One Night Is Never Enough (17 page)

He pulled away from her slowly. Letting the invisible net stretch along her skin, twisting about her. His eyes connected with hers, hot and dark, unreadable.

“What you do to me.”

She wasn’t sure which of them said it. But new Charlotte owned every word.

“Why are you sitting there, and why am I over here?” Her voice was breathless, half-turned and inclined as she was in her position—which was
not
thrown over the settee.

His eyes examined her, some cool amusement sinking back in, covering the darkness, the naked want. “I could have chosen to sit on the other side of the desk, but I hate desks.”

She took a moment to process his statement—his lack of an answer to her real question—as he reclined in his chair, lash back in hand. Sprawled and casual.

“Desks are pieces of furniture. You can’t hate them.”

He lifted his brows. “It’s quite possible to dislike furniture.” He smiled, a bit slyly. “You probably like desks, though, as they are very proper and stiff.”

She narrowed her eyes, unnerved by his continual press, advance, then withdrawal. “And you prefer lumpy, disreputable chairs, where the stuffing is poking through?”

He patted the arm. “Disreputable old chairs you can count on.”

“Chairs you should probably replace,” she said tartly.

He gave her a chastising look. “Now, Charlotte, it’s bad form to replace a solid, comfortable chair just because you see a pretty, sleek, new one. A thoroughly loved chair never disappoints.”

Her lips twisted at an odd angle, frozen on her face. “How do you know the desk won’t turn into a well-loved companion piece then? Once the patina wears and the nicks appear? Perhaps it might unbend in time.” She clamped her lips together to stop from uttering something even more ignorant, such as, “desks need love too.”

His eyes pinned hers. “Ah, but instead I choose the
right
chair in the beginning instead of trying to change the desk.”

She smiled, her social smile. “Of course.”

He examined her for a moment, but she couldn’t read the expression. “And sometimes a chair has been used as a desk for so long, it stops believing it is anything else.” He waved a hand suddenly, flicking out the lash so that the cords snapped. “Now, footstools. I think we can both agree that there is something inherently wrong with them.”

She stared at him. “Perhaps you really do require a woman to talk you dumb.”

His mouth pulled, and he stroked the lash threads from root to tip. “Oh, you aren’t giving yourself enough credit, Charlotte. I want you to
suck
me dumb.”

Her mouth opened, but nothing emerged. She should be used to it by now since even when he lured her into thinking of him as cultured, he reverted to uttering something base. Making all manner of things sputter inside of her.

His lips curved into a smirk that she longed to wipe free of his face. “Ah, it’s the smallest of pleasures really that make my day.”

As if the reference to time triggered something, he glanced at a clock in the corner of the room and briskly pulled himself up. “But there isn’t much time left.”

“You mean we aren’t going to sit here for the morning, angled oddly, exchanging repartee while you fondle that . . . that whip?”

Wanting to kiss you?

He smiled, as if he had heard the silent addition. “Unfortunately, no; Samuel will be here any moment.”

She stiffened. “You have invited someone else here?”

He waved a hand. “It’s his house. And you needn’t worry about him keeping your presence a secret. Samuel is a tar pit when it comes to information.”

The relief that came from knowing that the house—and likely everything and everyone in it—belonged to someone else was irritating. Along with the realization that she had
forgotten
any initial thoughts of a harem of other women sometime between climbing the stairs and being devoured.

“That is easy for you to promise. It isn’t your reputation that is at risk,” she said stiffly.

“Isn’t it?” He regarded her for a moment. “But anyway, to the task at hand. Samuel wants to participate in the Delaneys’ project, but he, hmmm, how can I put it, isn’t exactly on the guest list.”

She looked around the study. It wasn’t grand, but whoever owned the house wasn’t poor.

Roman rubbed a hand along the back of his neck. The gesture alarmed her. He was always a self-assured man. “Not everyone’s money is . . . clean.”

Someone involved in crime then? “You were invited,” she pointed out.

“Our main businesses are aboveboard. It is our tactics that are questioned.”

She wondered what “other” businesses they might have that
weren’t
aboveboard.

“Well, prostitution is really just a matter of making sure the prostitutes are happy, right?” she said.

She meant it to be a joke, but Roman’s eyes lit up. “Exactly. Perfect.”

“Wh—?”

He waved a hand. “I should have known you wouldn’t hold it against them. Here is how things will work then. You help with this each morning for a week, and I will pay one of your father’s debts each day.”

Her mind was whirling, still clamping around the prostitution response. What the devil did he—

“The most important debts, of course,” he said. “Easy enough to see which ones weigh the heaviest.”

Something suddenly sparked through the swirling confusion. She lowered her eyes briefly, before meeting his. “Oh?”

His lips curled, his fingers pulling along the lash again. “Only your father’s debts. You didn’t think I’d relinquish such a claim on
you,
did you? Tsk, tsk, Charlotte.”

She tilted her head, trying not to come to terms with how she felt relief at
that
too. “What is this task you need help with?”

“Simply a matter of some advice. Linking resources together. Helping where you can.”

She frowned. She hardly needed to be paid to give advice, but before she could ask anything else, the door opened.

A large man ambled in with an odd sort of gait. His hair was carefully combed and his shirt freshly pressed, but he appeared uncomfortable as he nodded to both of them quickly, then sat behind the desk. He appeared out of sorts, brushing by social consideration and going straight to business.

He put his hands on the top of the desk. “Merrick ain’t be telling your name, and that’s how we gonna keep it. Name’s Sam. I’ll be calling you Lady.”

