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“Do you?”
“Very well.” She cleared her throat. She would not be disappointed. She certainly would not be sad. Instead, she would be irritated. Irritation seemed feasible. “You cannot seduce the name from me, if that’s what you intend. Imagining it as a possibility insults us both. I shall send you a bank draft the moment our next shipment is paid for.” She collected her shawl from the sawdust-covered floor, shook it out, and turned on her heel to head for the door.
As her hand settled on the handle, he said, “Henrietta.”
She stilled. “No one calls me that.”
Silence. Then, “Hmm.” Close. Too close. He’d followed her. And then he touched her, one finger tracing down her spine, sending a thrill through her. No. Not a thrill. She wasn’t thrilled.
She stiffened, wrapping her arms about herself. Closing herself to the pleasure of his touch. “You needn’t condescend to touch me.”
“You think I do not wish to touch you?” The words were hot against the back of her neck.
“I think that men who have an inkling to deflower women—twice—do not send them home—twice—without proper deflowering.” She turned her head. “It would be one thing if you were a Mayfair gentleman. But we both know you’re not that.”
She hated the words the moment they were out of her mouth. She didn’t care that he’d never set foot in Mayfair. Lord knew most of the aristocratic men she knew weren’t gentlemen in the least. Not when the world wasn’t watching. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be.”
“I didn’t mean . . .”
“I was raised in the gutter.”
She met his gaze instantly. “That doesn’t mean anything.” When he did not reply, she turned back to the door, embarrassed.
“I’m no kind of gentleman,” he said at her ear, a dark promise. “I’ve never pretended to be.” He slowly traced her spine back up to her shoulders, lingering on the exposed skin of her neck, and whispered, “And when I deflower you, it will be very far from proper.”
And, like that, she was aflame. Out of her depth. And still, doubt whispered. “But not tonight.” She sounded petulant. She knew she did. But she had been quite hopeful for the evening, and it was, after all, her birthday, and now she was to go home and who knew when he’d turn up again. Probably never.
More interminable silence, long enough for her to fidget beneath it. And then, “Hattie?”
She did not look at him. “What?”
“Shall I tell you what kind of thoughts I am thinking?”
She lifted a shoulder. Let it drop. Willed him to think she didn’t care one way or another. Willed him to tell her every word he was thinking.
“I am thinking that your skin is the softest I’ve ever touched,” he said, that maddening finger moving in perfect circles. “I’m thinking that when I get you alone—fully alone—I’m going to strip you bare and test its softness everywhere.”
She sucked in a breath as the finger dipped to her shoulder, tracing the skin of her back, along the line of her dress. “I am thinking of how you feel here, soft like silk, and somehow, even softer elsewhere. I am thinking of how your breasts feel,” he said, the slow, languid tenor of his voice making them aching and heavy. “Softer, still, and their tips—” He growled. “I’m thinking of how they feel against my tongue.” She whimpered as the tips in question hardened, straining for him even as he resisted touching her but for that one, wild place where his fingertip stroked her shoulder.
“Of how they taste, like sugar and sin.” He was at her ear, and she swayed at the words, at the way they threatened her. “Of how you bowed to my touch yesterday. Do you remember?”
She closed her eyes, wanting it again. Nodding.
“Say it.”
“I remember.”
“Mmm.” Every one of this man’s rumbles was a riot over her skin. Through her body. “And you want it again.”
Another nod.
“Aloud.”
“Yes.” Breath, not sound. She swallowed. Spoke louder. “Yes, please.”
“Touch them.”
She jerked at the command. “I—What?”
“You want them. You want my hands on you. Show me how.”
She shook her head. “I can’t.”
“You can. Touch them. They ache for it, for your touch.”
No, she wanted to cry, they ache for yours.
And then, as though he’d heard the thought, “Think of your hands as mine. That’s what I am thinking. I’m thinking of holding them, of feeling them spilling out of my palms, of lifting them and taking them in my mouth. Of licking and sucking them until you are weeping and wet.”
She whimpered at the words, her hands rising to the door, her fingers splaying wide on the wood, holding her upright against the onslaught of his thoughts. How could he say such things? This man who dealt in silence and grunts? How could he stand here, in a place he had declared not private enough, and say such filthy, wonderful things?
How could she want more of it?
How was he so calm? He destroyed her with every word, and somehow, he remained cool, his breathing even as ever, his only movement those small, devastating circles over her shoulder, across the back of her neck. “And you are wet, aren’t you, Hattie?”
There was nothing he could say that would make her confess that.
“I’m finkin’ ’bout what it’ll do to me when you say it, Hattie.” Nothing but that low growl, slipping into his Covent Garden accent. Nothing but the idea that even the thought of her desire for him might lay him low.
She bit her lip and pressed her forehead to the door. Nodded.
“Fuck.” The curse came on a whisper. “Out loud.”
“Yes.”
“Say it.”
“I am—you’ve made me—”
“Wait.” His groan interrupted her, and suddenly it wasn’t just one finger painting her skin with circles, it was his whole hand, running over her shoulder, down her arm, threading his fingers into hers. Tugging her around to face him.
And when she faced him, she saw the truth that his accent had hinted. He wasn’t calm.
He was wild.
“Finish it,” he growled. “What ’ave I made you?”
“Wet,” she said, and the word seemed to strike him like a blow, setting him to his knees on a long, devastating curse.
He sat back on his ankles and stared up at her, his hands balled into fists on his thighs. He lifted one, running the back over his lips, like a man starved. Dear God, he was stunning. The sight of him there, on his knees, turned her into need. Pure, aching desire.
She shook her head, confused. “Please, Beast—”
“Now, I’m thinkin’ you should lift your skirts.”
And like that, with that single, hinted command, sanity fled. She did it, her hands under his spell as he watched the hem of her dress rise, as though by sheer force of his will. Or perhaps it was her will. Because when the skirts passed her knees, she didn’t stop. She kept going. And he kept swearing, a litany of soft, filthy words in the quiet room.
“More, Hattie. Further. Show it to me. All of it.”
