Seduction in Mind

Chapter Fourteen

His bedroom was small and plainly furnished with a tester bed, two chairs, a small table, and a bureau. The walls were covered in tapestries depicting the life of Ulysses, the bed hung with green cut-velvet in a design contemporary to the building. The fabric was new, as was the upholstery on the chairs. The only light was from two huge silver candelabra.

"In the interests of privacy," Sam said, walking over and pulling the draperies shut. "And I'm definitely interested in privacy," he whispered a moment later when he returned to take her into his arms.

"I'm not sure I can guarantee it," Alex said, smiling.

"Then we'll lock the door." He went to the door and turned the key in the lock, then tossed the key on the table. He approached her with a smile. "You're mine now until I let you go."

"Or you're mine," she replied lightly.

The idea of belonging to someone, even temporarily, struck him as odd; he'd been selfishly alone for so long. "I might be more than you can handle." He gave her a roguish wink.

She kicked off her silver kid slippers. "I think I'll manage."

"Let me help you."

"Manage you?"

"Undress."

"And then I'll help you-undress. I never have, you know." Her comment was spontaneous, part of the exuberance that filled her soul in this small, candlelit room where the Virgin Queen had once slept.

"Then I'll have to see that the occasion is memorable," he replied, keeping his voice sportive with effort when he felt instead a jolt of inexplicable pleasure. "We'll start with you." Leaning close, he unclasped one of the large pearl ear drops she wore.

She trembled at the delicacy of his touch, anticipation warming her senses. "I wanted to make love to you all evening," she admitted.

"While I didn't know how much longer I could play the gentleman." He unloosened the second earring and placed it with the first on the bureau top.

"Please don't any longer."

"It's been almost three hours-I'm damned proud of myself."

"Three and a half, and I'm not interested in pride." She was unbuckling the mother-of-pearl belt buckle at her waist, a note of haste in her voice.

Recognizing the tone, he turned her around by her shoulders and quickly unhooked the back of her gown. As the belt and light summer garment fell to the carpet, she spun to him, threw her arms around his neck, and pressed into his body. "I think there's something wrong with me," she whispered. "I'm frantic to have you make love to me… I'm never like this-never-frantic about anything, and I apologize. But if you don't mind, maybe we could undress you afterward…"

The message was loud and clear despite her whispered accents. He doubted there was a man alive who would have minded. "I'm more than willing," he calmly said, scooping her up into his arms. Carrying her the few feet to the bed, he placed her on the green cut-velvet coverlet near the edge and quickly unfastening his trousers, moved between her legs. As he entered her without undressing, he was reminded of occasions at Hattie's when hasty sex was convenient, although Miss Ionides didn't precipitate the same kind of casual disregard. In fact… He brushed away the subsequent thought, not wanting to acknowledge the degree of affection she inspired.

His attention was quickly engaged in far more pleasurable activities as the fascinating Miss Ionides wrapped her legs around his waist. She pulled his head down so she could eat at his mouth while he plunged deep inside her. Between her contented groans and sleek, wet cunt, he was hard pressed to think at all. She came, then he did, then they did. It was an orchestration of timing that could have been accomplished only by a man of his expertise, because there were only half-seconds to spare between her climax and his withdrawal.

There was a brief period of time after that when they felt sated enough to finish their undressing. Hers required only the removal of her chemise, drawers, and stockings, which he did with dispatch. Her undressing of him was more convoluted, both in time and emotion. They both understood the rarity of the event.

He stood beside the bed while she kneeled on the mattress and eased his coat off his shoulders and down his arms. When she began to fold it, he took it from her and tossed it aside impatiently.

Forcing himself to stand still while she unbuttoned his shirt, he found himself counting the seconds it took for each button to be freed and thought surely she must be a witch to make him feel eager as an adolescent once again. It was ninety seconds before his shirt followed his coat onto the carpet-eighty-nine seconds too long in his current frame of mind. When Alex reached for the single button that was keeping his trousers in place, he stopped her hand. "This is taking too long." She was utterly naked kneeling beside him and much too close and much, much too voluptuous-like some fertility goddess made to be fucked by rampant cocks like his. He inhaled against the raging state of his arousal. "I'll do the rest myself."

His trousers slid down his legs and his silk underwear followed in quick succession. When he took her in his arms, he said as a sop to his previously nonexistent conscience, "I hope you don't mind."

