Forbidden by Susan Johnson (good books to read for teens .TXT) 📕

"Didn't you know the Absarokee are an egalitarian society?" Her smile was teasing.

"I may have forgotten," the Duc carefully said, digesting her smile, her languorous tone, the deliberate statement of her past history.

Sliding the ribbon free, she dropped it with a graceful gesture next to her discarded shoes and stockings. Her dark-lashed eyes lifted to his. "Are you intimidated?"

"I don't think so," he quietly said, shrugging off his jacket with comfortable ease. "Should I be?" he added, smiling at her as he reached down to pull off his riding boots. He didn't suppose it would be polite to mention he held the record at Madame Beloy's bordello where the exhibitions tended toward the unusual in virtuosity and endurance.

Daisy began unbuttoning her dress as casually as he was discarding his clothes, his creme silk shirt having followed his jacket to the balcony floor. When he stepped out of his twill riding pants, Daisy remarked, "Those are different."

She was referring to his underclothing made of white cotton and briefer than the usual male style. He'd had them designed for comfort—particularly for playing polo.

"How would you know?" he retorted, his curt reply not based on any sound reasoning, but a response instead to her insolent self-possession.

"Because I've lived on this earth for thirty years and had my eyes open for a good deal of that time."

"Sarcastic women annoy me," he murmured, his gaze faintly glowering.

"As do arrogant men, me. Am I not allowed an innocuous remark?"

"Concerning your repertoire of men's underclothes, no. I've always considered it impolite to discuss previous lovers."

"My, we're touchy. Did I say anything about lovers?" Her smile was the kind he very much wanted to wipe away with an equally innocuous remark. "Surely," she added, "you don't want a woman who agrees with you completely."

"We don't agree on much, actually," he quietly replied, wondering perhaps if he'd made a mistake today. He was leaning against the carved balcony railing, very much at his ease, clad only in his crisp white briefs, his bronzed body in stark contrast to the brilliant white cotton, his muscles clearly defined from his powerful pectorals down the length of his lean form to the hard contours of his thighs and calves used so habitually in playing polo. Being nude before a woman—a woman he hardly knew�was apparently not uncomfortable.

Daisy smiled. Her father Hazard would have recognized the smile. It was her mother's. "Actually," she mimicked very softly, "on one or two things," and her smile heated the depths of her beautiful dark eyes, "I think we might agree."

He grinned suddenly, reminded succinctly that pleasure wasn't a cerebral exercise. "What would you say," he murmured, his smile in place, his strong hand extended to pull her up from the chaise, "if we didn't make it to the bed?"

Her answering smile was the most provocative evocation of sensuality he'd seen in a lifetime of investigating provocative sensuality. "I'd say," she replied, her voice scented with promise, "next time we could try the bed."

His hand closed over hers. "Fair enough," he said.

He finished undressing her as she stood before him, removing her clothing smoothly, without haste or awkwardness. Obviously he understood the intricacies of hooks and lacing and eyelets. When he discovered eventually she was wearing no drawers, he murmured with a mocking smile, "Now that's different."

. Her smile was beguiling and lush. "I won't ask how you know," she whispered back, teasing frolic in her voice.

He ignored her mockery, mildly intrigued. "Is it your Absarokee background?"

"I could say yes, because we don't wear underclothing on the plains, but that's not relevant here in Paris. The truth is," she said very, very softly, "I was hoping you'd come to fetch me at one today and I thought I might entertain you on the carriage ride to your cousin Georges's museum."

His smile sharply creased his tanned face, lit up his eyes. "I'm sorry now I was being so sensible."

"It just goes to show you the folly in prudence." Reaching up, she brushed his chin lightly with a kiss.

"You prefer imprudence then," he murmured, running his hands over her shoulders.

"Yes," she said, taking a small breath to steady her nerves, trembling slightly at his touch. His large hands were practiced; he knew exactly how to slide his warm palms and splayed fingers along the verge of her collarbone, brushing the swelling slope of her breasts only teasingly, then travel upward until his fingers slipped into the silk of her hair.

"And venturesomeness," he quietly pursued.

"Yes." Daisy softly breathed, feeling him pull the first pin from her coiled upswept hair.

"Something wild would interest you." His voice was cool, as though he were not saying "wild."

And she responded to the restrained paradox as much as the word. "Yes," she said very low, knowing a man with eyes like a jungle cat could be wild.

Her hair fell loose over her shoulders as he slid the pins free, heavy black silk he lifted forward, wrapped his hands around and tugged until she was pressed to his tall strong body, until she could feel his arousal pulsing fiercely against her stomach.

"So you want something reckless and rash." His deep voice was asking and promising at the same time. And maybe he was pushing her, only slightly, because she'd been pushing him since the first moment they'd met at Adelaide's.

"Yes," she answered, this woman who prided herself on constraint. "Yes," she softly added, thinking surely in these brief moments she must be losing all reason.

Lifting her suddenly as though she were no more than a small weightless object, he placed her on his iron-framed chaise that had traveled the world with him. The linen cushion was bleached white from the sun and well-worn, as were so many of the furnishings in this home. Display wasn't a natural bent for the magnificent, elegant Duc de Vec. His hermitage was modest, plain.

Discarding his underwear quickly, he followed her down and she momentarily wondered as he lay above her if the chaise would hold both