She felt trembling, expectant, like anything could happen.

Inevitably Antonia's feet led her toward the summerhouse on the far side of the lake. She'd discovered the building early in her visit when she'd still enjoyed the luxury of long walks.

Twilight deepened into night as she traced the faint path under the trees to the small building glimmering white ahead of her. A bizarre mixture of Egyptian and Greek taste set back from the water and perfectly private.

For a rendezvous, Lord Ranelaw couldn't have chosen better.

Or worse, if one took a moral standpoint.

She smiled faintly. Morality never impinged on Ranelaw's considerations.

When she rounded the side of the building, she glanced across the silent lake. Stars shimmered on the still blackness, turning it into an inverted sky.

"Good evening, Antonia."

She wasn't surprised to look back at the summerhouse and see Lord Ranelaw watching from the shallow flight of steps. His presence seemed part of the enchantment. Or perhaps she was so tired, she drifted in a blur where nothing seemed quite real.

"Lord Ranelaw," she said softly. A breeze across the lake ruffled her loosely arranged hair.

"Nicholas," he said equally softly. He leaned against one of the four Corinthian columns that supported the portico and folded his arms.

"Nicholas." His name signaled a concession they both recognized.

Starlight glimmered on his white shirt-did the man never go decently dressed in coat and neck cloth?-but she discerned few other details. She didn't need to see him. His image was etched on her heart. Handsome, careless, wicked.

Precious.

"I knew you'd come." He sounded calm, sure.

The darkness sharpened senses other than sight. She heard the rustle of the trees, smelled the slight dankness of the lake behind her, felt the evening breeze cool against her skin. Skin flushed with awareness.

"You waited three days."

"I can be patient," he responded steadily.

She bit her lip. Had she expected to see him? Did her presence mean they'd make love? Somewhere she'd already said yes.

"Are you going to run?" he asked in a casual voice, as if consent or refusal were all the same to him. But even in the shadows, she saw he tautened with anticipation.

"I should."

He straightened and prowled down to the bottom step. She knew he waited for her to flee like a frightened bird. Like a woman with an ounce of self-preservation.

He became preternaturally still. His voice was low, coaxing, thick and deep as velvet. "What's it to be, Antonia?"

"Don't bully me, Ranelaw," she said sharply.

"Are you pretending you're just out for an evening walk?"

That's what she'd told herself. Not even she believed it.

She'd left the house, wandered toward the summerhouse, because she knew Ranelaw waited. She admitted that to herself. She wasn't quite ready to admit it to him. "I didn't realize you'd be here."

Her eyes had adjusted enough to see the glint of his teeth as he smiled. "Yes, you did."

What use struggling to preserve her pride? He'd soon know she was helpless to resist him. He knew already.

"Yes, I did," she answered almost soundlessly.

The words lay between them like a challenge.

She poised in breathless suspense for him to sweep her into his arms. Across the several yards separating them, she couldn't mistake his urgency. The silence developed a vibrating quality. Even the breeze dropped in expectation.

Why hadn't he touched her yet? They both knew she wouldn't fight.

He turned his face to the glittering sky then he stared directly at her. Through darkness, that regard burned.

"Why?" The question cut through the night like a blade.

She released a disbelieving gasp of laughter. "I can't believe you're havering. You've schemed to get me on my back since we met."

She heard the scrape of his boots as he shifted. Still without coming closer. "And you've fought with all the determination you could muster."

"Not always," she said with reluctant honesty.

"What you've yielded, you've yielded against better judgment."

"I'm here against better judgment." She clenched her hands in the skirts of the dress she'd chosen because in the recesses of her mind, she'd hoped to meet Ranelaw. A dress that belonged to Antonia Hilliard not Antonia Smith. He'd never know her identity, but tonight he'd make love to her true self.

"I'm sure you are."

Something discomfiting shivered through her. Something that felt like chagrin. "You've changed your mind?"

"No. My mind has always been set on you."

He sounded like he meant it. She wished she could believe him. "At least that's what you'd like me to think," she said resentfully.

"My hunger is real enough."

She stepped closer. "Don't you want to kiss me?" she asked with an edge of desperation. "I'm here. We're alone. There's nobody to stop us."

"You think I'm out of my head."

"Yes."

He laughed softly. "Perhaps I am at that. Why are you here?"

The impulse was to offer some nonsense to content him so he stopped talking and kissed her. Instead she replied with complete sincerity. "It's Cassie."

"Cassie?" She heard curiosity.

She paused, wondering how to make him understand. Wondering why it mattered that he should understand. "She almost died."

"I know." She waited for more, but he remained silent, luring her to spill her secrets. This intimacy was dangerous, but she couldn't summon the will to shatter it.

"Cassie's illness reminded me life is short and I should snatch what I want while I can."

"Does that mean you want me?"

Ah, she saw his strategy. He meant to strip her pride. Or any illusion that she ceded under anyone's auspices but her own.