"I'm ravenous-I'm crazed-look… I'm shaking." She lifted her hand the merest distance so he could see the tremor.

His glance was quick, dismissive, his own sensibilities on an irrepressible rampage. He tumbled her backward on the bed, followed her down, slid between her outstretched thighs, and wondered if anyone was keeping count.

"I'm sorry I'm so… demanding," she whispered, arching up to meet his downthrust.

"Don't be. I'm in the mood to fuck myself to death," he breathed, plunging into her silken cunt with an unquenchable frenzy.

"How nice…"

Her words were so damnably polite, his gaze swiveled downward, and he scrutinized her fleetingly.

"I mean I'm grateful," she purred, sliding her hands down his spine.

His glance slipped away. Now, there's a concept; she was grateful. He didn't think the word applied to himself. He was wild for her, inflamed and impatient, but that all had to do with lust, not gratitude. Whatever she was feeling, though, matched the rhythm of his lower body to perfection, and she could call it what she liked.

It was fucking at its very best.

Later that night, he lay in bed, watching her brush the tangles out of her hair. His teak-handled brush looked large in her hand, oversized, as did the bureau she stood before on tiptoe so she could see herself in the mirror propped on top. Her slender form seemed to glow in the candlelight, her skin almost luminous, and he was reminded of a Titian nude, where female flesh always seemed lit from within. Such recall brought with it the memory of her posing for Alma-Tadema and in its wake a flood of disconcerting emotion.

"Are you sleeping with Alma-Tadema?"

She turned at the roughness in his voice, offended that he felt he could inquire. "Why do you ask?"

"For obvious reasons. You were stark naked with him last night."

"And a naked woman implies only one thing?" she said, her voice sweet and mocking.

"Generally." Or in his experience, always.

"If you knew me better, you'd know not to ask, or if you knew me better, you wouldn't have to ask."

"I don't need riddles. Answer me."

Her shoulders straightened marginally. "Why should I?"

"Why not?" His brows rose in suggestive response. "I'd say we know each other fairly well."

"Because we've made love? Surely, you of all people understand, it's essentially a physical act."

"Not necessarily."

"Really…" Melodrama echoed in her drawl. "Has this been love, then, and not sex?"

"Very funny."

"Exactly. Now, darling," she purred, "let's make a pact. You don't ask me about my friends and I won't ask you about yours."

He was surprised at the level of his affront. "You pose for all sorts of men and you won't tell me what else is involved in those relationships?"

"If it was any business of yours, I would. Of course, it isn't."

His temper quickened, but he chose not to question his bizarre need to know. That was no longer the point; her mocking challenge was the point. "You could pose for me and I could find out for myself."

"Why would I do that? You don't paint."

"Because I wish it." The world had been laid at his feet too long.

"Droits du seigneur are no longer in effect in England." Alex lifted her chin faintly. "Or haven't you heard?"

"It depends where you are."

She could almost feel the heat of his jealousy, and it pleased her on some primitive level far removed from any discernible good judgment. "Meaning what, my lord?" Her gaze held his as she set the brush down on the dresser.

The temperature of the room seemed to rise.

"Meaning I can make you do whatever I want."

"A rash statement even for you, Ranelagh."

He hadn't moved from his lounging pose. "I believe the door's locked."

"I know where the key is."

"I doubt you could reach it in time."

She tried.

She didn't.

The key dangled from his fingers a moment later, and he was smiling.

"You're fast."

"So I've been told." He wasn't even breathing hard.

"I wasn't talking about your sex life," she said. "And I still have no intention of taking orders from you."

"Maybe I could make it worth your while," he drawled, lazily swinging the key.

"What makes you think I'm interested?"

His mouth twitched into a faint smile. "Call it a premonition. Now, I'd like you to pose first on the table."

"And if I refuse?"

"I'd have to help you."

An ignoble heat warmed her senses, and she chastised herself for responding to such base authority. He had no right to play master, to order her around as though she were subordinate to his desires. "I don't like this kind of coercion, Ranelagh."

"But, darling, you like fucking. And once you've posed, I'll give you what all your artist maestros do." His smile was tight. "Your reward." Gently snapping his fingers, he pointed at the table. "Either get up there or I'll put you there."

She stood her ground. "It's none of your affair whom I pose for."

"I understand. I just thought I'd get my share."

"You don't deserve it," she replied coolly.

"But, darling, that's for me to decide-here… now… in my home-alone with you." He smiled, nodded toward the table. "Should I count to three?"

