Seven Secrets of Seduction (10 page)

His eyes held hers, dark and hot.

Nothing for it but to succumb. A lazy, languid feeling stole down her limbs, mixing with the anxiety and anticipation.

Movement caught her gaze, and she watched a book teetering on his head slip from its perch and fall to the floor, just missing her shoulder.

“Organizing books is a much more perilous diversion than I'd thought,” he said in his husky, edged voice, warm and dangerous. He moved slightly, shaking off another volume that had rained down upon his back—a consequence of upsetting the stacks. The movements sent shocks of energy through her as their connections pushed and pulled against each other.

“But equally rife with opportunity.” He gazed at her lips. “Do you surrender?”

“Surrender to what?” It was as if she couldn't catch her breath.

“To whom.”

“To whom?” The words barely formed on her tongue, heavy and low.

He smiled, a long slow pull of lips, and leaned down. A hint of bergamot combined with the smell of the books surrounding them, spines triangled, pages fanned apart, allowing the scent of fresh bindings and musty parchment to linger.

She licked suddenly dry lips, only an inch from his. “What are you doing, my lord?” A rational question surfacing from somewhere amidst the chaos.

His gaze traveled her face. “I'm embracing the beauty around me. Or under me, as it is. No need to go to the Serpentine if you have that lovely breeze already in your sights.”

That he remembered their conversation so well from the first day was almost as alarming as the way her body automatically responded to the meaning of his words.

“I think you are taking me too literally.” Was that her voice breaking on a low breath?

He shifted, and she heard another book slide from his hips. “First, I am not enjoying the underlying meaning of things, and now I'm being too literal? I think it a good thing I've challenged you to show me what I should be doing.”

His face was so close. His lips mere breaths away. She could see each eyelash like a long spike waiting to spear her.

“I have no expertise to do so.” But the temptation curled. Like a living, trapped thing that sought outlet.

And still he didn't move away. “You are one of the most vibrant women I've ever come across. And locked away behind your books—it just makes you that much more of a masterpiece waiting to be unlocked.”

She swallowed, but the swelling of her veins would not recede. “You know nothing about me.”

“Don't I?” His eyes caressed her face, unreadable, but hot. “I have wanted to know everything about you since the moment I saw you.”

The heat rushing around her body filled her face as well. “I don't know why.”

And she didn't. What sort of mad dream was this that he had noticed her? Was flirting with her? Ready to
inhale
her. That he had even taken notice of her
enough to do so made the rest even more unbelievable. There wasn't a sane connection between it all.

Her thoughts felt as caged as her wrists and ankles beneath their paper and leather bindings. She shifted, trying to unpin her limbs.

“No?” He loosened his position, rising to his hands and knees, still looming over her like a hunter, still holding her in some sort of thrall. “I will work diligently to change that.”

“Why?”

“Because I want to.” He cocked his head. “And I do as I wish.”

She needed to get away, to breathe and think. “So I've read.”

His smile became humorless. “So devoted to the written word.” He touched a book pinning her wrist. “Foolhardy to put your trust where it is easy to create falsehood. Don't believe all you read.”

She smiled back tightly, unable to let the statement go. “I don't. But sometimes it is just the opposite. It can be far easier to spill the truth in an article or letter where you can be free.”

“Oh? Those correspondents of yours—they spill their darkest secrets, do they? You believe everything they tell you?”

That partially answered her question as to how long he had been listening to her conversation with Georgette in the shop.

“I have no reason to doubt them yet.”

“Lies from those closest to you are often the most numerous and paralyzing.”

She narrowed her eyes and stayed silent.

“And your Eleutherios, hanging on word from him, aren't you? The rattle-pate old lecher.”

She pushed at his chest suddenly and began extricating her legs from the books pinning them.

“Better to leave dreams behind and go forward with purpose.” His voice was strangely intense. He moved to the side, shifting the settled avalanche of paper behind him.

