Lady Rosabella's Ruse - By Ann Lethbridge Page 0,64

he prowled towards her. As if she sensed a threat, her chin came up, her nostrils flared and she inhaled a deep breath. Her breasts beneath the fine lawn nightgown with its edges of finest lace rose up as if offering their bounty. Yet beneath the warm lovely skin he saw the throb of her heart, a beat of panic and warning.

A smile touched her lips. A lie, of course. Bravado he could not help but admire.

He picked up the brush and continued where the maid had left off, long slow strokes down the shimmering midnight-black tresses. He raised a hank to his nose and inhaled the subtle scent of soap and woman.

His blood grew thick and heavy, its beat a solid pulse in his shaft. He continued his brushing, long slow strokes, and watched her face in the mirror, the lowering of her lids over eyes gone smoky, the speeding up of her breath, the rapid pulse beat at the base of her throat. Heat wafted up from her body.

‘Enjoy your bath?’ he murmured in her ear.

Goose-flesh rose on her shoulders and her arms. A little shiver vibrated the warm air against his face. The primal urge to toss aside the brush and throw her on the bed, to force her to his will, was close to overpowering.

‘Thank you, I enjoyed it very much,’ she said in her low throaty voice that was like a rough stroke of firm fingers on his shaft.

‘I’m glad.’

She looked up at him in the mirror, the gold burst around her large pupils glittering. ‘I have a proposition.’

He almost laughed. How like this woman to go on the attack when already she’d been defeated.

Not too many men would try to bargain from a position of weakness, something his brother, Kit, had told him over and over again in their business dealings.

Garth liked her spirit. There was a great deal about this woman he liked. A surprising amount. He rarely liked them at all.

He ran the back of his hand down her jaw, watching the skin flicker beneath his touch, feeling the silky texture of her skin and the delicate contours of bone.

He set the brush down, silver side up, and clasped her elbows in his palms, slowly lifting her to stand with her back to him, the stool at his knees the flimsiest of barriers, her nape exposed and vulnerable. Her gaze met his in the glass, and in that brief clash, her eyes looked completely honest, open, trusting.

The notion that she fooled him so easily gripped his gut in an iron fist. The only place a woman was ever honest was in bed, beneath his touch. There his skill was so honed, so refined, he could expose them utterly.

Gentle pressure on her arm turned her to face him. He tipped her face with his thumb and forefinger, brushing her full lying mouth with his thumb.

Her eyes widened, not in fear, but desire.

‘A proposition,’ he purred against the soft flesh of her neck. ‘Do enlighten me.’

A quick deep breath lifted the swell of her breasts within a whisker of his chest. He waited for whatever would come out of her mouth with anticipation. A sense of excitement at the challenges she would present, before she revealed her secrets.

‘If I…if we do this now…’ Her voice was low and breathless and his loins responded to the sound instantly. ‘Will you help me with an audition at the Haymarket?’

He tipped his head.

‘It is all I will ask of you. A chance to be heard. I have debts I must pay. A singing role would help pay them.’

Her gaze met his full on.

Truth. This was the truth.

After so many deceits it was merely the start. And besides, the idea that she thought she could walk away after one night had his blood running hot with anger.

‘A proposition indeed.’ He bent his head and took her lips in a brief brush of a kiss. She tipped her head to grant him better access, slid her arms around his neck the better to woo him to her will. She’d forgotten he was a past master at the game of love and she was still a novitiate.

The image pleased him.

He broke away and cupped her cheek. ‘Let us talk about it later.’

Her shoulders stiffened. ‘No. We will talk about it now. These are my terms—’

‘Your terms?’ He mocked. ‘The terms were set the night you gave up your maidenhead.’

Eyes huge, she shook her head. ‘Why? It is done. What can