Sunday Smooch: Anna Campbell's WHAT A DUKE DARES

Welcome to another LoveCats DownUnder Sunday Smooch!

Today we have a smooch from  Anna Campbell but first 


... the two winner of last week's Sunday Smooch Giveaway is Christina R!


Can you please contact Annie West on annie (at) annie-west  (dot) com to receive your book giveaway! 


And now for today's Sunday Smooch from WHAT A DUKE DARES

A reputation at risk!
What woman in her right mind would say no to marrying the dashing Duke of Sedgemoor? Miss Penelope Thorne, that's who. She's known Camden Rothermere since they were children - and she also knows she'd bring nothing but scandal to his name.

Cam can hardly believe Penelope turned down his proposal. But if she wants to run off to the Continent and set the rumor mill ablaze, he can't stop her. Then her brother's dying request sends him to bring home the one woman he thought he'd finally gotten over.

The only way they'll both get back to London without their reputations in tatters is to pretend they're married during the journey. That means kissing like they mean it and even sharing a bed - until it becomes hard to tell where the game ends and true desire begins...

Scene set-up

Camden Rothermere, Duke of Sedgemoor, is escorting his childhood friend Penelope Thorne back from Italy where she’s been stranded after the death of her aunt. Gossip about Pen’s wild behavior on the Continent has entertained London society for years. If they’re discovered travelling together, there will be a massive scandal and a shotgun wedding which both want to avoid: Cam because he plans a glittering society marriage with a woman of spotless reputation, and Pen because she’s always loved Cam, but long ago recognized that he’ll never love her back. The final leg of the journey takes place on Cam’s yacht The Windhover. The kiss occurs in Penelope’s cabin during a violent storm just off the English coast.

Smooch  -

As the ship plunged like a wild thing, Cam’s mouth ravaged hers. Astonishment held Pen captive as a fierce mixture of sensations struck her harder than the waves against the hull.

Since she was a girl, she’d imagined Cam’s kisses. The reality was earthier, more intimate, more passionate, more…exciting than anything she’d conjured in fantasy, no matter how lurid. His mouth was hot and commanding. His hands were ruthless and inescapable. The storm beat around her until she wasn’t sure whether the chaos was outside or within her.

Pen was no longer the nineteen-year-old innocent who had turned down his proposal. She knew how a man behaved toward a woman he respected. In Cam’s kisses, there was neither caution nor care.

Some distant corner of her mind urged her to protest. He treated her the way he’d treat a strumpet from the docks. But how could she demur when she basked in endless heat? All her life, she’d felt so cold, so cold.

His tongue plunged between her lips, demanding a response. Helpless to resist, bewildered and giddy with arousal, she gave it to him. Her senses flooded with his rich flavor, his salty scent of storm and ocean and clean male sweat.

She moaned and arched into his damp clothes, frantically seeking the searing heat beneath. She’d set him alight and the flames of his desire lashed her. The breath scraped from her throat and she closed her eyes, reveling in incandescent sensation. Never had she felt like this.

Still his mouth explored hers as if he claimed a private kingdom. She could hardly breathe, sinking into untamed delight. She clung to his shoulders as her knees threatened to collapse. He was shaking, too. If he wasn’t braced so firmly against the window frame, they’d tumble to the floor.

Still he wasn’t tender. She was past caring. She’d permit him anything, as long as he kept kissing her, touching her, panting his appreciation into her neck. She burned to touch him. Return this bliss. Conquer him in turn.

“Damn it, Pen,” he groaned into her bare shoulder and nipped her sharply.
Shock sizzled through her with the sting.  His savagery appalled her, scared her, but spiked her excitement to a level where she threatened to combust. She tugged at his shirt until her lips skimmed hard pectorals, kissed the mat of soft hair.

With a stagger, he swung her from the window. Away from the embrasure, the ship’s pitching was dizzying. Or perhaps Pen was dizzy with passion. Cam tumbled her toward the luxurious bed where she’d slept alone for two weeks, tormented to know he lay just across the corridor.

Breathless with excitement, she toppled back onto the mattress. Then she was doubly breathless when Cam flung himself on top of her. His weight was unfamiliar, thrilling. The boat’s tossing rolled them together so they wrestled like puppies. Inside her, a great emptiness yearned. She grabbed his shirt and ripped it off, desperate to feel his bare skin. She was as fierce as he was. Even now when it was clear that he was mad for her, she still feared that this glory might end before she’d drunk it to the dregs.

Question:

Pen has had a crush on Cam since she was a little girl (a crush that ripens into a really excruciating case of unrequited love as she grows up). Who, real or fictional, was your first crush?

 

Come back next Sunday, when the winner of today's giveaway will be announced and a smooch from Jaquie Underdown will be posted!

Smooch Graphic by WebWeaver