Her eyes snapped with indignation. "You're extremely annoying."

"One."

"I don't know what makes you think-"

"Two."

She thrust out her bottom lip in a pout and moved toward the table. "I suppose you must be humored."

He was utterly still, his face half in shadow. "It might be wise." He tossed the key on the bed.

"I'm not afraid of you, if that's what you think," she muttered, climbing up on the table.

"I don't think that at all," he said, his dark gaze trained on her as she sat down. "Spread your legs… like you do for Alma-Tadema and Leighton."

"Screw you." There was fury in her gaze.

"Do as you're told."

"We're done," she said briskly, beginning to slide off the table. "Play your games with someone else."

Her feet hadn't touched the floor when he was beside her, his fingers shackling her wrists, holding her in place on the table edge. Leaning close, his dark hair fell forward, framing his face, and his heavy-lidded eyes, redolent with lust, blatantly offered her sex. "Please spread your legs," he said quietly.

She struggled against his hold, moody, disquieted-by his tantalizing virility, by her inability to resist. "You have to apologize first," she said, terse, resentful.

"Tell me if you're sleeping with them."

"Apologize."

A taut silence fell.

The muscles in his shoulders rippled as his grip tightened, his fierce gaze bore into hers for a moment, and then, inhaling deeply, he looked away. A second passed, then two in this sexual standoff-a voiceless, muted contention. Somewhere a clock chimed, and as though some signal had been given, Sam slowly released his breath and met her gaze again. "I apologize," he said, his voice tight as a drum.

"In that case," she ground out, each word mutinous with malcontent, "no, I'm not."

"I don't know if I believe you."

Incredulous, she stared at him. "I beg your pardon?"

"Call me cynical," he said gruffly.

"Some people have principles," she replied hotly. "Some people are discriminating about their bed partners," she added, each word trenchant with affront. "Some people don't sleep with everyone who crosses their path, present company excepted, of course."

His sudden smile dazzled, like a glorious rainbow after the storm. "You don't say."

"I do-most emphatically." She refused to smile. "So I hope we're finished with your jealousy."

He jerked back, apprehension flaring in his eyes. "I'm not jealous."

Sensing that the equation of lust or fascination or whatever term best described their extraordinary attraction was suddenly more equable, Alex's mood altered. "Well then," she said amiably, her mouth curving in amusement, "that should make everything so much easier."

Not about to acknowledge anything so outre as jealousy, Sam dipped his head and spoke with similar casualness. "By way of explanation, when I saw you posing last night, I wanted to carry you off and make love to you for a thousand years or so. Nothing excessive, you understand," he said with a deprecating lift of his hand. "You just have that effect on me."

"I understand completely," she agreed, the degree of excess he incited beyond comprehension.

"Does that understanding extend to, say, a more physical harmony? I apologize in advance for my licentious impulses, but you're irresistible."

"You have a certain compelling charm as well," she told him, her gaze dropping to his seemingly indefatigable erection.

He'd seen that look a thousand times. But Miss Ionides was more of an enigma than most, so when he spoke he was conciliatory in the extreme. "Does that mean you might be willing to spread your legs forme?"

"When you ask so nicely…" She slowly opened her legs. "I'd be delighted."

"We'd both be delighted," he said with feeling. Leaning forward, he grasped her around the waist, lifted her to the center of the table, eased her thighs slightly wider with his palms. "Now, that's even more delightful," he approved, his gaze focused on her sweet, damp cleft. "Do you masturbate?"

"Good God, Ranelagh." Leaning back on her hands, she quirked one brow. "You certainly ask a lot of questions. Isn't it enough that we simply enjoy ourselves tonight?"

"Do you?"

She surveyed him for a critical moment. "Sometimes, if you must know."

"Would you like to now?"

"Why should I, when I have you?"

"Because then I could watch."

Her lashes half lowered over her eyes. "I thought you weren't a voyeur?"

"I was planning on participating."

His smile was intriguing, along with the rest of him. "So I'd have you to look forward to-afterward," she observed pleasantly.

"Without question."

"One can hardly refuse such gallantry."

He almost said something impertinent but caught himself in time. Miss Ionides didn't respond to orders, although she responded to just about anything else. In the interests of future satisfaction, he was polite. "That would be for you to decide."

She grinned. "You're not taking any chances, are you?"

"Not a one," he replied with a flashing smile. "And whenever you want to stop, you just let me know."

"Because you can go all night?"