Defiantly she raised her chin. She sprang from one of the greatest lines in the land. Stretching back to the Dark Ages, the blood of warriors flowed in her veins. Still, for all her bravado, her stomach cramped with nerves. "Yes, I want you."

"At last," he breathed, so softly she scarcely heard.

She stood in tense silence, while he leaped down the last step to stand before her. With a slowness she felt in every beat of her yearning heart, he slid his hand behind her head and tilted her face toward his.

"You're trembling," he said softly.

"Of course I'm trembling. I'm scared to death. But desire is stronger than fear."

The deceptive starlight lent his smile a tenderness she knew not to trust. Even as she consented to become his lover, she wasn't gulled about his essential nature. He was a predator. If she forgot that, she was lost.

"I'm glad."

Any instant now, he'd press that beautiful, passionate mouth to hers and reason would vanish. She gathered the last shreds of sanity. "Before . before we start . "

She stopped and licked her lips with nervousness. Had she been this awkward with Johnny? She didn't think so. She'd been too intoxicated with the vision of sacrificing everything for love.

She wasn't so foolish now.

"Rules, beautiful Antonia?" he murmured, nuzzling her neck and threatening what little common sense she retained. She shivered. It was hard enough keeping two thoughts in her head when he wasn't touching her.

"Y-yes," she said on a husky sigh.

She tried without great conviction to establish some space between them. He'd only held her three times before. Why was his touch more familiar than her own skin?

"Let me guess." He brushed his face against the side of hers. "This must remain a secret."

The glancing touches should feel innocent. Of course they weren't. They readied her for him, made her wet, beguiled her into a state of hazy arousal where she'd let him do whatever he wished. She wasn't far from that state now. But she wasn't yet ready to throw over ten years of circumspection without a safeguard or two.

"Yes."

"Do you trust me to follow your rules?" The question was a whisper across her collarbone and she realized he'd pushed aside her sleeve so he could taste her shoulder. Another of those sensual shivers. Another welling of moisture between her legs. He drove her to the edge of madness. She should have started this conversation when he was ten feet away, not when he touched her and turned her mind to custard.

"I have to trust you," she said grimly even as the needy ache in her sex intensified. "What choice do I have?"

"Poor Joan of Arc, so bravely going to the stake." The hint of laughter shot another jolt of awareness through her.

She bolstered her failing determination. "You'll never use me against Cassie, even if you publish my brazenness to the world."

"What a nasty opinion you have of me, sweet Miss Smith. Do you consider me so manipulative?"

"Yes," she admitted on a sigh as he bit down gently on a nerve in her neck. She rubbed her thighs together to ease the emptiness but the soft friction only built her craving. If she didn't set her conditions quickly, she'd swoon in his arms.

"Wise woman." He kissed the place he'd bitten. "Yet still you're here." He ran his hands up and down her ribs, stopping breathtakingly short of her breasts. Even through clothing, his touch trailed fire.

"I'm not wise." She gathered her thoughts, difficult when her sex was molten with heat and her breasts ached for his hands.

"You have my word this is unrelated to my pursuit of Cassie."

"Thank you," she whispered, but he hadn't finished speaking.

"However, nothing will deflect my interest from Miss Demarest."

She stiffened. Where was her pride? She should march away when he refused to relinquish his pursuit of another woman. Pathetically she'd come too far for will to prevail over hunger. "I won't let you hurt her."

"You'll do your best." His hard tone contrasted with his languorous touch so near her swelling breasts. "Is that everything?"

Was that everything? She dredged elusive thought from the sea of sensual pleasure. "You have to protect me from conceiving a child."

He drew back and his teasing caresses stilled. She felt him studying her through the darkness. "Yes."

"That's all?" Astonishment pierced the mists in her mind. "Just yes?"

"Well, I'll do my best. Nothing is foolproof." His hands tightened on her waist. The air prickled with anticipation. "More conditions? Perhaps you want assurances in writing?"

"This is such a game to you," she said bitterly, gripping his forearms. She didn't deceive herself that this man held to anything as inconvenient as a principle. At this blazing moment, she didn't care.

His voice was ragged as he closed the distance between them. "This stopped being a game a long time ago."

Chapter Twelve.

Ranelaw gripped Antonia's hips hard through the filmy dress and dragged her into his body. The scent of her arousal made his head swim. Ruthlessly he pressed against her belly, letting her feel how he wanted her, how she was in his power and he wasn't letting her go.

She made a muffled protest when he crashed his mouth into hers. Her fingers formed talons on his forearms, digging into his skin through his thin cambric shirt. The sting fed the storm of passion inside him.

Ruthlessly he forced her lips apart, plundered the interior of her mouth with his tongue. Bit and licked and tasted. He treated her like the most experienced courtesan.

A voice inside his head shouted for him to stop. She was an innocent. He should woo, coax, lure. But his hunger attained such a pitch, he, who prided himself on his control, couldn't rein in his desire.

She stood stiff, trembling and unyielding, for all that she claimed to want him. His grip tightened. She'd stepped into this particular lion's den of her own will. If he devoured her, she had only herself to blame.