Her arms were still trapped by the monk's robe.

"Release my arms” she said in a low, determined

For a moment he didn't move. And then he sat back, pulling her up and removing the entrapping fabric. Stripping away the torn shell of Lina's beautiful silk chemise.

He was still dressed, of course, his loose white shirt open, exposing his strong, smoothly-muscled chest. His breeches were unfastened as well, and she wondered if he'd lost interest. No. She refused to look—but sitting up like this she could still feel him hard against the dampness of her sex, and it wouldn't take much for him to finish.

She sank back on the bed. "You'll let me leave?" she asked, looking up at him.

He reached his hand out to touch her face, pushing the hair out of her eyes, and his fingers were gentle, a caress, as his smile deepened.

“Good God, no," he said, and he pushed into her, hard, one deep, fierce thrust that filled her.

She arched, trying to accommodate his powerful invasion, and her involuntary cry was of pain and satisfaction. No turning back—he'd finished it.

He held himself motionless over her, and she could feel the tension rippling through his hard body. She didn't want to open her eyes, she wanted to savor this moment, this feeling, this possession that should have been something she hated. This possession that felt... completely wonderful.

Sanity was overrated, his cousin had said. She had to agree, because this was madness, and she wanted it. For a brief moment in time Adrian Rohan belonged to her, and nothing could ever take that away from his face.

Instead he looked dark, tortured, his blue eyes black in the shadows. His invasion of her body no longer hurt—she had grown grudgingly accustomed to it—but she wondered when he was going to remove it.

"Am I hurting you?" he asked, which surprised her. Why would he care about her comfort?

She searched for her most practical tone, but given the circumstances it eluded her. "It's all right," she said a little breathlessly. "You may remove it now."

She could feel his soft laugh inside her body-a most strange sensation. "I may? And why should I want to do that?"

She started up at him, perplexed. "Because you've done what you wanted. You had sex with me. It wasn't rape, I didn't fight you, so you needn't worry that I'll bring charges against you. As you pointed out, this was my own fault for coming here unprotected. But we're finished now, and if I' not getting out until morning I'd like to sleep." She could be quite proud of her unemotional reaction to the whole confusing business. Later she could wail and cry when no one was around. For now it was done, over with, and she was deceptively calm. Time to move on with life.

"Oh, my precious angel," Adrian said in a silky, amused voice. "My sweet child, and by god you are a child when it comes to matters of carnality. I thought you had a clearer idea of what went on between men and women. Haven't you ever been in the country?"

“Well, I could hardly stand there and stare when the animals were breeding,” she managed in a cranky voice. "My parents would have been horrified. And Lina won't explain these things. Aren't you finished yet?"

"My dear Miss Spenser, we have only just begun.”

Before she could say a word he started to withdraw, and she let out her pent-up breath, only to have him push into her again, thick and hard. She cried out, but he simply repeated the motion, his narrow hips moving, pulling partway out and thrusting back in again.

"What are you doing?" she gasped as she clutched his shoulders, the white linen loose in her fingers.

"You want the pretty words, or the truth?" he whispered, leaning forward to brush his mouth against hers. "You're being tupped, shagged, screwed— made love to." Each phrase was punctuated with a thrust, and he was as breathless as she was. "In fact, Charlotte, you're being fucked. It's about this—" he thrust hard "—and this." Another thrust and she could feel her nipples harden in the warm night air, feel the strange heat in the pit of her stomach begin to build and burn.

He slid his hands down her bare legs and pulled them up around his hips, and she could feel the soft cloth of his breeches against her thighs. He pulled her legs higher, and he was deeper, bigger than she'd expected, and she found her body reacting, her hips reaching up, wanting that unspeakable invasion, wanting more and not knowing what it was.

"I'm afraid..." he said breathlessly. "Can't wait..." He slid his hand up her leg until it was between them, and he touched the place he'd used his mouth on. Clitoris, he'd called it. How could he know more about her body than she did?

He pushed inside her again, hard, and he seemed to grow even bigger, swelling, and she knew something glorious was about to happen, when he let out a muffled curse and pulled free from her, and she felt a hot wetness cover her belly as he collapsed beside her on the bed.

He was trying to catch his breath, and she was twisting, restless, confused, when he rolled back, trapping her body with one long leg as she tried to pull away.

