From award winning author Katharine
Ashe, comes an enchanting Christmas novella about a shy but imaginative
princess and the rakish Earl who could make all her wildest fantasies come true….
The Christmas season has never been so steamy.
Handsome as sin and scandalously rakish, Cam Westfall, the Earl of Bedwyr is
every young lady's wickedest dream. Shy wallflower Princess Jacqueline Sensaire
knows this better than anyone, because her dreams are full of the breathtaking
earl's kisses. And not only her dreams--her diary too.
But when Cam discovers the maiden's not-so-maidenly diary, will her wildest
Christmas wishes be fulfilled in its pages . . . or in his arms?
Excerpt from KISSES, SHE WROTE, A Christmas Romance by Katharine
Ashe
“At least you won’t be at a significant
disadvantage when you wed,” the princess said thoughtfully.
“Disadvantage?”
“There is . . .” Her voice trailed off. She
looked out the window and tilted her head. Her stance was relaxed. This
conversation did not, apparently, agitate her as it did him.
“Princess?”
“The thing is, I have never kissed a man,” she
said and looked over her shoulder at him. “Will my husband be disappointed to
discover that I have no knowledge of kissing?”
Cam’s throat had gone entirely dry. If she had
no actual knowledge of kissing, she certainly had excellent intuition.
“Why do you ask me?”
“I cannot very well ask my brother. How
horridly embarrassing that should be.” She scowled but her eyes twinkled.
“You might ask your ladies in waiting, or the
Duchess of Lycombe.”
“How would they know the answer? They are
women.”
He was nonplused. “Well . . .”
She turned to him fully. “You and I are friends,
so I trust you will answer me honestly. I know you have considerable experience
kissing women.”
His cravat had shrunk again. “Do you?”
She lifted a single, eloquent brow. She was
far too intelligent for him, and far too forthright, and he was far too
accustomed to consorting with females of much less acute minds and much baser
characters. She was not now flirting with him but making a statement of fact.
He nodded in silent admission.
Both brows perked now, like the shimmering
feathers of a raven. “So . . . ?”
“I should think that your husband would be
delighted to teach you the finer points of kissing.” And learn a thing or two
in the process.
“I suppose you may be correct about that. Men
like to instruct women. I think it makes them feel more in control.”
He could not hide his amusement. “You don’t
say?”
“Well, doesn’t it? You are a man.”
“Good of you to notice.”
“Do you like it when you feel in control of a
woman?”
“I like it when a woman feels she is getting
what she wants from me.”
Her fine, expressive eyes widened. Then,
slowly, she turned to the pianoforte and began rearranging the music on the
stand. Cam studied the clean sweep of her back to her gently curved hips and
the straight set of her shoulders. She was not petite, not enticingly round,
not anything he had ever desired in a woman. But merely looking at her back and
knowing what she imagined of him — of
them together — made his heartbeats
hard.
“I should like to give it a try before I
marry,” she said without turning around. Her voice was pitched a bit low.
“Kissing, that is.” She glanced at him. Her cheeks were ever so slightly pink.
“Should you?” He suspected where this was
going. He’d been the object of countless women’s flirtations. But never this
woman. She confined her attentions to him safely in her diary.
This was a different woman before him now.
“Yes,” she said. “I think it would be a useful
experience to take into marriage. Don’t you?” She turned her hungry gaze upon
him . . .
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