The Lord’s Inconvenient Vow. Lara Temple

      ‘I am not hurt. Get off me.’

      ‘I’m trying. You must move your leg for me to...’ She reached between his legs to grasp as much of her skirt as possible and gave it a tug.

      This time he groaned, his arms tightening even further, and her supporting arm buckled. She managed to turn her head in time not to slam her chin into his chest once again, but this was worse. Her mouth was just an inch from his neck, she could smell his warmth, a musky scent that made her think of an oasis, green and lush, cool water pouring from a spring. She wanted to taste his skin the way a woman dying of thirst might want to fling herself into that cool water.

      Her fantasy shattered as he heaved, rolling her off him, but his leg was still caught in the skirt of her robe and it remained between her legs, a hard, warm, welcome presence. She clung to his shirt as if she was being dangled over an abyss. He was again a dark shape over her, just his narrowed eyes touched with shards of light.

      ‘I always knew you were trouble.’ The words barely made their way out between his gritted teeth. ‘I just didn’t know how m...’

      The word was stifled as she raised herself on her elbow and pressed her mouth to his. She hadn’t meant to do it, it just happened.

      It wasn’t what she expected. His mouth was smooth and warm like a polished marble statue out in the sun. But it was pliant, it pulsed with life, and she couldn’t help shifting her lips against it, tucking her lower lip into the parting, drawn by the warmth of his breath until she reached the moist inner curve.

      It felt so...perfect.

      She could stay just like that while dynasties rose and fell, her lips defined by the contours of his, his breath replacing hers. She sighed and without thinking her tongue came to explore the parting of his, sending a shock of tingling heat through her body and utterly destroying the lethargic beauty of the moment.

      The whole embrace could not have lasted more than several breaths but it felt like an eternity, until with a sharp tug he all but ripped her skirt from about his leg, shoved himself to his feet and was striding swiftly down the path.

      Sam stood on the veranda that connected Bab el-Nur’s breakfast room to the gardens. The scent of honeysuckle and the first wisps of orange blossom were wrapped around her by the evening breeze that came down from the hills. Beneath it she could smell the Nile, murky and mysterious; could almost feel the dark rush of its waters just a few dozen yards away, night prowlers moving among the reeds.

      She shivered and not because of the breeze or the crocodiles.

      She had not seen Edge for two years and then she hadn’t even liked him—he’d been a thorn in her side ever since she was a child, even if he’d saved her from coming to grief far too many times.

      She didn’t understand how it had all changed. How had Edge shifted in her map of constellations from a large but annoying star to the very centre, a sun warming and tugging all towards it? This rearrangement made no sense at all. Surely the stars would realign?

      She wished more than ever that Lucas and Chase were there. She needed them to tell her it would go away. That this was merely an infatuation like the time Chase became all silly over Signora Bertolli when he was sixteen and wrote her poems and rowed his gondola past her palazzo in the middle of the night until her husband lost patience and threw a statue out the window, sinking the gondola and almost starting a feud between the Bertollis and the Montillios. The dousing cured Chase and a month later he was already enjoying the favours of a far more dashing and very scandalous widow.

      That was what she would do. In a matter of weeks Huxley would be escorting her and her mother back to Venice where she would be introduced to society and meet all the charming Venetian men she’d heard gossip about. She might even meet Lord Byron and make him fall hopelessly in love with her since he seemed to be completely undiscriminating as he went from one Venetian lady to another as if they were sugar-coated castagnoles. That would certainly show Edge she was not a silly child.

      Her defiance flared and faded. She had so looked forward to coming to Egypt for these months. To celebrate becoming a woman here, where she was most herself. Where she was Sam, not Lady Samantha Sinclair.

      Now it was ruined.

      Because of him.

      He must have sensed her malevolent stare because he turned. They had ignored each other all evening, but instead of turning away as he had each time their eyes happened to meet, he squared his shoulders and came outside.

      Her heart made a fool of her again, squashing itself down to the size of a pebble and then bursting in a spray of hot honey. She turned away to stare at the wisteria vines Poppy Carmichael tended with such love. When they flowered fully it was one of the loveliest sights imaginable, but she did not want to be here to see it. She never wanted to come to Qetara again.

      Because of him.

      He looked at her across the mosaic-covered table, his hand spread over the small tiles. He had large but fine-boned hands and now she knew what they felt like on her. It was a strange thought and it made her shiver.

      ‘I wanted to apologise,’ she said, keeping her gaze on the floor. ‘I didn’t mean to...by the statues...that was wrong.’

      ‘Yes.’ The single word was sharp and she flinched. Before she could continue he spoke again, the words rushed and harsh. ‘It was my fault, too. Everyone takes you for granted and treats you like you are a child who can do as you will and I did the same... I mean, Dora is nineteen, but it never occurred to me... I should have known better than to even be alone with you. That was my mistake, but I never imagined...’

      He ran around, looking thoroughly miserable, and she stood rooted, ashamed to the depth of her soul, hating him and hating herself even more. She could think of nothing to say, either to fight back or regain her dignity. She had never been so humiliated in her life and he was not even trying to humiliate her.

      ‘I don’t mean to upset you,’ he said, his voice almost pleading and in such contrast with his usual matter-of-fact approach a small part of her released enough tension to feel a little sorry for him as well. ‘I only want you to understand, for your own sake, that it is time you grow up.’

      What is the point? she thought, holding back from giving the table leg a kick. It was too late.

      ‘I don’t want to grow up. I know I will have no choice, but I don’t want to. Bad things happen when you do, like Lucas and Chase and you going to war or even worse things like my father being a fool and getting himself killed and my mother still mourning him and...’

       And you marrying. You should not.

      ‘What is so wonderful about growing up?’ she demanded as he remained silent. He looked older. Not serious Edge poring over his books and artefacts, but the man she had felt against her.

      ‘It is not meant to be wonderful. It just is. There are things in life you do because you have no choice and you make the best of them. That is growing up.’

      She covered her face with her hands, blocking it out, blocking him out.

      ‘Then I want none of it. I am sorry I offended you, but that does not give you the right to lecture me.’

      ‘You did not...never mind. Whether you want it or not, it has already happened. Your family and upbringing may not be typical among our class, but you are a Sinclair and very wealthy and that means you will be courted by some and regarded with suspicion by others. People will expect the worst of you because they do not know you as we do and if you behave as you did today...’ His voice dropped as he spoke, from smoke to gravel. ‘Whatever you think, I do not wish you to be hurt.’

      She turned away. At least it was dark so he could not see the ruin she was becoming under his words.

      He