Slightly Tempted Read Online Free Page B

pouring its melody and its rhythm into every cell of his body, his feet converting that rhythm into movement.
    It was a sensual dance, intended to focus a man's attention on his partner and hers on him. It was meant to make them think of another kind of dance, one more intimate still.
    No wonder the British had misgivings about the waltz.
    He whirled her about until the light from the candles became one swirling band of brightness overhead, and wound her skillfully in and out of the more slowly circling couples, noting with satisfaction that she stayed with him every step of the way, that she showed not a moment's fear of missing a step or colliding with a fellow dancer or losing her balance. The bright uniforms of the officers, the paler pastel ball gowns of the ladies, all merged into a swooping melody of color.
    By the time the first waltz of the set came to an end she was bright-eyed and slightly flushed and a little breathless. And even lovelier than before.
    "Oh," she exclaimed, "I like how it is done in Vienna!"
    He dipped his head closer to hers. "Would the patronesses of Almack's approve, do you suppose?"
    "Absolutely not," she said, and then laughed.
    The music began again. But it was a slower, more lilting tune this time.
    He waltzed her through the crowds as before, weaving in and out, varying the length of his steps, taking several smaller ones, and then moving into wide, sweeping swirls that forced an arch to her back and her neck. He felt the music with his body, moved with it, challenged it, took liberties with it, felt the magic of it. And she moved unerringly with him, her eyes on his much of the time. He held her fractionally closer than the regulation hold, though they touched nowhere except where regulations allowed.
    She sighed aloud as the music drew to a close again.
    "I did not know the waltz could be so-" she said, but one circling hand, which she had lifted from his shoulder, suggested that she could not think of a suitable word with which to complete the sentence.
    "Romantic?" he suggested. He moved his lips closer to her ear. "Erotic?"
    "Enjoyable," she said, and then she frowned and looked at him with a return of her earlier hauteur. "That was not a very proper choice of word! And why have you called mechérie ?"
    "I have spent nine years on the Continent," he said, "speaking French most of the time. And my mother is French."
    "Would you call medear orsweetheart, then, if you had spent those years in England?" she asked. "Or if your mother were English?"
    "Probably not." He smiled into her eyes. "I would have lived all my life with English sensibilities and English inhibitions. How dull that would have been. I am thankful my mother is French,chérie ."
    "You must not call me that," she said. "I have not permitted it. Iam English, you see, with all of an Englishwoman's sensibilities and inhibitions-and dullness."
    She was, he thought, every inch Bewcastle's sister. Except that he had spotted the rebel beneath the aristocrat, the butterfly eager to fly free of its cocoon. And the woman behind the youthful exterior who was surely capable of hot passion.
    "I do not believe you for a moment," he told her softly, smiling into her eyes. "But if I may not call youchérie, what else is there? What sort of a name is Morgan for a lady?"
    "It was my mother's choice," she said. "We all have unusual names, my sister and my brothers. But mine is not so very strange. Have you not heard of the Morgan of Arthurian legend? She was a woman."
    "And an enchantress," he said. "You are aptly named after all, then."
    "Nonsense," she said briskly. "Besides, I am not Morgan to you, am I, Lord Rosthorn? I amLady Morgan."
    The music began again for the last waltz of the set as his smile turned to laughter.
    "Ah," she said, brightening, "a lively tune again. Dancing can often be very tedious, Lord Rosthorn, would you not agree?"
    "As danced the English way, I would have to agree with you," he said. "But the Viennese way is