It took a moment before she was able to form a reply. She very slowly leaned forward in her chair. “Very well, Sam.”

“Look, I don’t know how they be doing it in yur parts, but I like straightness.”

Luckily inborn replies were automatic. “Straight works well.”

“Good. Here’s the matter. Our money’s no good some places. And we don’t care to spread it much, but the missus wants to do a lil bluh”—he coughed, sending Roman a nervous look before looking back her way—“sweepin’.”

She stared at Sam, unknowing how to respond, or of what he was even speaking.

“ ’Bout time for a lil swa—cleanin’, sweep the bluh—dratted, bug—blighters.”

An odd feeling settled. Was this to be an etiquette lesson then? To clean up his language? She somewhat hoped so, or she was going to be hard-pressed to figure out exactly what he was saying.

“Not every woman wants to remain a tro—prostitute, as ye know.”

No, no she didn’t know. The odd feeling changed into something that was suspiciously more alarming.

“Some women just do it to fur—make a lil money, get a cu—leg up. Others have nuthin’ better. Lil work and bad bluh—money in the as—factories.”

If she weren’t stunned into stupidity at the moment, she might have nodded for him to continue. As it was, thankfully, he didn’t need the encouragement.

“We want to change the bluh—conditions. Prison, alley, abb—er, brothel. Get some ’greements. Lor ’knows that when I was whor—hirin’ Sally out, I started to feel a bluh—pinch about the emotions.”

“I . . . see.”

Roman Merrick had asked her here in order to give a whoremaster advice. A whoremaster. And the man’s . . . wife? About how to spread money to help women working the streets?

Sam looked relieved. “Ah, good. Cuz there’s nothin’ to be doing for us bluh—street types. Even when’s we fall into money. Need backin’ from Tur—
named
money. Who have the ear of Perlament.”

Charlotte decided to divide the rather odd conversation into compartments. She concentrated on the task rather than the participants. “Do you have specific ideas, or did you want to allocate money to groups that support your aims?”

“Both.” He settled into his chair, looking more relaxed. “Right good of you to de—figure it, Lady.”

She could almost feel the amusement at her back, but there was something more serious in the air behind her as well. She pushed the question of it aside, concentrating on the man seated in front of her as he spoke about specifics.

Half an hour later, Sam exited the room, more excited and relaxed than when he’d walked in. His shirt had been pulled loose from his trousers, in comfortable disarray. He had obviously been uncomfortable putting on whatever show he had thought he needed to perform when he’d first entered.

She stayed facing forward in her seat for a long moment before turning. Roman was still lounging in his chair, pulling the leather through his fingertips.

She waited until he met her eyes. “I believe you have something to say?”

He raised a brow in question.

“Something that might start with, ‘My apologies, Charlotte, I didn’t realize what I was asking you to do’ or maybe ‘Wake up, Charlotte, you’ve been abed too long.’ ”

A lazy smile curved. “If only it could be the latter.” His face grew serious a moment later. “Will you help?”

She examined him, the lazy posture with just a hint of tightness to it.

“Yes.”

He smiled again, everything about him relaxing.

“His—their?—aims are good, and he has some interesting ideas,” she said. “There are a few well-placed women who champion such causes. I know with whom to speak.” She shook her head. “Not quite sure how I will introduce the subject, but I do know the right ears for this.”

“Thank you.”

She examined him again. “You could have asked the Delaneys.”

“Why, when I could ask you?” He smiled slowly.

“The Delaneys have more power than I do.”

For now.
Someday . . .

“But then I’d be beholden to them when I’d much rather be beholden to you.” His smile stretched lazily.

“You don’t need to be beholden at all.” Bad idea to release the winning cards already in her possession, but pride was pride. “This is something I will do without payment. Surely you know that.” Active participation in her charities was something that cleansed her soul. To accept money would go against her every principle.

And if he knew anything about her . . .

“Yes.” His eyes dropped, lips still curved. “Though I will settle a few of your father’s debts anyway. A selfish desire, I assure you. As I want you
free
.”

“Why are you helping Sam?”

He looked up at her through lazy eyes. “Need to
clean
money sometimes. Need to care for different types of employees. I’m not doing it because I’m kind.”

She narrowed her eyes. His name wasn’t mentioned in charitable circles—beyond his singular appearance at the Delaneys’—so his selfish words made sense. Still, he seemed terribly interested in her charity work whenever the subject was raised. And when speaking on the subject, the lines of his body belied the amusement invariably present in his face.

She left her high-backed chair and walked over to sit across from him in one more comfortable.

He watched her, that insufferably light smile about his lips.

And she thought of her options. Of what she had been feeling every night before she fell asleep, every morning as she woke. Every time his lips or fingers touched her.

She could . . . choose her fate. Or at the very least, she could choose the way she fell. Cold and brittle, shattering upon the stones. Or hot and writhing and . . . alive.

“I wish to pay my debt. To give you the night I owe. I can clear my schedule tomorrow and say I’ve taken ill.”

He continued to lounge in his chair, but his eyes were alert, quick. “Why?”

She met his eyes boldly. Thinking of all she knew—and had yet to learn—about the man in front of her. She posed her own question in answer. “Don’t you wish to meet on even ground?”

His eyes sparked, he scooted forward in his chair, elbows on his knees, the lash forgotten. “Oh, Charlotte. You play with fire.”

“Do I?”

Roman looked at the woman in front of him, calm and collected, but there was heat there, such precious heat that was straining. Offering.