The Devil in Her Bed (Devil You Know #3) - Kerrigan Byrne Page 0,15
been the villain all along.
He had been a true devil that night. Flirting with and scandalizing Cecelia Teague, enraging Ramsay in the process.
Normally, he would have enjoyed himself, but not with her in the room. Only steps away. Sharing air and space. It was all he could do not to become distracted as the sound of Francesca’s bawdy laugh, unrepentant and decidedly unfeminine, shot waves of pleasure chills down his body.
He’d caught her eye a few times. That is, he’d caught her looking. At him. Like that.
Like she was the sun, and she already knew he was a mass of ice and ash and shadow, just waiting to be pulled into her orbit. Yearning for a touch of her warmth.
Which was strange, because the Countess of Mont Claire, while known for the heat of her bed, was equally as notorious for the ice in her heart.
He reached for his own brand of cool composure, and found it dispelled by the inferno she’d ignited within him.
He couldn’t forget … that he didn’t believe she was who she claimed to be.
And the one way he would find out was to get her naked and inspect every inch of her lithe and creamy body.
Galvanized by the thought, the Devil of Dorset stood, stepped out of the bath, and whipped from the rack a towel with which to dry himself.
Who would he be to her now? Who would she desire? Who would she let get close?
The devil, as they were wont to say, was in the details.
He flipped through the mental files of who’d already claimed to have had her. Most recently, Lord Colfax.
The thought of the disgusting old sod heaving himself between her thighs forced him to fight an acid retch threatening to escape his stomach.
What could the man possibly have done to seduce her? It had made sense when she’d left the Savoy luncheon with Terence Folsom for an afternoon tryst some weeks ago; he was a randy young buck with an elegant manner and a winsome smile.
George Randle had lifted a few eyebrows, as he was a portly fellow, but his wit and wealth seemed to make him a favorite with dames and debutantes alike.
No one had believed the inbred libertine earl, Henry Blankenship, when he’d claimed to have spent the night with her, but then he and Percy Morton had exchanged notes on her lovemaking. That had shocked the ton double, because everyone had whispered that Morton was an invert, only interested in bedding other men.
The list of her lovers became only more varied and bizarre from there.
It was enough to put a man off his dinner. Not only that, it made his job all that much more difficult …
How did one seduce a woman with unpredictable tastes? She certainly didn’t have a physical type. Nor did she prefer the young or the old. Swarthy or pale.
They’d not all been titled, either, her irritatingly various lovers. One was an officer of the court. Another a banker who, in turn, knew a speculator who’d claimed to have shared her with his twin brother.
Most of the others had been lords.
All of them had one thing in common. They’d wielded a great deal of influence in their spheres. More than they ought, in general.
Was it possible Lady Francesca Cavendish was impassioned by power?
Because power he could do.
He stood in front of his mirror, studying a body hardened with it. Of course, even as he dried the dips and swells of his muscled form, he understood that power was so much more than brute strength.
It was control. Discipline. Wealth. Influence. Charisma. It was the command of oneself and others. Power was fear and love, envy and adoration.
And he could manipulate all of these.
The question was, How could he flex his power for her, specifically? In what way would she react to him? Which power would put him above the pack?
He stared at the features he detested, hair he always covered, the eyes that haunted him in suffocating nightmares.
He hated the man in the mirror, as much as he hated the one in his memory …
All of this was his fault.
Blinking the thought away, he went to work.
Becoming someone else wasn’t so hard. Certainly, the props and prosthetics helped, but that would truly fool no one for long. The true art was in the small things. The thrust of his jaw, the shape and movement of his brows, tension in his lips and cheeks. The muscles too minuscule to define working to create an entirely