“Who?”

“Grace O’Malley,” she admitted, letting her lace-clad fingers drop from the wheel. “The Pirate Queen.”

At that Barrons stepped to the side, twisting to rest his hips against the console so he could see her properly. A sudden smile lit his entire face. “You wanted to be Grace, didn’t you?”

“My brother Stephen and I played pirates.” Even she couldn’t stop herself from smiling at such remembrance—and the very incongruity of the thought. Who would ever suspect it of the very proper Duchess of Casavian?

“What did you like about her?”

“She was brave. Fearless. Willing to defy Queen Elizabeth herself. And, of course, she had red hair like me. Stephen was always Edward Teach. He preferred the villain. We would run about the hills at Eton Grange during the summer, with real swords. Father allowed it as it helped teach us both swordplay.” She opened herself up just a little to him. “What did you play at?”

His dark eyes sobered, his arms crossing over his chest. “I had no brothers or sisters. My only companion was my weapons master.” A slight pause. “Master Baldock was a former Falcon who did not consider play a very useful means of development.”

Mina’s smile faded as she examined him. “There were no other children your age?”

“Only one. The daughter of an inventor the Duke of Caine gave patronage to. I used to put mechanical spiders in her bed. Honoria despised me.”

“You sound like my cousin Peter.”

“Careful,” he warned. “I knew Peter. We were of an age at Eton. That’s hardly a compliment.”

“Was I seeking to turn you up fancy?” she replied, shrugging her shoulder a little flirtatiously.

The light in his eyes flared with interest and Mina stilled. What are you doing? She turned away, focusing on the console again. It was too easy to forget herself around him.

“Do you know what I like about flying?” he asked.

“What?”

“There are no boundaries. No England, no France, no Russia… Simply wondrous places, the likes of which you’ve never seen before. I never realized how much I was missing out on, until the mission to Saint Petersburg.”

Mina’s breath caught. “What was it like?”

“Cold.” He gave a swift laugh. “Very cold at first. We were still bundled in furs into March, and the dirigible struggled with the temperature. Ice kept forming on the propellers, but it was wonderful. A modern-day Venice, they call Saint Petersburg. Full of palaces the likes of which you can barely imagine, akin to the magnificence of Versailles. And gold-domed monasteries. Their Orthodox Church has not rescinded their blue bloods. Perhaps it dares not. The blue bloods rule completely. It’s the most dangerous place I’ve ever been.”

Her mind took her to the places he spoke of. Ancient monasteries…palaces…a city of canals. Something stirred in her breast, an unmerciful itch.

“Have you ever traveled abroad?” he asked.

“There was no time for my Grand Tour. My father died when I was seventeen, and that put an end to that.” It put an end to a lot of things, actually.

He eyed her, that mischievous gleam making her heart tick faster. “I should take you to Paris. We’ll fly there on one of Galloway’s dirigibles and tour Versailles, or what’s left of it, or sip champagne from your shoe.”

She’d never imagined this playful side to him. “You’re forgetting that France is full of humanists. And why would I go to Paris with you?”

Barrons’s eyes practically smoldered. He stepped closer, the backs of his fingers brushing against her hip. “To make love on a bed smothered in rose petals while we drink champagne and argue immeasurably, and I strip all of these skirts and petticoats off you.”

“You’re a romantic,” she accused, unable to believe it herself.

“I could fuck you here and now,” he whispered, stepping closer again until she was looking up at him, all of the words fleeing her startled mind. His hand grew bolder, sliding up her corseted hip, his thumb brushing against the fullness of her breast. “But I think you need a little romance in your life, Mina. A little adventure. And God knows, I do.”

Leaning closer, his mouth brushed against her forehead, his lips smooth and cool against her skin. Mina shut her eyes, her hand curling around the wheel as if to hold herself upright against the sway of his magnetism. His mouth traced her cheek, breath whispering into her ear: “I want to make love to you on silk sheets. To melt all that ice and find out if underneath all of this silky-smooth skin beats a heart of pure fire, like I suspect it does.”

His thumb brushed back and forth, teasing at her nipple. Mina whimpered, backed against the console. His hand slid lower, a knowing caress against the silk covering her abdomen. “You liked what I did to you last night.”

Fingers cupped her between the thighs, rubbing gently, her skirts tangled between them. “I’ve made no secret of the fact that I want to be your lover. All you have to do is say yes. I’m certain if I write a reasonable check, Master Galloway can outfit the Lionheart by the end of the day. I’ll even let you fly it, if you want…”

The words were temptation indeed. Mina stared at him helplessly. “I can’t,” she whispered, the debt of her responsibilities sinking like lead through her chest.

He mistook her denial for a challenge, and a kiss scalded the smooth skin below her ear. He painted delicate butterfly caresses on her cheeks as he bunched the material between her legs, his fingers working a delicious friction as he sought to seduce her to his cause.

Clinging to his waistcoat, she shot a glance around the workshop. Galloway’s group was still exploring the Gilded Falcon, like a flock of well-dressed penguins. “Barrons!”

“Part your legs.”

She shook her head, then gasped as his fingers increased their mastery. Her hand gripped his wrist.

“Nobody can see. It’s just you and me here.” The devilish light in his eyes dared her. “Come to Paris,” he whispered and she bit her lip as her entire body trembled. “Come and make love with me in a bourgeois hotel tucked in some hidden alley. Come, Mina.”

If anyone glanced up and saw them… Everything inside her tightened at the thought. A new flush of urgency lit through her veins like white fire. She lost her mind. All she wanted was to tear at the intervening layers of fabric between them, to rake her nails down his bare flesh. To fill that beckoning ache deep within her.