had left, and that was likely due in large part to the fact that Mal was on his payroll.

But whatever Mal’s motivation, he had dragged Liam here to “take the waters” and take the waters he would.
 

He measured his breaths, trying desperately to empty his head of all thoughts. It was a nearly impossible task, it seemed, for his mind was always filled with memories he didn’t want to consider and guilt he refused to acknowledge.
 

He squeezed his eyes shut, but his thoughts continued to race, bombarding him from all sides.

“Damn,” he muttered, and then sank beneath the water entirely. Beneath the depths, there was no noise, nothing to see, and his brain began to quiet finally. Cut off from everything, even breath, he could almost pretend that his life above the surface didn’t exist.

Almost.

Unfortunately, his body required air to live and so he rose reluctantly. He wiped his face off and slicked his now-wet hair back with his good hand. He opened his eyes and froze.

There, standing on the edge of the steps that led down into the large, square pool where he reclined alone, was a woman. Not just any woman, but probably one of the most beautiful women he had ever had the pleasure to look upon in his thirty years.
 

She was intensely exotic, with a slightly olive-toned skin and thick, sleek black hair that was drawn back loosely, though strands of it continued to bounce around her oval face. Her dark brown eyes, which were currently focused intently on his face, sparkled in the lamplight and held on him with a confidence he normally didn’t see in women. Especially women wearing a white chemise that left no curve of her body to the imagination.

He licked his lips as a hot slicing shock of desire ricocheted through his body and settled in his loins. Beneath the water, he began to throb.

“This is a private room,” he managed to croak out.

Her eyebrows lifted and a slight smiled turned up her lips. “Oh, I certainly hope that is true, considering what I have planned.”

She took a step into the water and immediately that white chemise went sinfully sheer against her calves. Another step and her thighs were revealed as the water sloshed up and down against her movements.
 

He swallowed, his head spinning now, but not with its normally unpleasant thoughts. No, it spun with desire, confusion and a desperate need to have her come deeper into the water.

“Who are you?” he asked.

She smiled. “Violet Milford, my lord,” she said, and he almost expected her to put out a hand as if they were meeting under more normal circumstances.

He sucked in a breath, and her smile broadened.

“You know my name, do you?” she asked.
 

He nodded. “Yes. The courtesan.”

She hesitated on the third step of the pool and nodded. “And I know you, as well, Lord Windbury.”

Liam settled back, resting his good arm on the edge of the pool behind him as she continued into the water. Waves covered her body, but she was waist-deep now.
 

“Did my man arrange for your appearance?” he asked. Sometimes Mal did that, but never without Liam’s request as the impetus.

She shook her head. “That hulking beast outside? No, he has no idea I’m here.”

“Then I almost hate to ask this question, but how did you get past him?”

She smiled, and something in him shifted. When her full lips tilted upward, her already beautifully exotic face became even more intoxicating. He wanted to drag her against him and kiss her until she couldn’t form coherent words. It had been a very long time since he felt such strong, animal reactions. Sex had become a necessary bodily function, not a pleasure as of late.

“I brought along a distraction,” she replied, seemingly unaware of the place his wicked thoughts had taken him with just her smile. But then, her gaze dropped under the water swiftly.
 

He doubted she could see he was naked beneath, or hard and ready with just her unexpected appearance here, but given her vocation and knowing eyes, he would wager she had guessed both.

Perhaps she even counted on both.

“I am not looking to become someone’s protector,” he warned her, though he found himself offering a silent prayer that this fact wouldn’t scare her away.
 

She moved into the water, dropping under so that it soaked her shoulders before she stood up again and revealed her chemise, utterly sheer and plastered against full breasts. He couldn’t contain a grunt of ever-increasing need.

“I’m not seeking a protector, my lord,” she whispered as she reached him. She reached out and touched his face, the side without the scar, so he didn’t move away from her fingers. “I’m on holiday. I’m only looking to enjoy myself.”

She was so close, he could smell the light musk of some kind of perfume, and he lost all semblance of reason. He reached for her without thinking and dragged her hard against him. Her arms wound around his neck and she lifted her mouth just as he smashed his down.

The kiss was spectacular. Her lips, which looked so full, were exactly what he wanted. Soft and supple, they parted as his tongue demanded entry into her mouth. She denied him nothing, even as he fisted her wet chemise in his hand and dragged his nails against her back in the process. She merely arched against him, rotating her lips against him with suggestive and wanton response.

“Damn,” he muttered against her mouth as his blood began to boil with out of control desire.

They can escape winter’s cold, but their nemesis has a long, icy reach.

