A Winter's Knight: A Regency Romance Read Online Free PDF

perhaps?” She looked at him for support, as well as because she was simply happy to see him again.
    “Perhaps,” Tony said in a teasing voice.
    She smiled at his tone. “I bet you I can.”
    “I didn’t take you for a gambler, Miss Hartridge,” Tony goaded her. “What do you offer as forfeit, if you lose?”
    “What do you suggest?”
    “How about a kiss?” he proposed, looking at her with his ice blue eyes. The words came to him almost without thinking, but he found himself hoping that she would accept the wager…and lose.
    Phoebe inhaled, startled by the suggestion, but also delighted by it. “Very well.” Her heart suddenly pounding, she turned back to the table and lined up her shot. She was utterly distracted by the idea of kissing her knight in shining armor, though, and the stick wobbled. The cue ball missed its target entirely, and dropped into the hole itself. “Oh, dear,” Phoebe murmured.
    “That may be two kisses,” Tony noted clinically. “It’s very bad to lose the cue ball.”
    Phoebe put the stick down and turned to face Tony. “I guess that’s the danger of gambling. I am ready to pay up, sir.”
    “I was only teasing, Phoebe. You don’t have to,” he said very quietly, searching her face for a clue to her feelings. He hadn’t forgotten what he looked like. It had been a mistake to bring the idea up.
    “But I…I want to.” Phoebe whispered. “Fair’s fair.”
    “If you’re sure.”
    “Quite sure.” Phoebe tilted her head up, and rose on her tiptoes, shaking slightly on her weak leg. Tony felt her tremble, but mistook it for fear. “Phoebe,” he said. “I shouldn’t have…” but then her lips touched his, and he couldn’t speak anymore.
    He thought she might taste like honey. He never thought she’d taste like heaven. His arms went around her, steadying her as he returned her tentative kiss with his own.
    Phoebe felt the thrill of it arc down her body to her toes. Then, in a single motion, Tony put his hands on her waist, picked her up, and set her on the billiard table, bringing her head level to his. Seated firmly on the table, Phoebe no longer shook, so she brought her hands up to his shoulders, clinging to him as he kissed her.
    Tony felt her holding him, and he couldn’t believe how good it felt. Her hands touched his shoulders, his neck, and then his face. Phoebe had taken absolute control of the kiss, holding him to her, instinctively caressing with her thumbs even as her fingers kneaded gently into his hair. He realized belatedly that she was touching his scar. That thought was just jarring enough that he pulled away. “Phoebe, we should stop.”
    “Yes,” she agreed, her eyes heavy with a newfound emotion. Then she smiled impishly. “But only because I think I’m sitting on a billiard ball.”
    Tony laughed out loud. He couldn’t help it. “Oh, darling,” he said. He lifted her up again, as if she weighed nothing more than a leaf, and reached to the table to sweep all the offending game pieces away from his angel. The billiard balls rolled, clicking as they went. He set her down on the table again, unwilling to step away.
    “Was that one kiss?” Phoebe asked. “Because I think I owe you another.” She reached for him again, this time circling his waist with her arms, drawing him close to her, into the space where her knees had parted. Tony leaned against the edge of the table, unsure where this was going.
    “Tony?” Phoebe asked, a question in her eyes.
    “Yes?”
    “Do you want another kiss?” There was an unaccountable vulnerability there. Did she not know how desirable she was?
    Tony answered her by lowering his mouth to hers, by wrapping one hand around the back of her head, feeling the silky hair that had fallen free in their last kiss. Phoebe breathed in slowly, savoring every touch.
    The two clung to each other, each suddenly free to explore the other as they had only in their dreams. The kiss fractured into many, with Tony laying