The Accidental Mistress Read online

  Mildly surprised by the question, she hesitated, relaxing her stance a bit as she gestured toward the correct chair. “That one. Just there.”

  “Here?” He pointed, stretching out a hand.

  She frowned, wondering if he might be hard of hearing. “Yes, there.”

  Quick as a flash, he reached out and seized hold of her wrist, yanking her off balance. She gasped, unable to recover from his trick before he wrested the gun from her grip and imprisoned her inside his arms. In the blink of an eye, she found the tables turned, going suddenly from captor to captive.

  “Ooh!” she cried, wiggling inside his hold. “Let me go!”

  He tightened his arms, her body pressed firmly against his own. “Tut, tut. Quit your squirming, girl.”

  She stomped on his foot, wincing as a rebounding pain jolted along her instep.

  “Quit that, too,” he admonished, a spark of amused annoyance gleaming in his eyes. “You’re only causing yourself harm, since I have no intention of releasing you before I am ready to do so. In case you had not noticed, I am bigger and stronger and you are now entirely at my mercy.”

  Grasping her so tightly the air wheezed out of her lungs, he leaned back and set the gun atop the desk. Turning around, he moved the two of them a few steps away—too far for her to have any chance of recovering the weapon. Only then did he ease his hold enough to let her breathe normally again. On a sharp inhale, she filled her lungs with air, the movement pressing her breasts against the solid wall of his chest.

  Gazing downward, he quirked a brow. “I must admit I have to agree with your assessment.”

  “My assessment of what?” she demanded in a winded voice.

  “That you are a woman full-grown.” He snuggled her closer, and stroked a hand over her back and across her hip. “You may be young, but you are curved in all the right places. Considering our current proximity, you really ought to tell me your name, you know.”

  She squirmed against him. “Release me!”

  He chuckled softly. “So you would rather have me use persuasion, would you, to force out the answer?” His gaze lowered to her mouth, his tone dropping to a husky drawl. “You will find I have a rare talent for persuasion.”

  “And you will find that I am well used to the blandishments of smooth-talkers and confidence tricksters. I doubt your efforts will prove any more successful than theirs.”

  “A challenge, is it? I like challenges, especially ones issued by pretty little minxes like you.”

  Before she knew what he meant to do, his lips came down on hers. At first she stiffened inside his embrace, straining to be free despite the futility of the action. But even as she struggled, a part of her brain registered the captivating pleasure of his mouth moving against her own, the breath she’d barely managed to regulate becoming fast and shallow once more.

  Still, with a last ounce of determination, she gave another wiggling push. To her dismay, however, her attempt did nothing but encourage him to reach down and secure her wrists behind her back, before he slowly bent her body into his own, leaving her front plastered breast to chest, stomach to thigh, against him.

  She barely had a chance to adjust before he slanted his mouth and kissed her harder, compelling a response from her that she was helpless to resist. For in spite of having previously fended off unwanted advances from men, this was the first time she’d ever been caught by one.

  The first time she had ever been kissed.

  And what a kiss it is, she had to confess, her limbs turning warm and waxen as if they had a will of their own. Her brain might argue that she didn’t want this—want him—but her body most decidedly did not agree. Ragged heat washed over her, a shiver following as he coaxed her lips to part.

  Using his tongue, he painted her mouth with the lightest of strokes, a move that sent her heart racing at breakneck speed. Trembling from the almost shocking carnality of the act, she let him continue, let him delve inside her mouth to play there with a finesse that quite literally made her whimper.

  Then, as suddenly as it had begun, the kiss ended, Wyvern lifting his head to peer down into her eyes. His own gaze was lambent, eyelids half-lowered as if he too was trying to recover from an unexpected surfeit of pleasure. Yet he didn’t release her from his hold, obviously not so far gone as to forget why she had come into his possession in the first place.

  “Have you had enough,” he asked roughly, “or shall we try for another?”

  Seeing his expression that was half-challenge, half-anticipation—as if he knew he would win no matter her answer—she decided it might be wise to acquiesce to his original demand. “It’s Gabriella,” she murmured. “My name is Gabriella.”

  His lips turned up in a smile. “It suits you. A pleasure to meet you”—pausing, he shifted so their bodies rubbed together—“Gabriella.”

  “Tell me your name,” the marquis demanded gently.

  Heart throbbing in the base of her throat, Lily shook her head.

  “Is it Diana? Anna? Am I even close?”

  “No.”

  His jaw tightened. “Well, then, since you insist upon leaving me with nothing more of yourself than a memory, I suppose I had best make that memory one neither of us shall ever forget.”

  Before she could draw her next breath, his lips claimed hers, moving over her own with a skill and passion that sent her thoughts whirling away at the speed of a shooting star. Dark and demanding, his kiss sizzled through her, firing her blood and leaving her dizzy and trembling in his arms….

  Also by Tracy Anne Warren

  My Fair Mistress

  The Husband Trap

  The Wife Trap

  The Wedding Trap

  The Accidental Mistress is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  A Ballantine Books Mass Market Original

  Copyright © 2007 by Tracy Anne Warren

  Excerpt from His Favorite Mistress copyright © 2007 by Tracy Anne Warren

  All rights reserved.

  Published in the United States by Ballantine Books, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.

  BALLANTINE and colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.

  This book contains an excerpt from the forthcoming mass market edition of His Favorite Mistress by Tracy Anne Warren. This excerpt has been set for this edition only and may not reflect the final content of the forthcoming edition.

  www.ballantinebooks.com

  eISBN: 978-0-345-50243-8

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