Whitney jumped at the sound of her name. "Well what?" she questioned, starting to move forward in the hope of peeking around the corner and seeing what Paul and Elizabeth were doing. In this she was instantly thwarted, because Clayton abruptly stood up and strolled toward her, effectively blocking her view of everything but his chest and shoulders. "Well what?" Whitney repeated, automatically stepping back in an effort to widen the space between them. Before she realized what was happening, she had backed into the shadowy stone wall of the house.

"Now that I've brought you out here," Clayton began conversationally, "what do you want me to do next?"

"Next?" Whitney repeated cautiously.

"Yes, next. I want to be certain I understand my part in this little game we're playing. I imagine I'm supposed to kiss you, in order to make Sevarin jealous, is that it?"

"I wouldn't let you touch me to save me from drowning!" Whitney retorted, too angry to be humiliated.

Ignoring that completely, he said thoughtfully, "I don't mind playing my part, but I can't help wondering if I'm going to enjoy it. Am I going to kiss an amateur, or have you been missed often enough to know how it's supposed to be done? How may times have you been kissed?"

"I'll wager you live in constant terror of being mistaken for 4 gentleman!" she snapped to cover her growing alarm. His hands locked on her arms and he began drawing her toward his chest. Giving up her futile struggle, she glared murderously at the laughter glinting in his eyes, "Take your hands off me!"

"Are the times you've been kissed too numerous to count? Or were they all so meaningless that you can't recall them?"

Whitney thought she was going to explode. "I have been kissed often enough not to require lessons from the likes of you, if that's what you have in mind!" '

He chuckled as his arms encircled her rigid body. "So you've been kissed that often, have you, little one?"

Whitney stared at his chest, refusing to look up at him. Screaming was out of the question; her reputation would be destroyed if anyone saw her in such a compromising situation. She could not, could not believe this was actually happening to her. Torn between the urge to burst into tears, or hit him, she said as calmly as possible, "If you are quite through trying to frighten and humiliate me, please let me go."

"Not until I discover how much you've learned from all your 'experience,'" he whispered.

Whitney snapped her head up, intending to launch into a tirade, only to have her words smothered by his mouth. She froze at the initial shock of the contact, then forced herself to be perfectly still beneath the pressure of his lips. Although she had little experience in kissing, she had considerable experience in avoiding it, and she knew that by neither struggling nor responding, a woman could reduce an over-ardent mate to a state of apologetic chagrin.

When Clayton finally drew back, however, he looked neither chagrined nor apologetic. Instead he regarded her with an infuriating grin. "Either you had very poor teachers, my lady, or you are sorely in need of more lessons."

His arms loosened, and Whitney stepped back. Pivoting on her heel, she vengefully fired a parting remark over her shoulder, "At least my lessons weren't learned in a brothel!"

It happened so quickly, there was no time to react. A hand like a vice shot out and seized her wrist, spinning her around back into the shadows, and jerking her into his arms. "I think," he enunciated in an awful voice, "that your problem is purely a matter of inexperienced teachers."

His mouth crushed down on hers, mercilessly bruising her lips, forcing them to part from sheer, cruel pressure and when they did, his tongue plunged into her mouth, ravaging its softness.

Whitney writhed futilely in his iron embrace while tears of impotent rage raced down her cheeks. The more she struggled, the more insolent and punishing his mouth became, until she finally grew still, defeated and trembling in his arms. The moment she stopped fighting, he lifted his head and cradled her face between his two hands. Gazing into her stormy, tear-brightened eyes, he said quietly, "That was your first lesson, little one. Never, ever play games with me. I've played them all before, and you can't win. This is the second lesson," he murmured as his mouth descended toward hers.

Whitney drew a sharp breath and started to scream, but his mouth throttled the scream to an hysterical whimper, and so gently this time that she was stunned into silent quiescence. His hand curved around her nape, his fingers stroking and soothing, while the other drifted over her back in a slow, restless caress, moving her closer to his length. And all the while, his lips were moving on hers with fierce tenderness, shaping and fitting their soft curves to his own.

He touched his tongue to her lips, coaxing them to part, and when they did, his tongue slid gently between them, sending wild jolts through Whitney's body. She reached her arms around his neck, clinging to him for support. His arm tightened protectively around her, and his tongue fully invaded the soft recesses of her mouth, tasting and exploring, filling her, until her whole body was a rioting mass of dizzying sensations.

He deepened the kiss, and his hand moved from her back to her midriff, sliding upward to her breast, boldly cupping its soft, enticing fullness.

Outrage at that intimate fondling banished every other emotion in a blinding flash of fury. With a strength she didn't know she possessed, Whitney tore free, flinging his arms furiously away. "How dare you!" she hissed at the same time that she lifted her hand and slapped him as hard as she could.

In utter disbelief, Whitney watched a slow, satisfied grin sweep across his face. So incensed that she could scarcely draw enough air to speak, she said, "If you ever, ever touch me again, I'll kill you!"

Her threat only seemed to please him more, and there was no mistaking the silent chuckle that preceded his next words. "That won't be necessary, my lady. I already have the answer I sought."

"Answers!" Whitney gasped. "If I were a man, I'd give you an answer at the point of a pistol."

"If you were a man, you'd have no reason to."

Whitney stood there, shaking with thwarted outrage, yearning to do or say something that would penetrate his cool, imperturbable exterior. The tears filling her eyes were tears of fury, but the moment he saw them he was contrite. "Dry your eyes, little one, and I'll return you to your friends inside." So saying, he produced a white handkerchief and held it toward her. Whitney thought she would splinter apart from the turbulence of her hatred and animosity. She snatched the handkerchief from his hand and flung it to the ground, spinning on her heel with every intention of stalking into the ballroom alone.

"Excuse us," Paul said with a curt nod as he escorted Elizabeth past them, toward the doors into the ballroom.

"How long has Paul been there?" Whitney demanded wrathfully, facing Clayton with her fists clenched. "You vile, contemptible . . . you did all that deliberately, for his benefit, didn't you? So that he would see it. You wanted him to see it!"

"I did it deliberately, for my benefit," Clayton corrected her blandly, placing his hand under Whitney's elbow and guiding her toward the French doors

They stepped into the safety of the brightly lit house, and Whitney jerked her arm away, her voice a furious whisper. "You must be Satan's own son!"

"My father would have been disappointed to think so," Clayton replied with an infuriating chuckle.

"Your father?" Whitney scoffed, stepping away from him. "If you think your mother even knew his name, you deceive yourself!"

There was a moment of stunned silence white it registered on Clayton that he had just been called a bastard, followed by a shout of laughter as her ladylike slur on his legitimacy sank in. He was still grinning as he strolled along in her indignant wake, admiring the sway of her slender hips.