Sally MacKenzie Bundle (222 page)

“Oh!” The wet flick of his tongue was exquisite. The second stroke shot her to the edge of release. She tugged on his hair. She needed him inside.

“I thought we were going slowly this time?” he said. Did his voice sound a little breathless?

She yanked again and growled at him. He grinned.

“Or perhaps next time. I take it you are ready now?”

“Yes. Now.”

“Very well.” He slid inside and she shivered with delight. “As luck would have it, I am ready, too.” His voice was as strained and tight as she felt. He withdrew and stroked in again.

“Ah!” It was all she needed. She shattered, and as she did, she felt Edmund’s warm seed pulse deep into her.

They lay tangled together as their hearts slowed; then Edmund lifted himself off her. The cool air chilled her damp skin before he covered them with the blanket. She sighed and snuggled close to him.

“I’m afraid it may take a lot of practice to master the slow approach,” he said, smoothing her hair off her face. She smiled. She felt relaxed—and pleasantly wanton. “But we’ll have years to perfect our technique.”

“Mmm.” Years with Edmund. That sounded lovely. And to think, just a few days ago she’d been bored and wanting adventure, certain this Season would be like every other.

“But we don’t have years before we have to face your parents and brother and my aunts,” Edmund was saying.

“What?”
Jane sat up abruptly. “Da is in London?”

“He is, as well as your brother John. I cannot think they’ll be happy you spent the night in my company.”

“Da and John hate London.” Her eyes widened. “You didn’t tell them what we were doing, did you?”

Edmund laughed. “Do I look like I have a death wish? No, I didn’t give them any particulars, but after the scene at Wolfson’s, I don’t believe I had to. All of society must have a very good idea what we’ve been up to. I merely sent round a note telling them you were well and with me so they should not worry. I doubt that put their minds completely at rest, however.”

Jane snorted. “It should. Your aunts and my mother have been throwing me at your head all week.”

He grinned. “True. So shall we go tell them their efforts have been successful?”

Jane looked down at the naked man lying beside her on the sheets. It was hard to imagine this scene was real. She should pinch herself…or maybe touch him…

“Jane, we’ll never get to Motton House if you do that or, ah, mmm, yess…” He flipped her onto her back. “I’m afraid your poor family will have to wait a little longer for our news.”

Dear Readers,

The Naked Viscount
is the seventh “Naked” story I’ve written. New readers—and even fans of the series—sometimes ask me if the books need to be read in order. I don’t think so—in fact, I didn’t
write
them in order. I found as I went along, I discovered new characters that intrigued me—and then I’d have to figure out what
their
story might be.

However, for those of you who are interested, here’s a chronology of the stories—the year in the parenthesis is the year the book was published.

1816—
The Naked Duke
(2005)

The Naked Baron
(2009)

“The Naked Laird” in
Lords of Desire
(2009)

The Naked Marquis
(2006)

1819—
The Naked Earl
(2007)

The Naked Viscount
(2010)

1820—
The Naked Gentleman
(2008)

1821—“The Naked Prince” in
An Invitation to Sin
(coming in February 2011)

The Naked King
(coming in June 2011)

I hope you enjoyed
The Naked Viscount.
Thanks so much for being a “Naked Reader”!

Sally

And here’s a selection from Sally’s
next sexy Regency romance,

THE NAKED KING,

to be published by Zebra Books in 2011.

Stephen Parker-Roth landed in a large puddle. Mud and water splashed into the air, soaking his breeches, spattering his coat, and decorating his face with flecks of dirt. He wiped a blob off his right cheek with a clean corner of his cravat and frowned at the perpetrator of this sartorial disaster. “You have deplorable manners, sir.”

The miscreant blinked at him, tongue lolling. He looked not the slightest bit abashed, damn it.

“This wouldn’t have happened if I weren’t very, very drunk, you know.”

The fellow tilted his head to one side.

“You doubt me?” Stephen leaned forward and poked his finger at the beast to emphasize his point. “I warn you, I’m an exceedingly dangerous man. I’ve won brawls from Borneo to Buenos Aires to Boston. More than one blackguard has rued the day his path crossed mine.”

The dog barked, a rather startlingly deep, ringing sound, and put his head down on his front paws. His hindquarters remained in the air, tail waving like a flag in a stiff gale.

Stephen unbent enough to scratch the creature’s ears. “Ah, well, I won’t hold your ignorance against you. You’re just a…” He frowned. “No, you can’t be a homeless cur—you’re far too clean. How is it you’re roaming Hyde Park by yourself?” His fingers found a collar in the dog’s deep fur—and then he noticed the leash dragging in the grass. “Oh ho, you’re not alone. What have you done with your master, sir?”

The dog’s ears pricked up. A woman’s voice, rich and incredibly alluring, called out, “Harry!”

“Or mistress…” Stephen found himself addressing empty air. Harry was already bounding across the grass to a figure about a hundred yards distant. Stephen squinted in the sun. The female wore an enormous bonnet and a dress that looked like an oversized flour sack.

Pity. A voice that evoked twisted sheets and tangled limbs should not belong to an antidote.

The woman stooped to reclaim the leash, and Harry promptly began towing her back toward him. He’d best stand, then, like a gentleman should.

He struggled to his feet. The mud didn’t want to let him go. MacInnes was going to have an apoplexy when he saw him. Why his valet, who didn’t blink at tending his gear in the Amazon or the wilds of Africa, got as priggish as a damned dandy when they reached England’s shores was beyond him.

