Society's Most Scandalous Viscount by Anabelle Bryant Page A

no one had spared him a care otherwise and he’d learned to take what he wanted, when he wanted it. And still he didn’t matter.
    â€œYou’ve tied my ribbon to your horse. She’s a magnificent animal.”
    She combed her fingers through Nyx’s mane and Kell watched, fixated on how those fingers might feel threading through his hair, gripping his shoulders as they kissed, or better, as she rode upon his lap. “You left without saying goodbye.” His words came out rougher than he intended.
    â€œWere formalities necessary?” She stifled a laugh. “The rain had lessened and I needed to return home.”
    So she lived in Brighton. He’d never seen her before. He watched for a trace of revealing emotion, but the lady remained ambivalent. “Benedict Hampton at your service.” He initiated a mock bow. “As formalities go.”
    She didn’t reply at first.
    â€œPistol practice?” She nodded toward the targets mounted on the trees and took a few steps nearer the pines.
    At last a topic that provided solid ground. “Only in sport. I’ve never killed an animal and don’t care to.” He approached the stump and reclaimed the pistol. “Would you like to take a shot?”
    This time she was caught by surprise, her expression a mixture of curiosity and fear and he couldn’t contain his chuckle at her widened stare. Her eyes flared in a fascinating flash of blue-green.
    â€œI’ll help you, although I can’t fathom what you’ll need to shoot while cavorting about in the waves.” The image fit. In the pale celadon walking dress, her hair lifting in the breeze, she may as well belong to the sea. Her skin was as perfect as the mother-or-pearl shells he’d collected as a child and her illusive appearance these past two days convinced she was more mystic imagination than reality. Perhaps she’d emerged from the tide the first night he spied her with his telescope. Now he couldn’t clear her from his mind.
    Again she didn’t reply and he steered her toward the target, his fingers gentle against her round shoulders, the brush of her unbound hair like silk across his skin. Desire pushed to the forefront, trampling etiquette and friendship in its bid for attention.
    He paused when they’d taken ten paces and placed the pistol into her delicate grasp. It looked incredibly misplaced, her hands unlike the country miss he’d believed her to be, and for a heartbeat he reconsidered his offer. But before he could reason through his doubt, she made an assertive turn and raised the gun to aim at a target tacked to a trunk within the dusky copse. He shadowed her body, his chest against her back, thighs against her skirts and arms perpendicular with her arrowed position. Every cell in his body roared with objection. Were he to close his arms, he’d hold her in a firm embrace as he had done last night. A quick turn and he’d be kissing her before an objection rent the air. His cock encouraged the plan, his brain barely managing a stronghold to thwart the attack.
    He leaned closer to deliver instructions and his condition worsened, the shell of her ear hardly a breath from his lips, the subtle scent of cardamom and sweet cherry delightfully present.
    This was the path to madness. Yet he needed no hookah pipe to envision her smooth skin, imagine the sound of her sigh as he pleasured her or the height of their rapture as she came beneath him again and again. He remembered the smoke-induced fantasies he’d experienced when traveling among the town dwellers of the Arabian Peninsula. This woman promised all the pleasure with none of the ill aftereffects. In India he’d studied the teachings of Sanskrit literature and learned the practices of the Kama Sutra.
    He blinked to regain focus and shifted his gaze to the pistol. Her hands should be shaking from the weight of the weapon as she stood motionless in tune to his