Was he depraved to enjoy her disapproval?
Or did the rebuke in her tone plump his manhood because he’d never had an assignation with a woman who sounded like a proper lady before?
“As I told you, disrobing is my custom and preference. I’ve agreed to several of your terms. This one is mine.”
Silence. Then another round of subtle fabric whispers. The rings holding up the bed curtain scraped along the rail and the air around him cooled. He turned his face in the sound’s direction.
Strange how the blindfold honed his other senses while also heightening his curiosity. He’d never felt conversation necessary to love making before. But in obligatory darkness, her voice became a thread between them and every exchange—either of words, or simply of sound—a sensual tug.
Fascinating. This weakness—being unable to see—was balanced by a corresponding strength—focused attention.
Was that true of other “weaknesses”?
Perhaps he should not have been as stringent with his other lovers. Maintaining such iron-clad control may have been a mistake. Then again, he was not experimenting with blindness and titillating discussion by choice. He’d agreed to this assignation, yes. But she’d set the terms.
Why? He intended to find out.
“You told me you hadn’t come here for the reasons I assumed, and yet…” He let the sentence dangle.
“And yet,” she repeated. “I am here.”
“What do you want from me?”
She hesitated. “You answer first.”
“I imagine you’ve already guessed my motivation.”
“I’ve said I wouldn’t allow…” Her voice went faint. Uncertain.
“Coitus?” he finished for her, smooth and low. He’d considered using a harsher term but decided against vulgarity.He wanted to draw her in, not send her fleeing a second time. “Not necessary for my purposes.”
“Which are?”
“Chiefly? Distraction.”
“Dis-trac-tion?” Her voice raised with each enunciated syllable. Herts sharpened into knife points. “Is that all women are to you?”
The verbal slap stung. After all, he’d taken pains to make sure he did not harm his lovers. He’d raised no expectations. He’d no by-blows. He’d no reason to be ashamed about his treatment of women.
On the other hand—he forced his pique to calm—he’d no idea what evils she’d experienced.
Perhaps her husband was—or had been—a man like his father. He shunted aside a flair of guilt and refocused on his aim—information.
“So much bitterness,” he murmured, “in one so young.”
“I may not have reached my majority—”
So, younger than twenty-five.
“—but I have more than two decades to my name. More than enough time to have experienced perfidy.”
Between twenty and twenty-four, then. Older than he would have guessed. “But can we at least agree that I have not betrayed you?”
“You would, if I gave you a chance.”
Oh, yes. Some man had caused her harm.
Life could be extraordinarily unfair to young women. Even harder, he suspected, with someone of her fiery depth.