Eh. The change in altitude was not felicitous. He bent over, resting his hands on his knees, and swallowed several times until the landscape stopped whirling and his last meal agreed to remain in his stomach. It would be shockingly bad form to greet the lady by casting up his accounts all over her slippers.

“Harry! Slow down!”

Even sharp and breathless, her voice sent a jolt of pleasure through him. He leaned forward a bit more to shield any obvious evidence of his interest.

Rein up, you cawker. She might have buck teeth and garlic breath; she might be toothless and eighty years old.

He glanced up. Well, not eighty. She was moving too quickly to be that ancient.

The dreadful bonnet slid back off her head as he watched. Ah! Now he saw the purpose of that hideous headgear—it hid her riot of bright red curls. They glinted in the sunlight like dew-kissed roses.

She had spectacles, too, that looked to be in danger of falling off her rather prominent nose, and delightfully full lips, currently twisted into a grimace. She wasn’t beautiful, but she was definitely attractive.

Who was she? A maid assigned to walk the family dog? No sane butler or housekeeper would assign this girl that task—the dog was walking her, not she the dog. A lady of the night? Unlikely. It was now an awful hour in the morning, and he’d never heard of a dasher with an obstreperous dog, the voice of a siren, red curls, and spectacles. A fallen female with those striking attributes would be the talk of the male
ton.
Perhaps she was a widow.

Or married. Damn, he hoped she wasn’t married. He didn’t dally with married ladies.

He shook his head. Was he insane? How the hell had dalliance crept into his thoughts?

He was drunk. That was it. Very, very drunk.

And she was very flushed and very annoyed. She was glaring at him.

He
was
covered in mud—his shoes squelched with the stuff—but that wasn’t his fault. Her dog was to blame.

Harry dragged her the last few yards and plopped down at his feet. The girl’s brows were the same shade as her hair. She looked more like a flame than a rose, actually. Was she as fiery in bed?

He closed his eyes briefly. If he could remember how many glasses of brandy he’d had, he’d vow never to have so many again.

He regarded her glowering countenance. “Er, good morning.” He sounded perfectly sober, if he said so himself. “It’s, ah, a lovely morning, isn’t it?”

“No, it’s not.” She blew out a short, sharp breath and pushed her hair back out of her face. Her green eyes were as stormy as a wind-tossed ocean, full of passion…

Perhaps he should swear off brandy entirely, though drink had never made him so lustful before.

“I mean…” She swallowed, obviously trying to get her spleen under control. “That is, yes, it is a lovely morning. How nice of you to say so after Harry caused you to fall into the mud. I apologize for his behavior.”

Mmm, that voice. He’d so like to hear it threaded with need and desire, panting his name—

Definitely no more brandy.

“He’s a sheep dog,” the woman said. “I imagine he was trying to herd you away from the puddle, not into it.” She reached back to reclaim her bonnet.

Oh, no. He couldn’t let her cover her beautiful curls again with that monstrosity. His hand shot out, plucked the millinery mistake from her fingers, and dropped it into the mud. He mashed it down with his foot for good measure.

“My bonnet!” Lady Anne Marston gaped down at her poor bonnet, flattened under this rude person’s shoe. What sort of gentleman attacked a woman’s hat?

No sort of gentleman. The man might be handsome as sin with his startlingly clear blue eyes and shaggy, sun-streaked hair, but handsome is as handsome does—she had learned
that
lesson beyond hope of forgetting—and destroying a woman’s bonnet was not handsomely done.

She drew in a breath to tell him exactly what she thought of such behavior—and stopped. Was that brandy she smelled? Certainly the man wasn’t foxed at 10 o’clock in the morning!

“Your bonnet is an abomination,” he said.

“It is not!” And now he was insulting her as well. That was her favorite bonnet under his foot. It might not be stylish—
she
wasn’t stylish—but she liked it. She’d had it for years.

“You didn’t buy it in London, did you?”

She gritted her teeth. “Of course not. London bonnets are frilly, silly dabs of straw and feathers and gewgaws. I need something serviceable.”

She should leave. Yes, the man had landed in the mud, but it was probably more his fault than Harry’s. Drunkards were notoriously unsteady. She tugged on Harry’s leash, but the idiotic animal stayed where he was, at this human animal’s feet.

“Serviceable?” He ground her poor hat deeper into the muck. “How could this atrocity be the least bit serviceable?”

“It protected me from the sun”—
and kept critical eyes off my disreputable hair.

She would admit that last only to herself, certainly not to him. What did this fellow know of the matter anyway? He didn’t have red hair—though, being a man, he probably wouldn’t care if he did.

He snorted. “It protected you from the sun and every male who saw you in it, I’ll wager.”

Oh, she’d like to kick the cod’s-head exactly where it would hurt him most. He didn’t think she was some silly miss on the catch for a husband, did he? “I’d hoped it would protect me from annoying men”—she sniffed, giving him her best pretention-depressing look—“such as yourself.”

He chuckled. “Now that’s put me in my place, hasn’t it? And here I just rescued you from the ugliest bonnet in Britain.” He leaned forward slightly, sending another whiff of brandy her way. “When you go looking for a replacement, try Madam de Fleur’s on Bond Street. Fleur’s hats are far more attractive.”

Of course this fribble would be an expert in female fashion. She jerked on Harry’s leash again; Harry merely yawned. “You are drunk, sir.”

He nodded, looking not the least bit repentant. “I’m very much afraid that I am.”

“Did you rise early, then, to begin your debauchery?” It was a shame—in an academic, aesthetic sense only, of course—that such a handsome man was so dissipated.

“Er, no. I haven’t yet been to bed.”