Rake's Guide to Pleasure. (7 page)

"Yes. I'm shocked to find you at this party."

"And yet you are here."

"I
am not a very young woman from the country."

A laugh broke free from her irritation. Oh, yes, she was all bluebirds and innocence. "
Somerhart
, I am not a young miss, fresh off the estate. I'm a widow and free to do as I please. A fact I feel certain you've made note of."

"Pardon?"

"Widows. They are your companion of choice, are they not?"

His scowl turned into a sneer as he dropped her arm. "I cannot believe I thought you subtle."

"Subtle? Good God,
Somerhart
. How very misguided."

His anger kept him from stopping her this time, and Emma made her way to a vacated seat at the brag table. She hoped the man would leave before she started play, but she did not turn around. She wouldn't give him the satisfaction, nor the people in the room who were watching with happy interest.

And she would not let him chase her from her work again. She threw herself into the game and quickly accumulated three hundred pounds. She just as quickly lost it all. One of the men at the table laughed.

"Lady
Denmore
, you are reckless tonight."

"Yes," she snapped and placed a new bet. She could
feel
him there, a few feet behind her, glaring a hole into her neck. She wished her hair weren't up. Wished she hadn't worn a dress with such a low back. Wished the thought of him looking wasn't quite so thrilling.

Emma pushed the play harder, and the men happily obliged, sure that she was off her game. A collective groan went up as she turned her cards. "Reckless," she muttered, pulling the pile of coins toward her. Yes, she was reckless and unsubtle and a liar as well.

Two more months.

An hour later, she was up two hundred pounds and sick of looking at the wench across from her, the one whose ample bosom couldn't quite stay contained. "Good night, gentlemen."

Unseen hands pulled her chair out, but she knew who it was.
Somerhart
hadn't budged since she'd begun play. She'd only been able to tolerate his presence by picturing him as one of the hangers on: forearm perched on the back of her chair, shirt unbuttoned to his breast bone, his fingertips trailing teasingly against her hairline as he awaited her pleasure. But he had done no such thing and looked as rigid and elegant as always when she turned to him. His eyes burned. Had he waited just to resume their argument?

Emma ignored his hand and walked from the room. "What is it that you want,
Somerhart
?" she tossed over her shoulder.

"To speak with you."

"Why? I seem to annoy and offend you with very little effort on my part."

"You do."

"So why seek me out? To suffer? I hadn't heard you were the type to enjoy paddles and degradation. And one would expect that to get out."

"Pardon?"

"Then again . . ." She kept walking, heading for the stairway. "You do insist on circumspect partners."

"You are utterly outrageous," he growled, managing to sound quite ominous, but Emma smiled down at the balustrade. He could act horrified, but the truth was that she entertained him.

"How old are you? Twenty? Twenty-one? And speaking to me of
paddles!"

"Yes. Paddles. Shocking, as you've pointed out before."

He muttered something she couldn't make out, but it made her laugh all the same. From what she'd heard of the duke, he never muttered. Just as he never yelled. But in the three times she'd met him, he'd managed to do both.

"You say things just to surprise me," he said, as she stepped into the grand entry of the town house.

Emma rewarded him with a wide smile. "Why would I do that?"

"Because it amuses you." "And you."

Somerhart
frowned down at her, eyes narrowed. He stared until Emma felt her face grow pink. Not with embarrassment, but with pleasure at being the focus of this man's attention. His face was masculine despite its beauty, angles drawn out in strong jaw and high cheekbone. Emma couldn't help focusing on his wide, indulgent mouth. She thought of touching his jaw to see if the skin was smooth, or if it was roughened by the dusky hint of his dark beard.

"Where did you learn to play?" he asked, breaking the spell he'd woven.

Emma blinked and pulled her thoughts into strict compliance. "Lord
Denmore
loved games of chance. Nothing to do with the coin, I mean. He would play with pennies, with beans even. We spent hours playing every night. He said I had a gift."

"But you don't play because you have a gift. You don't play for beans. Or pennies."

"Mm," she hummed and glanced around for the footman. "My cloak, please. And a hack."

"I will drive you."

"There's no need. People would talk."

"People are talking already. The whole of London knows we are lovers."

Emma couldn't help her sharp breath. His voice had dropped to an unexpected timbre with those words. The sound of pleasure. Nothing at all like his normal, clipped tone.

"We are not lovers," she whispered. He took her plain cloak and settled it over her shoulders. The backs of his fingers brushed again and again over her throat as he slowly tied the ribbons. He looked suddenly softer, more sensual. Like a libertine. She could see him as he must have been in his youth— hedonistic and hunting for pleasure in every dark corner. Shivers slid down her skin and squeezed her nipples into tightness.

"I am neither subtle nor circumspect," she reminded him.

"The talk has already started, Lady
Denmore
. It will continue whether we indulge ourselves or not. I created quite a scene at
Matherton's
, you'll recall."

"And here," Emma managed to say, though her lungs seemed to tremble.

"Yes. And here."

