"That wasn't very smart." He stood dryly under his porch roof, the corner of his mouth twitching upward. "All you did was make yourself wet."
Rosa blinked to clear the water from her eyes and frowned at him. "I want some venison or duck before I'll leave."
His foot propped up the column and he took another swig. "You come here and eat my food, and what do I get in return?"
He was missing the point entirely. He'd been in France too long, where the mysteries of the bayou held no sway. She quickly sailed through the ten feet between them, up the steps, and stopped inches from his face. "I don't ruin your crops, your plantation, your life."
As she brought the rain to a slowing, misting stop, he didn't blink, nor try to move away from her. She could see there was no fear in his eyes. His gaze dropped to her lips. "No one told me you were so beautiful."
Her other vice, her womanly desires, surfaced with the rapidity of the storm she'd created. It was a painful throb deep inside her, this need to feel a man's body wrapped around her own, an all-encompassing and voracious appetite that she indulged less than she did her need for food. The roasted duck was forgotten, as were his arrogance and overbearing manners. She decided that while Damien had set out no food, he was offering to feed her other ache.
Confident of her charms, she smiled slowly, floating above the porch step, while mosquitoes buzzed around the lamplight. The starkness of his statement caused a sheen of feminine pride to set her skin aglow. She was beautiful, with the exotic look of a Spaniard, and she could have whatever she wanted. She wanted him now.
Rosa laughed deep in her throat, a sensual promise. "Yes, I am."
His answer was to close the inches remaining between them and press his hard lips to hers, the taste of the whiskey droplets on his mouth sinking her into a spiral of pleasure. The wetness of his tongue pushing urgently into her mouth filled her with the masculine tastes of cigar smoke and whiskey, hot passion and urgent need.
Her hands gripped his head as she tasted thoroughly, enjoying his hard grip on her arms, the quick mating of his tongue with hers, his lustful willingness to succumb to sexual attraction. Beyond them on the porch she sensed movement. A small pale woman was clutching her hands to her chest in horror, her brown hair unbound, her white nightgown prim and demure.
She belonged to the delicate French-designed house, with its long louvered windows and sweeping galleries, and its wide front steps leading from the swampy jungle to the civilization of the drawing room. But her delicateness, her fragile bloom, did not belong with this virile man whose appetites were as urgent and questing as Rosa's own.
"Your wife is watching," Rosa whispered in his ear now, sucking gently on the lobe.
"Is she?" He turned, still clutching her, and smiled. "Good evening, Marie. Care to join us?"
When the woman turned with a gasp and ran into the house, he laughed an emotionless laugh. "Poor Marie, she doesn't know how to have fun."
"And you do?"
"I do." He turned back with a ferocity that stole Rosa's breath, pulling her into him and molding her body to the length of his, her wet dress clinging to her small rounded br**sts.
His kisses trailed down her neck to her shoulder, worshipful hot presses that caused her to moan, her body aching with want. As his thumb brushed across her breast, teasing her nipple, she urged him, "Yes. More."
"More," he agreed, lifting her dress past her waist with demanding hands, stroking her thighs possessively. With sure and greedy movements he went to the straps of her sheath dress, pushing them off her shoulders to expose her br**sts. With a groan of his own, he took her into his mouth, sucking and pulling gently with his teeth, cupping her bare, eager flesh with his soft hands.
Working open his pants, she pulled the hot length of him into her hands as her desire swirled and churned inside her, pushing out everything but the need to be possessed by a strong, reckless, mortal man. The storm brewed inside her, hot and tight, her infrequently indulged desires sparking like kindling, and she felt rather than saw that her thoughts had actually ignited the shrubbery on either side of the front steps.
He barely glanced over, murmuring, "The bushes are on fire."
"Shh, I know." She turned the rain back on with a tilt of her head, keeping her greedy hands on him, laboring over the smooth feel of his hard shaft until his panting breath hitched and he forcibly pushed her away.
"No more."
His ragged groan was her triumph, her glory in bringing a man to the edge of his control.
The gentle drops of water spattered across her arms, rolling down to her fingertips, and a fine swirling mist rose around them as she delicately poised herself over him. His back was flush against the solid column for support and he urged her body downward with his hands, spreading her thighs and easing her toward him until she hovered in breathtaking anticipation.
"I would ask you for something." His muscular arms held her hips tightly, keeping her still, his hardness teasing her softness as he denied her.
"What's that?" She let her eyes flutter shut, not caring in the least what he wanted. There was only her need, her rolling, throbbing desires seeking to burst forth out of her in a cascade of gloriously delicious sin.
It wouldn't be difficult to take control, drop herself down onto him and force the hot joining they both wanted, but he was whispering in her ear, distracting her, asking…
Her eyes flew open in surprise. She'd had humans make requests of her, beg for mercy, for more, for release. But this human, this Damien du Bourg, was asking boldly what no one had requested of her before. He looked serious, his eyes filled with lust, yes, but also a cold, calculated determination. She shivered under the onslaught of raindrops, her body just far enough out that the porch roof offered no protection. "How do you know I can give you what you ask for?"
"I know who you are. You can do this." His face shined from the rivulets running down his cheeks, the lamplight reflecting off of his empty joyless face.
She tossed her sodden hair back over her shoulder, pressing her bare br**sts against the softness of his damp linen shirt. It was a foolish request, one he would live to regret, but Rosa thought Damien was deserving of regret. He had a black heart, cold and arrogant, and she was attracted to the idea of him being indebted to her.
This wasn't the normal way of things, but she was young and impulsive. She thought it would be satisfying to see this proud man forced to serve her and the father, as he would have to if she granted him the escape from death he requested.