She said nothing, pulling her legs out from under the fallen stacks. She had just gained purchase when her heel slipped on a binding. She again collapsed on her back, legs curled under his, looking up at him, skirts tangled in paper.

Damn books.

“I admire your capitulation.” His smile was lazy again, the dark intensity replaced by a languidness that did odd things to her stomach.

“Lord Downing?”

“Yes?”

“Perhaps you might help me stand?”

“My back is quite sore from saving you from all of those heavy tomes. I'm not sure I should be doing hard labor. Maybe you'd better continue lying there, at ease. The view is quite lovely.”

Her skin turned unwillingly warm again, her mind actively chalking up the entire situation to a lack of consciousness that must have taken her when they fell. Or perhaps she had fallen days ago, and this was all some strange imagining, an elaborate fantasy.

His eyes turned more amused, and he leaned over her again, his elbow propping him up at her side. “Yes, diligent work ahead indeed. Or perhaps you might just capitulate fully now, and we can move to more comfortable surroundings.”

Her mouth opened, but nothing emerged.

The first two fingers of his hand formed an L at his
cheek and chin above his propped elbow as he gazed upon her. “You have but to say the word. One small concession to any lingering inhibitions. A simple surrender.” His eyes caressed her face.

Men just didn't look at her like that. She didn't know if her heart could survive if they did.

Or perhaps it was just this man.

“Lord Downing?”

“Yes?”

“Get off me.”

“I'm unfortunately not on you.” He waved a hand to her free side. “You can move anytime. I'm merely serving as an umbrella should more papered bricks plot to bring about your doom.”

“And I am saving you from my coshing you with one as soon as I am free.”

“Very well.” He looked falsely beleaguered as he rose. He held a hand to her, and she warily took it, popping up and becoming free from the papers as he pulled her perfectly to her feet.

“Tomorrow then,” he said, not releasing her hand. “Perhaps in the gardens in back of the house? I've heard they are full of weeds and sprouting things. You can tell me all about the wonders of them. Perhaps let me discover for myself the path of a rose whispering down your bare flesh?”

Flutters, promising and alarming, beat against her midsection. “That is unnecessary.”

He smiled slowly, gazing down at her from his greater height. “Oh, it is very, very necessary. One simple concession on your part, and we can even begin tonight.”

She was saved from answering by a cleared throat. “Lord Downing?”

The viscount's hand tightened around hers, but his eyes didn't stray. Miranda looked over to see the butler in the doorway. She wondered how long he had been standing there, waiting.

Creases appeared around the viscount's eyes for a second before smoothing away. He replied without turning. Without taking his hand away from hers. “Tell them I will be there momentarily.”

“Yes, my lord.” The butler disappeared.

“Well, Miss Chase.” He gave her a lazy smile. “I'll look forward to convincing you to surrender tomorrow then.”

His fingers slid from hers, lingering at the tips before breaking free. “And I am quite confident in my ability to succeed.”

 

Miranda chewed on a chapped nail, her gloves hanging on the rack upstairs, somehow the feel of his fingers permanently embedded within them, driving her mad. “Uncle, I can't return.”

His head was buried in an open ledger, glasses perched perilously upon the end of his nose. “Return where?”

“To Viscount Downing's library.”

He looked over the edge of his glasses. “Oh, right. That's where you were yesterday and today. Forgot you were starting.” He looked to the window. “Must have told you about it in a less lucid moment, because I thought I'd gone and forgotten completely.”

Miranda waved a hand, happy that she could sidestep entirely how she'd discovered it. “I can't return.”

His eyes swung back. “Why not? I thought you'd like it. I'd do the task myself if I had the time.”

She continued chewing, unable to stop herself. Her
mother would have been completely appalled. “It's not proper.” What had escaped the box first? Greed? Sorrow? Surely it had been pure temptation. How had Pandora even managed to keep it closed as long as she had?

No, the answer was simply to bury the box and never return.

