An Outrageous Proposal. Maureen Child

he was. Most definitely. Being here with her in the fire-lit shadows while rain pattered at the windows was, he thought, more than tempting. There was an intimacy here, two people who had shared a hellishly long day together. Now, in the quiet shadows, there was something new and … compelling rising up between them.

      He knew she felt it, too, despite the wary gleam in her eyes as she watched him. Still, he wanted her breathless, not guarded, so he eased back and gave her a half smile. “I’m only saying you’re a beautiful woman, Georgia.”

      “Hmm …” She tipped her head to one side, studying him.

      “Surely it’s not the first time you’ve heard that from a man.”

      “Oh, no,” she answered. “Men actually chase me down the street to tell me I have twilight eyes.”

      He grinned. He did appreciate a quick wit. “Maybe I’m just more observant than most men.”

      “And maybe you’re up to something,” she said thoughtfully. “What is it, Sean?”

      “Not a thing,” he said, all innocence.

      “Well, that’s good.” She nodded and reached down absently to rub at the arch of her foot. “I mean, we both know anything else would just be … complicated.”

      “Aye, it would at that,” he agreed, and admitted silently that complicated might be worth it. “Your feet hurt?”

      “What?” She glanced down to where her hand rubbed the arch of her right foot and smiled ruefully. “Yeah, they do.”

      “A long day of standing, wasn’t it?”

      “It was.”

      She sipped at her champagne and a log shifted in the fire. As the flames hissed and spat, she closed her eyes—a little dreamily, he thought, and he felt that fist inside him tighten even further. The woman was unknowingly seducing him.

      Logic and a stern warning sounded out in his mind, and he firmly shut them down. There was a time for a cool head, and there was a time for finding out just where the road you found yourself on would end up. So far, he liked this particular road very much.

      He set his glass on the table in front of them, then sat back and dragged her feet onto his lap. Georgia looked at him and he gave her a quick grin. “I’m offering a one-night-only special. A foot rub.”

      “Sean …”

      He knew what she was thinking because his own mind was running along the same paths. Back up—or, stay the course and see what happened. As she tried to draw her feet away, he held them still in his lap and pushed his thumbs into her arch.

      She groaned and let her head fall back and he knew he had her.

      “Oh, that feels too good,” she whispered, as he continued to rub and stroke her skin.

      “Just enjoy it for a bit then,” he murmured.

      That had her lifting her head to look at him with the wariness back, glinting in those twilight depths. “What’re you up to?”

      “Your ankles,” he said, sliding his hands higher to match his words. “Give me a minute, though, and ask again.”

      She laughed as he’d meant her to, and the wariness edged off a bit.

      “So,” she asked a moment later, “why do I rate a foot rub tonight?”

      “I’m feeling generous, just becoming an uncle and all.” He paused, and let that settle. Of course, he and Ronan weren’t actually brothers, but they might as well have been. “Not really an uncle, but that’s how it feels.”

      “You’re an uncle,” she told him. “You and Ronan are every bit as tight as Laura and I are.”

      “True,” he murmured, and rubbed his thumb into the arches of her small, narrow feet. Her toes were painted a dark pink, and he smiled at the silver toe ring she wore on her left foot.

      She sighed heavily and whispered, “Oh, my … you’ve got great hands.”

      “So I’ve been told,” he said on a laugh. He slid his great hands a bit higher, stroking her ankles and then up along the line of her calves. Her skin was soft, smooth and warm, now that the fire had chased away the chill of the afternoon.

      “Maybe it’s the champagne talking,” she said softly, “but what you’re doing feels way too good.”

      “’Tisn’t the champagne,” he told her, meeting her eyes when she looked at him. “We’ve not had enough yet to blur the lines between us.”

      “Then it’s the fire,” she whispered, “and the rain outside sealing us into this pretty room together.”

      “Could be,” he allowed, sliding his hands even higher now, stroking the backs of her knees and watching her eyes close as she sighed. “And it could just be that you’re a lovely thing, here in the firelight, and I’m overcome.”

      She snorted and he grinned in response.

      “Oh, yes, overcome,” she said, staring into his eyes again, as if trying to see the plans he had, the plans he might come up with. “Sean Connolly, you’re a man who always knows what he’s doing. So answer me this. Are you trying to seduce me?”

      “Ah, the shoe is on the other foot entirely, Georgia,” he murmured, his fingertips moving higher still, up her thighs, inch by inch. He hadn’t thought of it earlier, but now he was grateful she’d been wearing a skirt for their mad ride to the hospital. Made things so much simpler.

      “Right,” she said. “I’m seducing you? You’re the one giving out foot rubs that have now escalated—” her breath caught briefly before she released it on a sigh “—to thigh rubs.”

      “And do you like it?”

      “I’d be a fool not to,” she admitted, and he liked her even more for her straightforwardness.

      “Well then …”

      “But the question remains,” she said, reaching down to capture one of his hands in hers, stilling his caresses. “If you’re seducing me, I have to ask, why now? We’ve known each other for so long, Sean, and we’ve never—”

      “True enough,” he murmured, “but this is the first time we’ve been alone, isn’t it?” He set her hand aside and continued to stroke the outsides of her thighs before slowly edging around to the inside.

      She squirmed, and he went hard as stone.

      “Think of it, Georgia,” he continued, though his voice was strained and it felt as though there were a rock lodged in his throat. “‘Tis just us here for the night. No Ronan, no Laura, no Patsy, running in and out with her tea trays. Even the dogs are in the kitchen sleeping.”

      Georgia laughed a little. “You’re right. I don’t think I’ve ever been in this house alone before. But …”

      “No buts,” he interrupted, then leaned out and picked up the champagne bottle. Refilling her glass and then his own, he set the bottle down again and lifted his glass with one hand while keeping her feet trapped in his lap with the other. “I think we need more of this, then we’ll … talk about this some more.”

      “After enough champagne, we won’t want to talk at all,” she said, though she sipped at the wine anyway.

      “And isn’t that a lovely thought?” he asked, giving her a wink as he drained his glass.

      She was watching him, and her eyes were filled with the same heat that burned inside him. For the life of him, Sean couldn’t figure out how he’d managed to keep his hands off of her for the past year or more. Right now, the desire leaping inside him had him hard and eager for the taste of her. The feel of her beneath his hands. He wanted to hear her sigh, hear her call his name as she erupted beneath him. Wanted to bury himself inside her heat and