"Because I'm interested in pleasing you," he said, unutterably well mannered.

She laughed. "You really are good, Ranelagh."

"We try, ma'am," he replied silkily.

"And with enormous success, I don't doubt."

He wasn't about to answer that. "Later on, let me know." He traced his fingertip up the warmth of her inner thigh, reaching out with his other hand to lift his hairbrush from the dresser top. "I'm always open to suggestions."

She was about to answer, when the pad of his finger touched the nub of her clitoris and a frisson of pleasure refocused her attention. With extreme delicacy, he caressed the silken tissue, over and around, up and down, in a slow, delectable massage, while she leaned back and felt the rapture travel upward and outward in rippling waves. He was painstakingly subtle, his fondling leisured, controlled, as though he understood the finite degrees of bewitchment and female arousal. As though he might have done this once or twice before and after a time, in answer to her softly undulating hips and breathy pleas, he slipped his fingers inside her honeyed warmth and explored the sweet paradise that kept his cock standing stiff.

In very short order, she was quivering under his hands, her swollen tissue weighty with blood, her senses aflame. Aching for consummation, for his primed cock and consummate skill, she turned more demanding. "I want you now," she said as a spoiled heiress might.

He refused, although with infinite politeness. He knew better now. "Let's try this first," he suggested, taking up the teakwood hairbrush, twisting the handle and lifting it away.

"You said-you didn't-have women here." Her breath was gone, lost to lust.

"This is for hiding diamonds." He held out the teak handle so she could see its hollowed core. "It's African, and I don't have women here. It's virgin."

For a flashing moment, she debated his honesty, but frenzied, nearly dizzy for wanting him, her next ravenous pulse beat vanquished unnecessary thought.

"Why don't we see how you like something virgin." The faint curve of his mouth was more a grimace than a smile. "There's a novelty…" Not sure she was listening any longer, not sure himself why her sexual experience seemed to matter so, he turned his attention to an activity sure to please them both. Slipping the smooth wooden tip of the brush handle into her pouty slit, he slid the polished wood around the verge of her throbbing labia with exquisite finesse until she lifted her hips, reaching for more. "Not just yet," he whispered, smoothing his hand over her hip as though gentling a skittish filly. "I want you wetter…"

"Sam!" Half-whimper, half-plea, she tried to brush his hand away.

"Hush, darling," he soothed, his voice velvety, holding her still. "Don't move and I'll give you more."

She instantly quieted, and his erection surged higher, submission a powerful aphrodisiac. He chided himself briefly for such uncharitable impulses, but she was lying before him in all her opulent womanhood, predaceous in her desires, and charity didn't stand a chance against primal lust.

He slid the makeshift dildo in a calculated two inches, and stopped. "More?" he inquired gently, driven by some inexplicable need for sovereignty over her.

Her lashes lifted, and the smoldering heat in her eyes was potent answer.

"You look ready," he whispered, spreading the swollen flesh of her labia with his fingers, pushing the teak handle two inches deeper.

She softly moaned as her tissue slowly yielded to the pressure of his invasion, gently arched her back at the delicious flood of rapture. He could deliver nirvana on cue, she blissfully thought, basking in a warm, gossamer ecstasy. "I might have to bring you home," she breathed. "You're so much better at this than I."

This wasn't the place to mention the extent of his practice. He bent to kiss her instead, brushing her lush mouth with his, burying the wooden handle the last providential measure into her welcoming flesh, inhaling her rapturous cry as he held it solidly in place. Then, lifting his mouth away, he gently ran his fingers over her labia, closing her pouty lips over the lodged handle.

She whimpered at the slight pressure of his fingers, her tissue stretched, filled, crammed to surfeit, the resulting jolt to her fevered senses almost too much to bear. But the continuing massage, no matter how delicate, drove the dildo deeper, brought her passions, raging and overwrought, near orgasmic, she rocked against the stunning delirium.

His palm was pressed hard against her wet cunt. She was eager, frenzied, hungry for sex, and for the first time in his life he felt an overwhelming urge to keep a woman. He didn't question his motives, self-indulgent too long; he only understood he wanted her-preferably in bondage to his whims. And all the fairy tales of women imprisoned in towers or cottages deep in the woods suddenly took on a licentious cast. The fact that he wished to keep her for himself alone, available and in rut, didn't bear close scrutiny, so he ground his hand against her flaming cunt instead, replacing disquieting thoughts with the familiar constant in his life-sex.