Her uncle blinked. “What's not proper about it? Not getting the promised payment for each week's work—that's not proper. The store coffers will be flush. Not getting the books he chooses to toss—that's not proper. Hinted that I'd get an original copy of
The Bengal.
” His eyes glazed and moved to the right. “Not getting that—that would be improper.”

Her uncle's coveted book. Within her grasp. All she had to do was put herself in harm's way for a week. A week of long, deliberate caresses and hot, lazy smiles.

“He gave me an illuminated manuscript.”

“Eh?”

She froze, her nail tip half-removed between her teeth. “A simple one, far from valuable,” she said quickly, removing the nail splinter. Stupid. She couldn't let him become curious enough to look at the actual book.

She laughed nervously as the images from it—not simple in the least—flashed behind her eyes. “But more importantly, I'm there
alone
.” Obviously open to rife temptation in the basest of manners too.

He looked away from the spot on his personal bookshelf in the back office room, where he must already be imagining his promised book carefully nestled. His eyes were blank. Zero comprehension in their depths.

“Alone with no supervision,” she stressed. Every servant melted into the ether when the viscount came
into view, and she had no doubt that it would continue as such. Their disappearances had been entirely too deliberate.

The blank look continued. “You want supervision? He said he wanted just one worker. And I thought you hated Mr. Briggs working with you on the payment books.” He pointed down.

“No! Yes! Not that kind of supervision.” She spiraled her hands forward, willing him to understand without explicitly stating anything. “Thomas Briggs is…we don't work well together. When I say supervision, I mean proper supervision.” Blank. “The viscount lives alone.” Blank. “A bachelor.”

“Well, can't blame the man for that.” Her never-married uncle frowned. “I didn't realize you cared about—”

“Uncle! It is not proper. I'm not married.” And obviously not as oblivious to temptation as she'd all but crowed about to Mr. Pitts.

“Course you aren't. Hope I'd be invited, if you were.”

She stared at him and drummed her fingers again. The bell jingled.

“It's not
the thing,
” she tried to reiterate, hoping he would get the message and save her from herself. “It's not proper.”

“Proper?” His frown became more pronounced. “This isn't your mother's academy.”

No, her mother's academy would have taken a wooden rod to her backside two days ago. And if they knew her thoughts now, they would lock her in a hole for a week.

She sighed. “But it is not quite
the thing
to be alone with a gentleman in his house.”

“You are working, not gallivanting. Hardly improper.”

“What's improper?” Georgette undid her fashionably large bonnet as she sailed into the back, Peter peeking behind her, around the corner of the entrance from the store proper, where he was manning the counter.

“I am cataloging a library. By myself,” Miranda emphasized in her uncle's direction.

Georgette snorted. “Sorting and putting books on a shelf? Really, Miranda, if only it were improper to do such, I'd feel much better about the amount of time you focus on such things.”

Miranda drummed her fingers against the table harder. “It is impossible to have a reasonable conversation with him.”

And impossible to ignore him.

Georgette coughed delicately and gave her a nudge.

“Not my uncle, Georgette,” she said exasperatedly. She turned back to her uncle. “Impossible, uncle, I tell you.”

He pushed his completed papers into a messy pile. “What is impossible about it? I don't see the problem. The viscount is a busy man. He is not going to stop by to converse.”

And that was just it. Even though they had conversed plenty, conversing did not seem to be particularly high on his list of
preferred
activities. And nor did her mind exactly shy away from thinking about those other activities when he was near. Which was why she needed to cull the temptation and remove the dessert from the feast. She barely knew what
fork
to use at such a table.

And why he would focus those energies on her was completely baffling.

Georgette's eyes widened at the word “viscount,” then turned crafty. Miranda looked at her, spirits sinking at the gleam therein.

“You probably won't even see him,” her uncle said. “Go, enjoy yourself, and make sure you scoop up every last treasure he lets slip. Like the illumination he gave you, simple as it might be. And you must have wanted it, since you took it.”