The Seduction of Miss Amelia Bell by Paula Quinn

his breath from falling short.
    “Ye robbed these good people of at least a se’nnight of gossip.” Her voice was a light,
     teasing caress that made him doubt it was her beauty alone that provoked his thoughts
     of kissing her senseless.
    “How thoughtless of me,” he said and crooked his arm, offering it to her. When she
     accepted, looping her arm through his, he cut her a smirk that twinkled in her eyes
     and escorted her to the opposite end of the hall, away from the table.
    “I really must apologize for what I said earlier,” she told him while they walked.
    “So there have been men more comely than me in yer dreams then?”
    She glanced up at him and her smile was made all the more stunning by its lack of
     guile. “Well, I do sleep quite frequently.”
    “And in odd places,” Edmund agreed, surprised at the ease with which she spoke with
     him, smiled at him. There was nothing coy or calculating about her, and Edmund found
     himself wanting to trace his fingers, his mouth, over the soft blush that spread across
     her cheeks. Once he took her prisoner she wouldn’t want to kiss him, and he wasn’t
     the kind of man who forced himself on a lass. If he was going to taste the sweet honeyed
     nectar of her lips, it would have to be tonight.
    “I’m terribly sorry for being asleep during yer arrival.” Her blush passed as quickly
     as her repentance. “I barely had a chance to shut my eyes since meeting ye in the
     garden this morn.”
    “Ye’re not sleepy now, are ye?”
    “Nae.” She giggled. “Why?”
    “Because I intend to spend the night dancing with ye.”
    She cut him a look from beneath the sooty sweep of her lashes. “That would be lovely
     but my card is already full. ’Tis my mother’s doing. A ruse to make the other hens
     believe I am sorely desired.”
    She didn’t need a ruse, Edmund thought to himself when she leaned a bit closer into
     his side and tilted her lips to his ear. He bent his head to hear her. “In truth,
     I was hoping to steal a moment alone with ye to discuss our early meeting, and then
     there ye were, and here we are now. I would call that a fortunate thing, wouldn’t
     ye?”
    “I would.” His gaze moved over the beguiling curves of her profile.
    “What I wanted to ask ye was not to mention finding me in the arcade to my parents.
     It would vex my mother terribly to know that I was”—she paused, and veiled her gaze
     from his—“wandering about the garden at such an ungodly hour.”
    Edmund was surprised to find that he was curious about what she had been doing there.
     He didn’t ask though. It wasn’t pertinent to his cause, so why bother wasting thought
     on it? In the morning she would hate him for taking her from everyone she loved, including
     her betrothed. Tonight, he intended on winning her favor and perhaps something more.
     After they had her, he wouldn’t have to speak with her again.
    “Why do ye sleep in the garden when ye know yer mother disapproves?” He crooked his
     mouth at her. “Are ye rebellious then, Miss Bell?”
    “Not particularly, my lord,” she answered. “I simply don’t agree with her reasons
     why I shouldn’t.”
    Edmund smiled at the limp lock of glossy chestnut hair dangling off her shoulder,
     reminding him of Selkirk’s comical expression when he saw his daughter asleep in the
     soup.
    She cast him a worried look and he winked at her to let her know he saw nothing wrong
     with her way of thinking.
    “So ye will say nothing?”
    “Upon pain of death, ye have my word.”
    She gifted him with a grateful grin and then turned to leave him almost before he
     could stop her. She paused and turned back to him.
    “Did a troubadour truly mention me in song?”
    He gazed down at her and thought how many ways his uncle Finn could describe her.
     “He did.”
    “And what did he say?”
    If anything else were at stake besides everything he believed in and loved, he would
     have had a hard time keeping his hands off