“Oh, Hugh,” she sighed as his fingers found the curve of her thigh and squeezed through the soft muslin of her dress. He rubbed his thumb in lazy circles, each motion bringing him closer to her most private area.

Dear God, if he could make her feel like this through her dress, what would happen when he actually touched her skin?

Sarah shivered at the thought, stunned by how excited she was just from thinking about it.

“You have no idea,” Hugh murmured between kisses, “how very much I wish we were anywhere but this room.”

“Anywhere?” she asked teasingly. She ruffled one of her hands through his tawny hair, delighting in how easy it was to muss.

“Somewhere with a bed.” He kissed her cheek, then her neck, then the tender skin at the base of her throat. “And a locked door.”

Sarah’s heart leapt at his words, but at the same time, his comment awakened a sliver of common sense. The door to the little drawing room was shut, but it wasn’t locked. Sarah didn’t even think it could be locked, and more to the point, she knew that it shouldn’t be locked. Anyone who tried the door and found it barred would immediately want to know what was going on inside, which meant that unless one of them wanted to brave the twelve-foot drop out the window, there would be just as much scandal as if someone had simply walked through the unlocked door.

And while Sarah had every intention of marrying Lord Hugh Prentice (once he asked, which he would, and if he didn’t, she would make him), she didn’t much fancy a marriage-inducing scandal mere days before her cousin’s wedding.

“We have to stop,” she said, without much conviction.

“I know.” But he didn’t stop kissing her. He might have slowed a bit, but he didn’t stop.

“Hugh . . .”

“I know,” he said again, but before he pulled away, the door handle turned decisively, and Daniel strode briskly in, saying something about looking for Anne.

Sarah gasped, but there was no way she could right the situation in time. Hugh was more than half on top of her, there were at least three hairpins on the floor, and—

And, well, Hugh was more than half on top of her.

“What the devil?” Daniel stared with frozen shock before his natural quick thinking set in and he kicked the door shut behind him.

Hugh got to his feet with more speed than Sarah would have thought possible under the circumstances. Freed of his weight, she sat up, instinctively covering her breasts with her arms, even though her frock had not even a single button undone.

But she felt exposed. She could still feel the heat of Hugh’s body against hers, and now Daniel was staring at her with an expression of such fury and disappointment that she could not meet his eyes.