The Courtesan's Daughter (22 page)

This was no time to realize yet again that she was her mother’s daughter in the most embarrassing of ways.

“Why not? You agreed to do it. No one forced you to make our bargain. Actually, in the efforts of honesty, you seemed eager enough just a few moments ago. Perhaps if I kissed you again? Fondled you? Perhaps then you could be led down the well-trod path of
wanting
to bare your breasts for me?”

“You are
horrible
, and wicked, and …
horrible
!” she choked out. Because, actually, there was some wicked truth to what he’d said. There was nothing for her but that she must hate him for it. “And what do you mean by ‘well-trod path’? I can assure you that
I
have never done, have never even contemplated … that no one has ever—”

“Yes,” he interrupted, showing every sign of colossal boredom, “I am quite sure that all this is new to you. Your innocence, one might even say your naïve behavior, assuredly speaks volumes on your behalf.”

Caro reared back as if slapped. It was an insult and nothing less. Only Ashdon could make inexperience in debauchery sound like an insult.

She
would
be her mother’s daughter, blast him. After all, they were to have been married, almost. In fact, she could have him for a husband at any time; one needed only to have him collected and deposited upon her doorstep, like a very bruised plum.

“Why thank you, Lord Ashdon,” she said stiffly, “but I daresay
your
kisses wouldn’t help at all.” She had the exquisite joy of seeing him snap forward in his chair, his eyes gleaming like knives. “I’ll certainly keep to our bargain,” she continued. “How could I do otherwise? ”

“This from the woman who broke the marriage contract arranged by her mother?” he said with a sly smile. “Now who is lying? ”

“
That
was different.”

“Yes, certainly. That would have required that you keep your clothes on until you were married. This is without doubt the better path.”

“I choose my own path. That is the entire point.”

“I was under the impression that the entire point was to get you bare-breasted, a feast for my eyes and hands and mouth. We can’t seem to agree on anything, can we, Caro?”

Her nipples tingled in response to his words and to his gaze upon her, so stern and yet so sad. He was an odd man, this Earl of Ashdon, odd in that he either seemed to be fighting some demon within himself or fighting her. She quite decided that she preferred not to share him with any demon. From now on, Ashdon would fight her, if she could manage it. She was quite certain she could.

She
was
her mother’s daughter, and she was not going to let Ashdon forget it.

“I can think of one thing we’ll agree on,” she said.

“What’s that?” he asked.

“In a few minutes, we’re both going to agree that I have exceptionally lovely breasts.”

She didn’t have any idea at all of how to describe the look in his eyes, except to say that she liked it very much, even if it was a bit frightening. Still, although he looked rather fierce, it was a fierceness that made her smile deep inside. Very deep inside. It wouldn’t do at all if Ashdon realized that she was winning.

What would her mother do in such a situation? She wouldn’t act nervous or shy, and she wouldn’t show any fear, that was certain. What was it about her mother that made men go limp and women try to emulate her, for she was copied, after a fashion. There was that time years ago when her mother had worn red and blue parrot feathers in her artfully arranged hair and for the next two months, every woman in town had worn parrot feathers. None of them, according to her father, had ever achieved Sophia’s casual élan, but as her daughter, Caro fully expected to have a leg up in that regard. As to the parrot feathers, she remembered it so well because she had asked her mother about it when the price of parrot feathers had risen to unheard of heights, and she still remembered very clearly what her mother had said.

Effortless. She had to loosen her bodice and display her breasts to a man, and it must appear effortless.

She could do that.

“The disturbance is rising on the other side of that door,” Ashdon said. “If you still contend that you’re going to actually honor our agreement, you’d best get on with it.”

Caro cleared her throat softly and said, “Let them wait. I shall do this in my own time and in my own fashion.”

Ashdon raised his eyebrows and held his tongue. It was a promising beginning. She didn’t want Ashdon’s voice in her ears, having his eyes upon her and his long legs stretched out toward her was quite enough. What she needed was to hear Sophia’s voice in her head. What would her mother do? What would she say? After a lifetime of exposure, and after interrupting countless minor seductions between her mother and father, she had a solid notion.

