Excerpt of Temptations of a Duke's Daughter by Samantha Holt

“Valentine,” she tried again, jabbing her finger against a firm chest.

An eye cracked open but she did not think he recognised her. He closed it again with a muttered “no.”

“You cannot stay here. You shall catch a cold.”

“It’s summer,” he murmured.

“Even deep in your cups you will still argue with me.”

Both eyes opened and he stared at her for several moments. She had seen drunken men before—her late-husband mostly—but he never looked like this.

Even with the limits of the candlelight, his eyes were two dark pools of pain, as though he had been drinking to escape something awful. She had not thought Valentine to be much of a drinker so what had happened to make him imbibe so much?

“Chastity.” His voice was thick and gritty.

“Yes.”

“Chastity. Duke’s Daughter.” He lifted his chin. “All wrong.”

Did he mean she was all wrong? Or that this situation was? She shook her head. Analysing his drunken ramblings was pointless.

“We need to get you to bed.”

“No. I’ll stay here.”

“You must go to bed,” she insisted.

“It is no less than I deserve.”

“You are a quite the brute at times, it is true, but even I do not wish you death from sleeping on a cold floor.”

He snorted, lifted a hand, and let it drop, slapping the wood hard. “Cold floor is good enough for me.”

“Good Lord, I am not certain why are determined to flagellate yourself, but I am not going to waste any more time listening to such nonsense.”

Valentine smirked. “I like a commanding woman.”

“Good. Now I command you to stand and go to bed.”

With a heavy, overly dramatic sigh, he dragged himself up from the floor and she dropped the candleholder onto a console table to rush to his side as he flopped against the wall. He looped a heavy arm around her shoulder, and she pressed a hand to his back and chest to navigate him toward his bedroom in the dark.

She resisted the urge to mutter about how heavy he was or think on the muscles currently flexing beneath her fingers. Once she successfully dumped him on the bed, she lifted his legs on top of the blankets, lit a candle, and debated his sprawled form.

“Too many clothes.” He tugged his shirt, and she heard a button ping across the room and clatter to the floor.

“Really?” She rubbed both hands over her face and eyed his struggle. “I am not removing your trousers though.”

With difficulty, she fought to remove his shirt after carefully setting aside his cufflinks. She tore the fabric from beneath him and cast her gaze up to the ceiling as he set a hand behind his head and the other upon his bare chest. His open collars revealed the slight tuft of dark hair but seeing the dark, wiry hair over hard muscles and ridges made her throat tighten. She needed to go. This was too intimate.

He took her wrist before she could escape. “Stay.”