CHAPTER ONE
Words that Burn
Lorene’s Perspective
He was watching her again. His look was that of a wolf eyeing up a lamb.
Slowly through my lashes I let myself glance his way. Imposing wasn’t enough of a word to describe the big American.
He wasn’t the tallest man in the room. He wasn’t even the biggest, but without a doubt he was the strongest.
Physically for sure, because I had seen his hands, hands that had known hard labor, but in general he seemed to exude an aura of power. Like a storm barely managed, but able to break forth with devastation at a moment’s notice.
What on earth was a man like him doing in a high society party such as this one? He was out of place entirely within this gilded world of finery and fickleness.
The look in his eyes when not watching me was one of wildness to be free of the place. He didn’t strike me as a man who conformed to others wishes and yet he was here and over all the women in the room it was me that he watched.
His stare had a curious effect, it made me feel very much alive. In a way it must be what prey animals felt when they knew that a predator was near.
It was said that of my day I was one of the most beautiful women there was and truly I had no end of admirers and subsequent marriage proposals because of it, but for the most part I ignored them all. This man’s infatuation with me was different however.
Instead of a plea in his eyes to be near me they instead said that they owned me and I felt the intensity of his stare keenly as if he peeled me layer by layer out of my clothing.
I fully met his gaze and stared boldly into his eyes from across the room. For a moment it seemed as if we were the only two people in the room.
My eyes blurred as I forced myself not to blink. I was not going to be the first one to look away.
His possessive demeanor over me was annoying and I wanted to show him that I…. that I was not daunted by him. Was that really the truth, though?
I blinked and quickly looked away. Turning I moved with a swish of my skirts away from the scene of my defeat.
My breath unsteady I made my way through the pressed throng offering out fake smiles and greetings in turn, as after all I was the hostess of my father’s party. Finding a pathway of escape I ducked outdoors and made my way out onto a veranda.
The party raged on inside gaily, but I stood in the cool night air breathing hard as if I had just finished running a race. The rapidity of my breaths only underschooled the amount of cleavage I was showing.
I had a lot to show and almost half of it was on display with the promise of more should a strap of my gown give way. Ultralow necklines were the fashion of the moment in Paris, but I very much wished that I had not bowed to fashion’s dictates, at least for this evening.
I’d seen it in his eyes. I’d seen the reality that this man would approach and when he did his fingers would delve into my bodice and lift my breasts free as he gazed at them wolfishly, fully intent to taste them with his mouth.
Lust was nothing new on the part of men for me to encounter, but he was different. It was like the look in his eyes signaled an event that had already happened.
Biting at my full lower lip I fought the urge to try to pull my dress up higher even as a dampness spread into my undergarments in a clear sign that I as a woman had recognized the reality of a man worth mating. My nipples throbbed duly even as my breasts swelled against what little material still clothed them.
Closing my eyes, I tried to force the impact that the Hunter’s gaze had wrecked upon me, away. Instead in the next moment my eyes flew open as I stopped breathing altogether.
He was here. He’d followed me.
Taking a quick gasp of air I forced myself to turn around slowly.
There he was closer than he had been all night.
“Can I help you?” I whispered.
He said nothing, but then he came closer. Breathing heavier I fought to not show the reality of that very thing as he came near.
Closer and closer he came. My neck craned backward as he came close enough to almost touch.
His eyes were green and gold, the epitome of a shifting matrix of an enigmatic hazelness that were a match for my own hazel colored eyes.
I watched his eyes leave my face to trace down over my shoulders, until he was looking down upon my breasts. His hands started to rise and flinching, I moved back quickly as my hands came up to hover protectively over my breasts.
His hands never stopped, but rose up to work at freeing the tie about his thick muscular neck. His heart was beating fast too, but his deeply spoken words only reflected a calm surety of control as he said, “I do not grope women.”
Still breathing heavy I swallowed and slowly let my hands fall down to clasp together at my waist. There was nothing to be trusted about this man and yet I believed him in what he had said.
I sensed a truthfulness of character about him that frankly made my knees wobble even more than they already were. In general, I was a complete mess inside and I could only hope that it was not as visible on the outside as I felt it to be inside.
The man’s gaze drifted away for a moment and he shook his head. A wry expression came over his hard proportioned masculine face and the vestige of a smile beckoned at his full lips as he said, “I did not expect you.”
“Expect me?”
His probing gaze came back to mine and simply he said, “You’re beautiful.”
“Many women here tonight are beautiful.” I whispered back in reply.
His head shook no with a definitive movement that said I was wrong. Was I?
I glanced toward the glittering world of a social meeting of dignitaries of state and captains of industry. For the most part many of the women swirling by were attractive, if not outright beautiful.
My gaze went back to the stranger as if in denial of his statement. It almost felt like I was challenging him to do so.
He smiled charmingly then and asked softly, “Didn’t your mother ever tell you that beauty, true beauty, is within?”