Emma was caught up in the moment, in
him,
and she could not afford to be. She could not take this man to her bed, despite what she wanted. And she definitely wanted. Him. Naked and aroused, letting her experiment with all her useless, unsavory knowledge. But perhaps he was too commanding to let her play by her rules. Perhaps he would insist she follow his.

She thrilled to the thought, and had to part her lips to draw enough air into her parched throat.
Somerhart
leaned closer.

"I have shocked you for once, Lady
Denmore
."

"You . . . you do not even like me."

"You are . . . intriguing."

"And I can suddenly see how such a rigid nobleman has managed to seduce half the women of the ton. I'll remind you that I do not wish to join their sordid ranks."

The sensuality cleared from his face, gone in the blink of an eye as he drew himself to a straight line. "Ah, yes. I'd forgotten your convenient modesty."

Emma gritted her teeth against his arrogance. Life was so easy for rich men. She was relieved her anger so easily replaced her arousal. "Yes," she spat. "I am quite picky. Often I like my seductions to consist of more than 'Hallo there. Care to spread your knees for a duke?' Silly miss that I am."

Oh, she'd definitely caught him unawares again. A flush crept from under his cravat and stopped just under his ridiculously lovely cheekbones.

"Reconsidering your offer of the carriage, Your Grace?" Emma cooed.

"No," he snapped and tugged his coat sleeves into place as if they would dare to rise above his wrists. "Despite your vulgarity, the offer stands."

"How very tolerant of you."

Somerhart
crossed the entry in three strides and jerked the door open before the footman could reach it. The poor servant looked as if he might drop into paroxysms of dismay. "Come,"
Somerhart
ordered.

"I haven't accepted your offer," she replied. "My reputation is not something to be so lightly ruined."

"Oh, for God's sake. You are notorious, Lady
Denmore
. Already. A woman heralded for rampant gambling and undignified behavior, and you've only been in town for a month."

"True, but I have never taken a lover,
Somerhart
, and no one has ever accused me of such."

The tic in his jaw stilled, and his eyes slid slowly down her body, warming to that seductive glint she'd seen moments ago.
Never,
he was thinking, and she knew it. She was thinking the same thing. That if she agreed to this, he would be her first lover. This man, famous for his prowess. He
knew
things, she could see that in those glinting eyes. Things about women's bodies and their needs.
Her
body.
Her
needs.

His eyes passed from warmth to heat.

"You may escort me home," she said quickly, to try and quell the need rising up in her blood. "And that is all you may do."

"You sound very sure," he murmured, drawing even closer. Emma could smell the starch of his linens, the subtle tang of soap. She slid her fingertips up his chest and let them rest against the muscles there, just for a moment. She felt his heart beating, sending blood to all that vital muscle, warming his skin. . . then she pushed him away with a shove that nearly toppled him.

"Really, Your Grace. Crooking your little finger again? At least buy me a bauble before you try to
tup
me in the carriage."

Somerhart
looked as if he'd like to throw up his hands, but he was simply too dignified. He only jerked at his coat cuffs again and shot a glance toward the footman who was most assuredly looking elsewhere.

"Get in the damned coach." He jabbed a finger at the waiting carriage, and Emma obeyed, hiding a smile as she passed. "You are intolerable," he growled and followed her down the front steps. "A minx," he added for good measure.

And Emma couldn't help but laugh in agreement.

Hart knocked on the gleaming black side of the carriage, one foot still on the street. "Your direction," he snapped toward Lady
Denmore's
shadow as she arranged herself inside. There was a definite pause before she answered.

"
Belgrave
."

Hart did not sigh his impatience, because dukes did not do such a thing, but a very
sighlike
sound emerged from his lips.
"Where
in
Belgrave
?"

A longer pause. "Marlborough Road. Number Twenty-three."

He stared at the pale smudge of her face in the dim confines of the carriage. Marlborough Road. Not quite
Belgrave
then. More like Chelsea, or just at the edge of it. Hart had been telling himself quite forcefully that he needn't accompany her, that he should send her on her way and have his driver fetch him afterward.

If he left with her it would fuel the gossip about them to a fever pitch, add permanence to her fledging notoriety, and revive the old talk about him. Talk he'd been trying to forget for years. And Lady
Denmore
would either torture him further or tempt him into going forward with these impetuous thoughts of seduction.

But she lived in Chelsea, for God's sake. The edge of respectability. Not precisely a safe place to simply drop a woman at her doorstep and wish her well. It seemed he had no choice.

Hart gave the street and house number to his driver, then stepped up to his doom. The carriage rocked with his weight, reminding him that the sturdy boat of his life was about to be swallowed by rough waters. Breath escaped his lips in a definite, undeniable sigh.

As his eyes adjusted to the lamplight, he could make out her gloved hands folded against her black cloak, and the dark line of her eyebrows against pale skin. Those eyebrows arched with some scathing emotion.

Hart braced himself for an attack but none came, and he slowly settled into the strange feeling of being closed up with a woman he didn't know how to handle. She irritated him to no end and prodded the beast he'd kept contained for so long. It had once roamed free, and she
reminded
it, revived it to its former hunger.