became irresistible. She started to follow, her teeth gritted, more vexed with herself than with the strong, insufferable man who was leading her along. Enlightened by the lessons of Eustace, she was not going to be bamboozled by a male of the species ever again.
“Your brother is either too busy drinking or gambling or engaged in some other pursuit to worry about you for the moment. Unless of course you’re the precious item he’s wagering.”
“Don’t be grotesque!”
Beatrice went hot and cold. Might it actually be true? Charlie had gone on and on about the loss of her reputation damaging her chances of the marriage that would save both their fortunes. What might he be driven to when his judgment was clouded by brandy?
Her moment of hesitation was fatal, and Ritchie whisked her along just as he’d done in the conservatory. Within seconds, he’d plunged the pair of them into a small study or smoking room, a masculine retreat, lined with books. With an air of triumph about him, he locked the door behind them.
Beatrice stepped back and back, away from her captor. Fear surged, but swirled with a delicious longing in her belly. She was a person of supposedly bad reputation, so why not be worthy of it? Why suffer the disadvantages of being a scarlet woman without tasting any of its advantages?
But maidenly fantasies on a drowsy afternoon were one thing. Facing a powerful man in his lust was quite another.
“Don’t look at me like a terrified mouse, Beatrice.” Ritchie frowned, his broad brow puzzled. “A girl of your experience isn’t afraid of being alone with a man, surely?”
But I have no experience. I was tricked into posing for those photographs. I don’t even know for sure whether I was touched while I slept or not.
So, indeed, some variety of a mouse. But she wasn’t going to admit to being a fool and a gullible ninny, or Ritchie would laugh. And he’d know he could cozen her into any brand of debauchery that took his fancy.
“No, I’m not afraid of you, Mr. Ritchie.” She stared at him, her eyes steady. Then, feeling the edge of a chair just behind her knees, she sank into it, feigning a composure that was far from her true state. “I’m just not particularly fond of your company and I don’t see why I should grant you any further liberties. Even with my experience.”
Ritchie shook his head. He was smiling, but he looked impressed in a vaguely perplexed sort of way. “What would it take for you to grant me a few more of those liberties, Beatrice?” He swaggered over to her and stood looking downwards. He was like a giant, a colossus, looming over her, and he seemed to own the very air around them. “I’ve got a lot to offer.”
Beatrice swallowed. Right in front of her, he was still aroused and he did indeed have a lot to offer. She stared at his groin from beneath lowered lashes, then back up at his face.
“You’re a tempting woman. Far too tempting.” He reached down and cupped her face, and for a moment she thought he was going to draw her lips to him. Perhaps rapidly unbutton his trousers and offer his cock to her, as Ambrose Chamfleur had done to his Sofia.
“And that tempts me too, Miss Weatherly.” Ritchie laughed softly as if he’d read the lewd visions in her mind. Was he some kind of mentalist, with supernatural powers?
Shaking, Beatrice turned away. If he could read her visions, he could read her desires too. And know that she’d wanted to caress him in that way, and that she’d almost reached out to unfasten his trousers.
I’m going completely mad. I’ve known the man barely more than an hour … and he’s turned me into a jezebel and a slave to carnal appetites.
His fingers curved around her cheek. The touch was as soft as thistledown, but no force was needed. Like a cat hungry for affection again, she rubbed her face against his palm, and when he pressed a little more firmly, it was the simplest matter in the world to follow his urgings.
Beatrice laid her face against the front of his trousers, blindly seeking tangible evidence of his maleness.
Through the fine cloth, he felt hard, warm, alive. His penis throbbed as if it had a sentience all of its own. Beatrice’s mouth watered, remembering Sofia Chamfleur’s enthusiasm, and she rubbed her cheek against him, the response purely instinctive. She had no idea precisely how her action would feel to him, but his low gasp of pleasure was educational
“My dear … my dear …” Ritchie’s voice was ragged, not that of the man who taunted her and who seemed to control her so effortlessly. Now he was teetering on the edge of his own precipice, and the idea of that was both thrilling and alarming.
Ritchie had so much power he could simply throw her on the carpet and ravish her, and even though the throbbing ache between her thighs told her she wanted that, and wanted it badly, some self-preserving thread told a different story.
Don’t give yourself away quite so easily. Always, always remember how Eustace duped you. From now on, you must not let a man take the upper hand.
With one last buss of her cheek against his groin, she broke his hold on her, and wriggling like an eel, she slid sideways and out of the chair. Shooting to her feet, she skipped across the room. Out of his reach.
“I’m afraid that nothing you have is sufficient to tempt me, Mr. Ritchie.” With a twist of her lips, she stared pointedly at the lingering bulge in his trousers.
“I wonder.” He didn’t look down, but his imperious brows quirked.
“I’m quite certain.” It was dangerous to be here with him. She had to get out. “Now, if you have nothing more to say to me, I’ll return to the ballroom.”
Whirling, she sped for the door, not waiting for an answer. She was close. Escape was in sight. She almost had her fingers on the key in its lock.
Ritchie’s hand closed around hers, enveloping it.
How had he moved so fast? And with no sound? Was the wretched man possessed of strange occult powers of bilocation or blink-of-an-eye speed?
“Stay, Beatrice. Let me make you an offer.” He turned her, his ungloved hand on her bare upper arm again. The hot feel of it sent strange sparks rushing through her veins, heading for her deepest, most responsive zones. She opened her mouth to say there was nothing he could offer, to lie in effect, but before she could, he went on in a low, hard voice. “If I can’t tempt you solely with my amenable personality or my prowess as a lover, perhaps I can offer you a more businesslike arrangement?”
It was difficult to breathe. And when she did, the gasps made her breasts rise and fall alarmingly in the low, newly stitched neckline of her dress. Ritchie flashed a glance downwards, and his lips parted on a gasp of his own.
“Please let me go, Mr. Ritchie. There is nothing you can offer that I want.”
“You’re a liar, my dear. Your eyes and your blushing face and the way you’re panting all tell me otherwise. But that’s by the by.” He narrowed his eyes at her, suddenly all ruthlessness, “I’m offering to pay your and your brother’s debts. Which are considerable and far more than you realize, by the way. I’ll also settle an annual sum of money on you both that will keep you comfortable for the rest of your lives.”
Beatrice’s mouth opened and closed, like one of the fish in the conservatory pond. She knew she looked foolish, but there were no words she could utter.
The debts were perilous, she knew that. Many were inherited from their late father, a dear man but a poor manager, who’d caused them to lose Westerlynne on his demise.
But other debts were more recently incurred. Charlie liked to think he was keeping things from her, but he was as good as using a lace handkerchief to mop up a swamp. Her offers of help in planning a stratagem were always brushed aside with mutters of “gentlemen’s business.”
There was no hiding what Ritchie wanted in return for his assistance. She knew it. And she knew he knew she knew. It