Megan Frampton Read Online Free Page B

him in place for her, while she ran her left hand under his jacket, down his side to his waist. And immediately slid it up, unableto resist feeling his body underneath his shirt.
    She wished he had to write a column on men’s underclothing. That would be a delicious academic exercise.
    For a moment, he let her do as she liked. She licked his lip, and kissed his mouth, and curled her fingers up into his hair.
    Was she doing it right?
    She shifted, and felt something hard beneath her. She must be doing it correctly—Christian was not immune to her, in certain parts of his body, at least.
    She had to move, to get closer to him. She took her hand away from his body and placed it on the back of the sofa and, using it for support, she inched herself further up his lap, so her torso was pressed against his chest. It felt delicious. Her breasts felt full and heavy, and she wanted to rub her body all over his and see what other feelings could be elicited.
    A scientific experiment that Christian would certainly appreciate.
    It seemed that Christian did appreciate her movement, since the grip he had on her arms tightened, and his tongue—his tongue!—slid into her mouth, startling her with its presence. Its wetness.
    And then, just as her brain was beginning to process what was occurring, her body responded. It felt—wonderful. Delicious, and decadent, and sensual, and just what she’d hoped for. Although not
everything
she’d hoped for, because if a kiss could feel this good, what would the rest of it be like? She might possibly explode.
    He kept kissing her, sliding his tongue in and out of her mouth, tangling his tongue with hers. She’d somehow gotten both her hands in his hair, and she reveled in the thick luxury of it.
    At last, after a few minutes when the only thing Violet could hear was their breathing, he broke the kiss to regard her through heavy-lidded eyes. “I accept your challenge, Violet,” he said, sliding his hands from her arms to her waist. “And I am willing to accept that I might have been wrong in what I intended our marriage to be.”
    He drew a hand up her rib cage and his fingers halted just shy of her breast. Inside, her mind screamed at him to touch her there.
    A slow, lazy smile played about his mouth. A smile she’d never seen onChristian’s face before. “Show me what it will be like, Violet.” A pause, during which Violet nearly forgot to breathe. “I dare you.” His fingers finally, finally found her breast, teasing her nipple—which had stiffened, to her surprise—through her thin shift.
    * * *
    What did he know, anyway? He’d lost his head early on, and his academic’s mind had decided that was the Truth of it, capital T, and he would never let himself get in such a situation again. He would keep his passion separate from his real life. It seemed … reasonable.
    A resolution that had made perfect sense until Violet—his betrothed—propositioned him. A resolution that had never wavered, until he’d watched her drop her gloves onto the floor and gaze at him with those soft brown eyes. Not to mention pressed that soft body against him.
    A resolution that now seemed ridiculous.
    “What would you like me to do first, Violet?” he asked. He didn’t stop the motion of his fingers on her nipple, which had hardened under his touch. She was still wearing her corset and shift, but his mind was already imagining what she would look like—what she would feel like—when she had removed the last scrap of her clothing. To hear her moan as he took her stiff nipple in his mouth and ran his tongue over her skin, caressed the fullness of her breasts.
    But he didn’t want to scare her. If he took charge now, neither of them would ever know if she had courage enough to follow through on—as she put it—breaking through the impasse. To his mind, the impasse had everything to do with trust, and misconceptions, and passion. Could they trust each other enough with their passion?
    They both