Her breathy scream exploded in the shadowed room, and she melted under his hand. Quickly catching her as she slipped backward, he gathered her in his arms, holding her close as her last shuddering spasms died away. He glanced at the clock, anticipating the remainder of the night with pleasure, fairytale images of the delectable Miss Ionides as his personal bond servant a decidedly lascivious fantasy. When she stirred in his arms a moment later, when her eyelids fluttered open, he said, "You can come again… soon… and then, if you're very good… next time-"

"I'll let you have sex with me," she whispered.

He leaned back, astonishment in his gaze. "You'll let me?"

Postcoital now, returned to the world, she smiled, sat up, and caught her breath. Her rising had stirred the dildo, stimulating already overstimulated nerves, and quickly reaching down, she moved to extract it.

He caught her hand. "I don't think you understand."

"You don't understand," she countered softly, shaking his hand off.

"What? About you wanting cock?"

"About this propensity of yours for supremacy."

"Or yours."

They gazed at each other for a charged moment, these two people familiar only with compliance.

"You don't stand a chance, sweetheart," he drawled gently. "Because you want to come again."

"And you don't?"

"Not with the same, shall we say, greediness."

"We can't all be libertines," she said with a sniff.

"Nor would I want you to be," he returned softly. "Except when your ready passion is conveniently mine."

"I don't find it currently convenient."

"I might disagree," he replied with despicable calmness.

"That's your prerogative, of course." She reached for the dildo again, only to find herself curtailed by Sam's firm grasp.

"Why don't we see?" Forcing her back down onto the table, he rested his hand directly above her mons. It was a light, skimming touch for a brief moment before he exerted a tempered pressure on an especially sensitive portion of her already oversensitized anatomy, bringing it into contact with the submerged dildo.

She tried not to gasp at the searing jolt, but he knew how prone that particular area was to arousal. He wasn't surprised at her sudden stillness. "Feeling a little something?" he asked impudently, massaging her susceptible flesh lightly into the unyielding dildo, watching with a knowing competence as she speedily came to fever point. This particular neat-handed skill was the result of a long-ago liaison with a celebrated French actress who had a fancy for young men, and it was always effective.

In fact it was a headlong rush to orgasm, and he took note of the unmistakable evidence of the lady's readiness in the creamy fluid issuing from her insatiable cunt. The liquid oozed in pearly rivulets down her thighs, and he was relatively sure there was no longer any question whether her passions were currently involved.

"Do you want to come?" he inquired with unabashed insolence. "All you have to do is ask."

She heard his voice through a wall of insensibility; sheer will lifted her lashes. "Go to hell."

He shouldn't care; he shouldn't insist. On an intellectual level, he disapproved of submission. "Tell me," he said.

He was leaning over her, the scent of his hair sweet in the air, his bronze skin even darker in the shadows, the powerful muscles of his arms taut as he waited for her answer. Thick black hair dusted his forearms and fingers, his virility mesmerizing. Her gaze dropped to the engorged beauty of his upthrust erection, and ultimate temptation lured and seduced. Perhaps he'd been right when he'd said she needed a man like him. Perhaps he was right about everything.

"What do I have to do to have you?" Her voice was strong, not needy, her gaze direct.

He raised his brows and flexed his wrist. "Instead of this?"

She shuddered at the riveting pleasure.

"Why not both?" he suggested softly.

"Together?" Shock registered in the blurted-out word.

"You decide."

"No… no," she said quickly, the look in his eyes wolfish, hungry. An instant later, she wondered if she'd imagined the wicked gleam, because his dark eyes were alight with laughter.

"You're sweet as candy underneath it all, aren't you?" he teased.

He was so damnably tempting-even his wickedness. "I don't know," she breathed, her sensibilities in chaos. "With the exception of wanting you, I don't know anything at all anymore."

He knew what she meant, but he'd been the object of pursuit too long. He was wary. "It doesn't matter." The phrase was ambiguous, as were his thoughts, but gentleman that he was, he slipped the dildo out.

"They say intellect is much overrated," she remarked, reading something different into his words, throwing caution to the wind in any event. Only ravenous desire mattered, Alex decided, pulling his head down for a kiss and making love to this man who made her forget everything but wanting him.

