Luckily, there was none to be found, and she brushed at her skirt and straightened her gloves, then patted at her hair, clearly at a loss for how to secure the cluster of curls that had come loose from her coif.
“Let me,” he said, brushing her hands away. She would make a muck of it, surely, and with her kiss-swollen lips, she already looked like she’d been compromised. Turning her around, he sifted through her hair until he found a pin that didn’t seem to be securing much and tugged it free. The stray curls he wound atop her head, securing them with the pin. Perhaps not as neatly as her lady’s maid would have done, but it would suffice. His fingers caressed the nape of her neck, soothing the night chill from her smooth skin.
“Your Grace?” Her voice trembled.
“James,” he corrected absently, watching, fascinated, as gooseflesh chased across her shoulders. He wanted to hear her say it, wanted to close the distance she had erected between them with the constant use of his title.
She half-turned, peering at him over her shoulder, her brows knitting in confusion at the husky tenor of his voice. Whatever she read in his face made her eyes widen, her even white teeth worry her lower lip—she tensed, but made no move to flee, as if curiosity had rooted her to the spot.
“Are you—are you going to—”
“Yes.” He blanketed her mouth with his, wrapped his right arm about her waist to pull her back into the cradle of his body, trapped her head where he wanted it with his left hand, tipping her chin up. The thin fabric of her gown couldn’t possibly shield her from the evidence of his arousal, and she jerked just a bit, gasping into his mouth, her hands clutching his arm. Then, impossibly, she softened against him with an enticing shudder. His groan was lost to her lips; the unconscious pressure of her pert little bottom against his hips was more affecting than it had any right to be. It seemed somehow unfair that a woman of no experience and little seductive prowess should be so unintentionally irresistible. She could not possibly know what she had done to him, the shreds she had made of his self-control.
He wanted so much more than a kiss from her. He wanted things that would shock her to the tips of her dainty little toes. But not here, where half the Ton waited just inside the ballroom—not here, where Lady Ravenhurst lingered on the terrace. And so he contented himself with just a kiss, savoring her soft, champagne-flavored lips beneath his own.
“James,” he said, drawing back to tease her lips with light brushes. “Say it, Jilly.”
She rocked onto her toes in a blatant attempt to coax him back down to her, a little murmur of discontent building in her throat. The moonlight gilded her hair, glistened on her moist lips. She smelled like vanilla and almonds, good enough to eat, and he wanted to slide his tongue down the enchanting valley between her breasts and taste her.
He let her almost, but not quite, reach his lips, and she made a sound of aggravation, her lips pursing into a delightful pout.
“James,” she said at last, just a shade of resentment coloring her voice.