Caro reached up with her left hand and slowly peeled off her elbow-length white glove. Ashdon watched her avidly, his clear blue eyes going smoky.

“I shall need to remove these, I’m afraid,” she said softly, keeping her eyes on her arms. “I shall want my hands free when I untie my bodice and loosen it. Do you not agree, Lord Ashdon? ”

“Uh, yes,” he said. His voice sounded scratched and worn. She took that as a good sign.

She slowly slipped the other glove off and then slid both gloves through her hands, caressing them like a silky cat, before handing them out to Lord Ashdon, saying, “Would you be so good as to hold these for me, Lord Ashdon?”

Ashdon leaned forward and took the gloves, laying them carefully over one of his knees. He never took his eyes from her and they glowed like blue embers. She took that as a good sign as well.

“I may have a bit of trouble with this cord,” she said, fingering the long silk cord that was tied under her breasts and trailed down the front of her gown to her knees. “My maid had to tie it very tight. I might require your assistance, my lord, as the pearls you gave me tonight hang a bit lower than the cord. Do you mind?”

“No,” he said. Actually, he didn’t so much speak as growl. As Lord Ashdon was a bit given to growling, especially at her, she took that as a good sign as well. Things were going quite well, all in all. The fact that she could scarcely breathe was not going to be factored in.

He stood, filling the small room, the candles dancing at the movement, the moving shadows highlighting the arc of his brow, his fine cheekbones, his chiseled jaw. He was a tall man of well-turned leg and broad shoulders. He had a mouth not given to smiling and eyes that experienced joy too seldom. There was a sadness about him that intrigued her, for she could not name its source. Sorrow and sensuality tumbled within him, fighting for dominance. She was an ally of sensuality. Let sorrow retreat, abandoning the fight for him.

“They’re lovely pearls, aren’t they?” she asked, touching the strand at its lowest point. “I’m so glad you gave them to me.”

He stood staring down at her, mute. She handed him the tasseled ends of her cording, which he took. It looked for all the world like she was his captive, led on a silken rope.

“Thank you, my lord,” she breathed, avoiding his eyes. If she looked at him, she would remember who he was and who she was and that this was a game that she wanted to win, even if she had forgotten why. “This bodice tie is very weak. I shall have no trouble with it, but you, you must be very adept and very determined or the cording will defeat you. I should not want,” she said on a broken sigh, “you to be defeated, my lord.”

“I shall not be,” he murmured, pulling her to him by the ends of the cording. “Not in this, Caro. Never in this.”

She walked toward him with tiny steps, her head lowered, her gaze averted, but she did not stop walking. She came on. Her mother would have done no less.

When he had her close, when she was tucked under his chin and within the length of his arms, he stopped. She stopped.

His scent tantalized her. Ashdon had what she could only describe as a clean smell: clean linen, clean hair, clean skin. Like the top of a mountain, like winter on a lake, like a spring meadow. Like Ashdon. The world seemed full of scents, of perfumes and flowers and cloying, sweetly spiced odors, but Ashdon smelled clean, and because of him all other scents were the lie of clean. A mockery of Ashdon.

She loosened the tie of her bodice and let it gape open to reveal the top edge of her chemise. Her stays were small and did not cover her breasts. It was the French fashion, and everyone knew the French excelled at fashion. Besides, her mother had told her what to wear, from her skin to the pearls at her ears. Had she known this would happen? Had she somehow known that Ashdon would immediately demand his privilege bought with pearls? She had known about the challenge, it had been her idea, after all, but had Sophia known that Ashdon would be so angry and so impatient?

Of course she had known.

Perhaps it had not been Ashdon who had told Dutton and Blakesley of her pearl price. Perhaps that had been Sophia’s doing as well. It was logical, or was it? She was not a courtesan. She was not going to be a courtesan. Her mother did not want her to be a courtesan and would never direct her down its path.

Then how did she find herself in the Duke of Hyde’s dressing room with her bodice gaping and Lord Ashdon … bewitched?