Meeting her passionate kiss with equal ardor, Sam decided the way he was feeling right now, he'd be more than satisfied to keep the bewitching Miss Ionides impaled on his erection for the foreseeable future and all the rest be damned. Grasping her hips, he hauled her bottom to the edge of the table, lifted her legs onto his shoulders and, bending forward, guided his erection to her alluring cunt and proceeded to execute his single-minded plan.

When he woke the next morning, he was momentarily startled to find a woman in his bed. For a dreadful moment he thought he was with Penelope again. The error immediately corrected itself in his brain, and more pleasant sensations came to the fore, along with lush memories of the previous night.

Alex was truly remarkable, unrestrained in her passion-and also in her demands, he recalled, smiling. The satisfying feel of her in his arms this morning was equally remarkable, for he preferred waking up alone. He'd have to find a larger bed, he thought, if they were to make use of his secret apartment. A moment of apprehension struck him at such an extraordinary consideration, and in the cold light of day, with his independence at stake, he decided the bed was perfectly fine. He wasn't ready to alter his life for a woman. Particularly not after having known Miss Ionides, however remarkable her talents, for less than a day.

Unsettled by his thoughts, he unconsciously shifted his position. The slight movement brought Alex awake.

When she smiled at him, his reservations vanished, and when she stretched up to kiss him, he forgot all but the tantalizing promise in her smile.

"I recall someone like you making me very happy last night," she sighed. "Are you still available, or does duty call?"

"What did you have in mind?" he drawled.

"I was thinking about something sexual," she breathed.

His brows rose. "How sexual?"

"Surprise me…"

He laughed. "I'm not sure I have any surprises left after last night."

"Something simple will be equally appreciated." She twisted her hips slightly, and her damp cleft slid up his thigh.

"As long as it's soon?" he said, smoothing his palm down her bottom, touching her slippery wetness with his fingertips.

"And long and hard… like this," she purred, lightly grasping his swelling erection.

He rolled over her a second later, plunged into her waiting sweetness, and bid the lady in his bed good morning with such extravagant lasciviousness, neither heard the sounds of the City waking outside. It was a tropical morning in Queen Elizabeth's bed; it was a dawn of obsession for two people who had until then been unaware of the concept; it was a private, sequestered world filled with dazzling pleasures.

Much later, when passions were quenched, when the level of satiation and contentment was sufficient to let in the outside world, when the chiming of the clock seemed to have become conspicuously shrill, they reluctantly rose from the bed and even more reluctantly dressed to face the events of the day.

Sam extended an impulsive invitation for breakfast, when he'd never actually shared his breakfast with a lover. Alex accepted, when she'd not been sure she could speak of mundane things after the glorious splendor she'd experienced. But they found they could converse like ordinary humans and that they both liked bacon more than eggs and not kippers at all. After three cups of coffee, they agreed as well that most of the problems of the world were entirely solvable.

When it came time for Alex to leave, Sam escorted her downstairs and helped her into his carriage. He had a meeting that morning; she had plans to work and appointments scheduled.

"You're sure you don't mind if I don't see you home," he said once again, not wishing to offend.

"I prefer you not see me home," she replied with a smile. "Just in case my family is parked on my doorstep."

"You know best." He leaned in and gently kissed her.

"Thank you for a most enjoyable… time," she whispered. "You certainly know how to entertain a lady."

"And I consider myself the most fortunate of men," he replied graciously.

She smiled. "Adieu, then, Ranelagh."

"Sam."

"Sam," she repeated, and after a hushed moment glanced past him to the sidewalk.

Taking his cue, he moved back and shut the door.

She waved once and smiled.

He nodded at his driver.

And the carriage pulled away from the curb.

But rather than his normal relief at taking leave of a lover, a niggling discontent insinuated itself into his brain.

She hadn't once asked "When will I see you again" or "Won't you come over soon" or any of the familiar cajoling female phrases he was used to evading.

He was not only surprised but mildly annoyed.

And, more startling, disappointed.

For her part, Alex was wondering if she'd ever see him again. Realistic about the viscount, she wasn't unduly optimistic. Her view was purely rational, quite separate from the blissful happiness she was feeling. Ranelagh certainly knew how to leave a woman ardently aglow. But if he didn't call upon her, her life was entirely complete without a man. After two husbands, she was well past the point of needing a man in her life. And not from malcontent. Rather, she was enjoying the broad and diverse pleasures of her unmarried state.

As the carriage took her away from the beauty of last night, though, a small sigh escaped her.

If Ranelagh didn't call on her, she would miss his magnificent and inventive talents in bed, she thought selfishly.