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A pale blur showed as her mouth curved into a smile and his hands twitched That smile was attached directly to an inner core of heat and here in the darkness, after a very unfruitful attempt not to sink into equally unfruitful fantasies, his defences were especially weak

He could see her more clearly now, the oval of her face and the deeper shadows of her eyes He was as tense as if a wild ani for shelter had just prowled into his tent No, Saerous than any desert predator

‘That is hardly the point Surely this can wait until ?’

‘No it cannot It requires a degree of privacy For heaven’s sake, Edge I shan’t pounce on you, you know’

Oh, hell I wish you would

‘Very well Just be quick about it I would rather not be discovered entertaining you here’

‘You aren’t entertaining in the least at the ht be entertained yourself once I tell you why I’m here’

He frowned Her voice was high and raspy She was nervous; very nervous She kept shifting her weight, too, as if preparing for a bout of pugilism

‘I have a proposition, Edge’

A proposition

His body felt fractured—heat pulsed fros and shoulders like aHe was tired, worried, confused He wanted to recapture that pleasant numbness he’d worked hard to attain since Jacob’s death

But A proposition From Sam

The words echoed through hishim from sleep—memories of her taste, the feel of her in the darkness Her scent—even ar in a garden inand he was as hard as the rock formations she’d admired

And why not? They were both ed and had no ties The physical attraction was undeniable and Saer to such encounters He’d been isolated froh about Sae in Venice The Sinclairs were always neorthy and Dora and herplayed out in foreign climes The fact that it involved an Austrian prince, a Russian count, and the very dashing Lord Ricardo Carruthers all vying for the attentions of the scandalous Sinclair sister had pushed it to the forefront of London gossip that summer

So why not assent to a proposition? Perhaps it would finally put to rest the foolish fantasy she’d planted in his er she’d fanned since he’d seen her on the Howling Cliffs There was nothing wrong with acting like the anis that were right in his life at the moment