Bewitched was such a short step from besotted.

Ashdon was staring down at her, his eyes burning with passion and need and perhaps just a bit of surprise. She gambled recklessly by looking at him, studying his face, watching the way his mouth opened to take in a heavy breath, to see the line of his dark beard trace his mouth, to note the sweep of his lashes as they reached for his brows and the smoky line of his dark lower lashes.

His eyes smoldered.

She smoldered.

The strand of pearls rolled against her skin, gathering between her breasts, falling out of sight into the hem of her chemise. Ashdon had his hands around her ribs, his thumbs pressed just under her breasts, the cording tangled in his hands and falling over his wrists.

She couldn’t breathe. Her heart hammered under her ribs and she knew he had to feel its wild beating.

Someone hammered at the door to the dressing room from the drawing room. Ashdon pulled her into the shelter of his arms and turned her so that his back was to the door, shielding her.

“This is madness, Caro,” he growled. “Tighten your laces. Cover yourself. I won’t see you ruined this way.”

“I won’t have my honor questioned, my lord,” she said softly. “Let the world call me ruined. You and I shall know that I was paying a debt of honor.”

“Honor be damned! I won’t have you ruined for some stupid game, started for what reason I can’t even remember now.”

“Can’t you, Ash?” she said, tipping her head up to look at his chin. He had a dark beard. She liked that. “You gave me pearls. I give you all that falls within their scope. Don’t you want to touch me? Don’t you want to see if my breasts are as lovely as I claim?”

He swore something, she couldn’t tell what, and then his mouth was on hers and his fingers were in her chemise, pulling it gently down, his fingertip grazing a swollen nipple.

She arched into his hand with a moan of longing and aching and confusion. Could anything feel like this? Could hands on skin do this?

Her bodice collapsed against the cording around her ribs, Ashdon’s hands on her breasts, hard and hot, gentle, relentless. His kiss delved deep and long and she opened her mouth to consume him. The pearls twisted against her breasts; he fisted his hands in the white length of them and pushed her from him, her mouth still seeking his, open and wet, starving for the taste of him.

He stared at her, his eyes a blaze of blue, his breath coming in pants that sounded loud and harsh in the stillness of the silk-lined room. He held her, controlled her, by the pearls, twisted tight now around her neck, his clenched hand a mass of veins and muscle. He looked hungry, hungry and wild, beyond speech, almost beyond thought.

It was the same for her. She was beyond everything but the need for Ashdon.

“Don’t resist,” she urged in a hoarse whisper. “Take what you have won.”

“What are you?” he breathed. “To say such things, to want—”

“A woman,” she breathed, interrupting him. “Nothing more. Just a woman. Tell me it is not a woman you want.”

He shook his head like a man coming out of a nightmare on a cloud-thick night, lost and seeking, afraid. “You don’t even know what you’re saying. You don’t even know what you’re offering.”

“Then show me,” she said, staring into his eyes, wanting him, wanting him to want her.

The door to the dressing room thundered in its frame, the sounds of the assemblie rising to a roar of curiosity and frustration. Ash pulled her to him roughly, the pearls his chain, and kissed her hard, fast, and then released her and the pearls.

“Cover yourself,” he barked.

She tried. She did, but her hands were clumsy with passion, trembling with what they’d done and what she’d wanted him to do. He was right; she wasn’t at all certain she knew what it was she wanted, but she knew she wanted it from him.

Ash stood barring the door as she fumbled with her bodice. Her chemise was twisted, her lips felt swollen, and her hair felt tumbled. She was certain she looked as if she had been, tumbled, that is.

The door flew inward with a bang, the crush in the drawing room surging behind it. Caro jerked her head upward, her hands to her floppy bodice while Ashdon stood directly in front of her, a shield from curious eyes. At the front of the group stood Lord Henry Blakesley, fourth son of the Duke of Hyde. He wore an amused expression, as was his habit. At his side stood Sophia, whose expression fluctuated between amazement and approval.

“How lovely,” Sophia said. “I see the wedding is back on.”