Lisbon

© 2012 Lynne Connolly

Richard and Rose, Book 8

On a ship bound for Portugal with her children and the man she loves, Rose should be blissfully happy. Except Richard treats her like she’s made of porcelain. She’s recovered from the childbed fever that nearly killed her, yet he won’t share her bed and it’s driving her mad.

To win him back body and soul, she resolves to use every wicked, seductive trick he’s taught her. Until a possible attempted murder on board puts them both on alert for the trouble that seems to dog their every move.

Richard is almost relieved to have something to investigate. He loves Rose too much to risk losing her—which is exactly what could happen if he gets her pregnant again. When it becomes clear a series of accidents is no such thing, they realize an old enemy has caught up with them.

It’s imperative for Richard and Rose to work together to defeat this foe, but their new distance could prove their undoing. Especially when Mother Nature conspires to make them endure one last, desperate test of their love…

Warning: The earth is moving for Richard and Rose, but this time it’s not entirely their fault.

Enjoy the following excerpt for
Lisbon:

Richard’s scolding continued as he undressed me. I still loved his voice, the quiet cadence, the rasp hidden under his customary congenial tones that grew pronounced in the throes of physical ecstasy. I wanted to hear that again. So much. Feel the touch of his hands, hot on my body, the soft, moist movement of his mouth on my skin, the hard suction when he sucked my nipple—I had to stop. I could feel the moisture forming at the top of my thighs. I let his voice float over me, listening to the tone rather than the meaning.

“You have to preserve yourself, let me care for you—”

But I had to respond to that remark. I snapped, “Like veal in aspic?” I hated veal in aspic. Slimy and cold. “You want to keep me wrapped up against all danger? You can’t, Richard, it’s impossible.”

A small pause, then, “I know.”

His hands left my body and the stays fell away. I caught them and dropped them on the chair, then bent to retrieve my gown and drape it over the chair too. I unfastened my petticoats myself.

I stood in shift and under-petticoat, still wearing stockings and shoes and my hair pinned up in its knot on the top of my head. Keeping my gaze on his face, I reached up and took out the pins, one by one. I knew the action lifted my breasts. It would make the nipples press against the thin lawn fabric. I would force him to suffer.

Because of my earlier thoughts, my nipples had peaked, and as I moved, the extra sensitivity made me shiver. He stared at me, his eyes cool but a small frown furrowing his brow. At least I’d had some effect. Desperation filled me.

“Do we stay like this forever?” I asked. “Do we draw further apart until you can’t bear it anymore and search for something outside the marriage bed?” He opened his mouth to protest, but I wouldn’t let him speak yet. “It would be meaningless, and that’s what you’d tell me when I found out. Because I
would
find out, you know that, don’t you? There are people longing for it to happen, for you to stray, people who will run to me to see how I’m taking your betrayal. And I’ll have to smile and pretend I don’t care, just as other wives do. You’ll be sparing me, you’ll say, stopping me from bearing more children, wearing me out with childbirth. During my time in society, I’ve heard it all, Richard, and the excuses, and I’ve seen the hurt in their eyes.”

I couldn’t keep my tears back any longer, and I didn’t see the point anymore. I let them fall but didn’t wail. Just let them trickle slowly down my cheeks, leaving hot trails behind.

“I’ll never do that.” He sounded sincere, his voice steady. He
was
sincere. But I knew he needed the closeness we had shared, if not making love, then intimate relations. I wanted the true involvement we’d had, the love and sharing, not just the making love. I wanted him to hold me. I wanted to wake up in his arms, to kiss him good morning. The lack of it was driving me insane.

I wanted to shock him into returning to me. I remembered something that had crossed my mind once, briefly. “And I’ll be alone. After a surfeit of lovemaking, suddenly I’d have nothing. Richard, what if, one day, I see a man with your eyes? What if I grew lonely enough to turn to someone else?”

Shock forced his eyes to dilate and the lines around his mouth to whiten. But to do him justice, he didn’t turn away. He must know I was close to breaking. I had shown him everything, only stopping when I could hold my voice steady no longer.

“You cannot. You know what sexual relations will mean—” Now his voice shook. “You can’t fall pregnant again.”

“It’s an excuse.” I knew several ways to avoid children, and in any case, I’d had childbed fever. “The doctor told me that nine out of ten women who’d had what I had end the illness sterile. In others that might be unfortunate, but not in our case.”

“There’s always a chance. Always. And I can’t lose you.” He took my hand, stroking his thumb across my palm in a well-remembered gesture. “It’s still me, sweetheart.” His voice softened, gained that rough edge I loved. “I can’t look at you without wanting you. Touching you is almost impossible because I want to do this—” He dragged me close. His arms locked around me, crushing my breasts against his chest, and his mouth collided with mine, needy and hungry. I welcomed him with everything I could.