My face flushed even hotter at the unexpected compliment. I didn’t know what to say.
Then slowly finding words I said, “I think that is a compliment. Am I correct in assuming that, sir?”
“Of the highest order.” He replied with deeply.
Meeting his gaze and feeling curious, I asked, “What exactly is it you see about them that makes you sign them off?”
“They’re fake. All of them. To a one they are all obsessed with an imaginary setting that doesn’t exist in the real world. The world out there. You on the other hand strike me as one that could handle life with all its ups and downs, even if the wealth of your birth was taken away. The reality that you are so lusciously proportioned in addition to the strength I see in you only makes you all the more tantalizing.”
“You are very forward with your speech, Sir.”
“That I am. I believe in speaking the truth. I tell you honestly of my desire for you. I have no wish to be joined to something fake, a being not fully alive or even being capable of partaking in the life that I live. You on the other hand, well - being inside of you would only be like adding something incredibly precious to my life.”
I slapped him. He saw it coming and did nothing to stop it.
The palm of my hand connected solidly with his broad jawed face with enough force to make my hand go instantly numb. The nerve of the man to speak as if he were already my lover!
The imprint of my hand had no sooner come to life on his deeply tanned cheek, when my own head was snapped sharply to the side. Gasping, I reached up to feel at the burning side of my face.
He’d slapped me!
Tears of pain and outrage spilled from my eyes, but both vanished as I laid my accusing stare upon him. Instantly I stepped back as I saw the evidence of a spirit that was truly savage.
His calm words were at contrast to the fire I saw in his eyes, “I am not your slave to either hit or command. You would do well to remember that my lady.”
Fear bade me to run, but pride made me say, “Only a coward would hit a woman!”
“Oh really and what would a real man do?”
I stumbled at a lack for a handy response.
He waved his hand to the garish party beyond the shadowed veranda, “Behold your cowards. I am not one of them. I am a man and truly I hold nothing against you, for surely the truth must be that you’ve never seen a real man before and thus I know that you do not know how to act correctly around one. I tell you truly that if you are to be my woman you will know submission of spirit, mind and body. I like your spirit, but you need to know your place when it comes to being with me.”
“Know my place! You’re one to speak! Who are you anyway? Do you know who I am?”
“It matters not.” He said with a shrug.
“There you are wrong, Sir! In fact, it matters a great deal. You are nothing to me and I wouldn’t have you if you were the last man on earth! Good night, Sir and please do not ever invite yourself into my presence again as you sir are no gentlemen!”
Tipping a hand to his eyebrow, he dryly responded back with, “Indeed I am not, nor shall I ever be. A gentleman wouldn’t know what to do with you. He’d slobber by permission on only select parts of you deemed permissible to be touched, even as he’d jerk off inside of you in seconds, as you no doubt lay prone and unfulfilled upon the bed waiting for him to fall asleep. No my lady you were crafted and made for so much more. I’d ride you both deeply hard and softly coaxing even as I’d take you in a hundred ways and leave every inch of your skin feeling adored. From your hot mouth, to your pressed together breasts, to your tight sheath, and even tighter ass my cock would travel with abandon even as I would make you scream with pleasure and beg me for more. A body such as yours was built to be possessed by a man, who will fill your belly with life, and create a legacy for generations to come.”
In absolute shock, I stared at the man before me. Never had I heard such words and never did I want to again.
I couldn’t leave the fight though, and sullenly, sounding brattish even to my own ears, I said, “And you think you’re the man to do all those things to me?”
“If I were I can promise you I’d lay the palm of my hand hard to your bare backside to cure you of the disrespectful way of talking to me that you are right now.”
Stepping backward I gained distance from him and quickly circled away to join the relative safety of numbers within the grand room of the estate. He did nothing to stop me, nor did he utter a word as I fled from the scene of easily my greatest embarrassing moment in life.
My ears were still burning with the sound of his words, the things he would do to me if he could. How did God even permit such a man like him to live?
Surely he needed to be removed somehow from society and locked away somewhere. As it was I still felt my heart quaking in fear of him.
I hoped and prayed to God that I would never see the man again in my life.
Adam’s Perspective
I watched her go in full appreciation of all that she was. Indeed, as she strode off in heated passion it was but a resounding expression of the huge impact she had made upon me.
Her name was Lady Lorene Ellsworth and I had told her the truth of what I would do if she were mine. The problem though was that the likelihood of that ever occurring was decidedly slim.
The affluent society of money and royalty on this side of the pond was at odds against a free man of non-royal birth getting what he wanted. And I truly did want her.
I adjusted the raging hard on within my pants as best as I could, but it was a discomfortable feeling at best, because with passion I ached to be buried within the plush wet depths of a woman who would never give me the time of day again to even speak with her.
It was just as well that she had gone. I did not care for the way that her presence seemed to overwhelm my senses and make me care about nothing else but being with her.