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Midnight tea indeed.
She followed him inside and into the drawing room where she had sat over a year ago. Nothing about the room had changed. She remembered the bronze oil lamp above the fireplace and the tapestry of Rati, wearing a golden headdress, arms stretched with a bow and arrow, astride a many-hued parrot. She flushed at the significance of the Indian goddess of love and carnal pleasure.
“Have a seat, Miss Herwood,” he indicated.
She sat at stiff attention upon the settee without removing her bonnet or releasing her reticule.
“Do you often keep your servants up at such late hours?” she asked when a footman set down a tray upon the table between them.
Seating himself across from her, he smiled at her attempt to censure his treatment of his staff.
She helped herself to the tea and biscuits as it was a useful occupation to avoid conversing with him. Why had he brought her to his place for tea? Was he bored and in need of a companion? Did he have an...urge...when he saw her coming out of the gaming hall and no one else to seek in the middle of the night? She found herself wanting an answer to her questions. She looked over at him to find him appraising her.
“How is Lady Isabella?” she asked the question she had not wanted to ask.
“I understand she is well and currently in Scotland with family.”
Ah. That was why he was in need of company. She sipped her tea and waited for him to speak, but he only continued his observation of her.
“This is a delightful tea,” she said.
“It is a chai blend of cardamom, nutmeg and black tea from the Himalayas. You should try it with milk.”
He picked up the small vessel. She held out her cup and saucer. He held her saucer still, his hand upon hers in the process. Her heart palpitated an uneven rhythm.
“Delicious,” she acknowledged, then proceeded to finish the beverage quickly to hasten the end of the tea.
“More?”
“No, thank you.”
They sat staring at one another until impatience and insecurity forced her to her feet. She walked around the room, pretending to analyze the décor, conscious of his gaze upon her.
“How long do you intend on keeping me here?” she asked, feeling more at ease now that she could more easily avoid looking into his eyes.
“Do you mean to imply that I am holding you hostage?”
“I do.”
“Is my company so distasteful to you?”
She frowned. Though he did not mean it, it was an unfair question. “Not at all, but I am quite puzzled as to why you wish for mine.”
“Do you really?”
“Yes, our arrangement had been executed and finished.”
“Would you care for another arrangement?”
She looked at him sharply, then returned to looking at the walls, stopping before the tapestry of Rati. She felt angry. She had put him out of her life, had met another man with whom she might have a chance, and he had the gall to reappear and ask her for another arrangement?
“Lord Rockwell,” she said, fueling her courage through anger, “you must disavow yourself of this notion that I am always at your beck and call, available to you as you wish. Despite what our past arrangements have been, I am not a whore. Circumstances compelled me to become one, but I have no interest at the moment in renewing that state. There is no sum of money that you can offer that would make me amenable to—”
Feeling his presence, she whirled around. In the next instant, his mouth was over hers. She struggled, but his arm was about her, crushing her to him without give. She pushed against his hard body. He circled his hands about both her wrists and pinned them above her head as he pushed her up against the wall. His mouth assaulted hers with frightful force and suffocating breadth. She panicked that he might try to impose his will upon her, though she would never have thought him capable of such an offense—no, she panicked because her body was responding to him.
“What is the safety word?” he growled as he devoured her neck and shoved his hips into her.
Holding her wrists in one hand, he untied her bonnet and tossed it to the floor. She closed her eyes against the onslaught, trying to pick up the fragments of her anger as her traitorous body succumbed to the longing she had hitherto kept at bay.