"'Sorry," he said, not sounding particularly repentant. "You seem to have an unexpectedly strong effect on me. I barely made it out in time. The last thing I want to do is saddle you with a brat.”

Part of her understood what he was saying. He had spilled his seed outside her body so she wouldn't get pregnant. Leaving her empty, aching, feeling strange and restless and unfinished.

Why would any woman seek this out? It was messy, undignified, and while the things he did with his mouth had had the most astonishing effect on her. the fact remained that for a few minutes of unimaginable pleasure she'd destroyed her future.

She tried to sit up, but he pushed her back down again with lazy strength. He laughed. "I usually manage these things better. The truth is, you excite me beyond measure, for no earthly reason I can think of." He pulled her closer to his body on the soft bed, and she was feeling too weak to fight him. He pulled her into his arms, curling his bigger body around her back, and she felt some of the strange tension begin to leave her. This was what she wanted, what she had always wanted, she thought. Her back pressed against his chest, his arms around her, holding her against his warm, hard body. Her bum was up against his sex, but he was no longer hard, and she had nothing to fear from him anymore. She started to release a sigh when she felt his hand on her stomach, long fingers splayed across the soft, sticky surface.

And then before she realized what he'd intended his fingers dipped lower, into the soft curls between her legs, and she froze.

“No," she said sharply, trying to pull away.

She'd forgotten how strong he was. He had one arm around her, clamping her body against his, as his other hand continued its wicked descent.

“We're still not finished," he murmured in her ear, his voice low and wicked. "You're not finished."

She tried to kick out, but he simply trapped her long legs with one of his, as his fingers slid lower, finding that dangerous place he'd found earlier.

She was wet down there, from him as well as her own embarrassing dampness, and his fingers slid easily against her. He did it with insulting ease— one moment she was struggling, fighting, and in the next she'd gone rigid in his arms, every nerve in her body contracting in shameful delight.

He moved his hand, spreading the wetness around her sex, and she caught her breath. He touched her again, harder, longer, with wicked, wicked knowledge of a woman's body, and she cried out as the cruel delight washed over her again, and again.

Finally he moved his hand away, reaching up to cup her chin, pulling her face back so that his mouth could meet hers, and he kissed her as he'd touched her, long, hard and deep. She started to turn toward him when his hand slid down her stomach once more, and she broke the kiss.

“Please," she begged, desperate. "I can't take any more. Please."

''You can," he said, his voice dark and dangerous. "You can take anything I give you." And when he touched her this time she was shot into a darkness so deep that there was no escape. At the apex of her release she screamed, unable to stop herself.

He turned her in his arms then, and she was sobbing against his chest as he held her, his hands stroking her hair, her tear-streaked face, her trembling mouth. When the last shaky sob died away her kissed her with such tenderness that she wanted to start crying anew.

He was whispering to her, soft, gentle words that made no sense, words of praise, love, pleasure. "Sleep now, angel," he said. "You need your rest."

She could feel him now. Somehow he'd gotten hard again, but he seemed in no hurry to do anything about it. "Sleep," he said, his lips against her brow, brushing her soft skin.

And so she slept.

Adrian looked down at the woman in his arms, sleeping so soundly, so trustingly. He'd been a bastard to do this to her—he could face that in the few brief moments of post-coital regret, when his own defenses were at low ebb. He should have left her strictly alone.

He'd already known how dangerous she was to his self-indulgent peace of mind. He'd been fascinated by her furtive glances, her well-hidden longing. He'd wanted her for a long time now, he realized, wanted her badly, and he'd been too proud and too vain to admit it. Adrian, Viscount Rohan could have anyone, all the great beauties of London and Paris. Why was he wasting his time with an overtall gawky virgin no one else wanted? Older than he was, though only by a trifle, with ivory skin and freckles and long, luscious legs and he must be mad to be so obsessed with her.

He should have escorted her straight back to the house, accompanied by a stern lecture on the dangers of such reckless curiosity. Or even better, found a servant to take her back. She'd been an idiot to come out here in the first place. If he were a better man he could have rescued her from the mess she'd walked into.

But of course, he wasn't made to be the noble hero. And there would have been no one he could hand her off to—in fact he was less dangerous than most of his compatriots in sin. He shuddered to think what Cousin Etienne would have done to her.