She leaned back, and they both watched his fingers play along the inside seam of the leg. “Why?”

“They are able to touch you here,” he said, the words lush and lovely, his fingers at the outside of her knee, teasing up the line of the breeches. “And here,” he added, his touch at the inside of her thigh. “And…” He trailed off as he reached the place where her thighs met, and she shifted. He growled at the movement. “That’s right,” he whispered. “Spread yourself for me.”

God forgive her, she did, parting her thighs, affording him access to the place they both wanted him most. He took what she offered, his strong hand cupping the most secret part of her, and she sighed her pleasure at the touch, even as she was desperate for more of him.

“You like that,” he said, as though he were discussing a painting. A meal. A walk in the park.

“I do,” she said, not taking her gaze from that hand, from the place where he held her, firm and with an unbearable promise. “God help me, I do.”

“He won’t help you,” Duncan said, his other hand coming to the buttons on her linen shirt, releasing them one by one until she was looking down at the swell of her bare breasts. “This is the domain of another, far less perfect.” He cursed again, the word reverberating through the room as he spread the two halves of her shirt and bared her to him. “You are the most beautiful thing I have ever seen.”

She watched that hand, large and bronzed, slide across the skin of her stomach, a wicked promise. “Please,” she said, desperate for him.

“Please what?” he asked.

“Don’t make me beg.”

He looked at her then, knowledge and understanding in those unbearably gorgeous eyes. “I fully intend to make you beg, love. I promised you pleasure of the highest order. I promised you that I would control our time together. And I promised you would enjoy it to distraction. And you want all that, don’t you?”

She did not have the energy to lie. She nodded. “Yes.”

He leaned forward then, rewarding her truth with a long, lingering suck at one nipple, until she cried out her pleasure and put her hands in his hair.

The moment she touched him, he stopped. “Put your hands on the desk.”

She did what he asked without question.

He liked it. “Look at yourself,” he commanded, letting one finger draw a wicked circle around the straining tip he had just anointed. She looked fully the wanton, Anna, in all her glory, and Georgiana took the moment to arch her back, presenting her bare breasts to him. Tempting him once more.

She was rewarded with another long caress, this time on the breast he had previously ignored. And then he lifted his head and said, “I want you to enjoy this.”

She smiled. “I have no concerns that I shan’t enjoy it.”

He was utterly serious. “If I do anything you do not like, I want you to tell me.”

“I shall.”

“I shall know if you are lying.”

She met his gaze. “I shan’t lie. Not in this.”

In all other things, but not here. Not with him.

She took a deep breath. “Shall we go to my bed?” It was a heartbeat away, behind a nearby door. Large and plush and made for him. She would be lying if she said she had not spent many a night in that very bed, thinking of this man, of this moment. Of the way he might touch her one day. Of the way he might want her one day.

And that day had come.

He shook his head, his fingers playing at the tip of her breast, sending a thrill through her. “I don’t want you anywhere he’s had you.”

Chase.

She shook her head. “You don’t have to worry.”

She saw the storm cross his face at the words. She wished him to know the truth. “I have not… with anyone…”

He held up a hand, staying the words. “Don’t.”

He did not believe her. “Duncan —” she began, letting the words sound her urgency.

He did not let her finish, instead pulling her to the edge of the desk. “Here.”

She looked down at the oak. “Here? On the desk?”

“On his desk.”

She heard the slight emphasis on the pronoun, barely there. Barely noticeable if one did not expect it. She also heard the frustration in the words, instantly understanding its roots – he thought there was no place in the club where she and Chase hadn’t done this.

And so he took ownership of this place, where he believed Chase was king.

He wanted her here.

And, God help her, she wanted him just as much.

More.

She nodded. “Here.”

He watched her for a long moment, and she saw the myriad of emotions chase through him: anger, frustration, desire.

Pain.

She reached for him, wanting to stop it, but he resisted, pulling away from her touch, instead moving to lift one of her feet in his enormous hands. “I want you here,” he said, gruffly, unlacing her boot. “I want you naked,” he said, punctuating the slide of the boot from her foot as he set it on the arm of a chair perched nearby and set to work on the second. “And I want you mine.”

Mine.

The word curled through her on a flood of desire, robbing her of breath. When had anyone ever wanted her like this? When had anyone ever honestly desired to claim her? Yes, men wanted her body when she dressed in her bold silks and satins and paraded through the casino as Anna, but this was different. He wanted her – Georgiana – in a way no one ever had. Not even the man she had given herself to all those years ago.