by Lenora Bell
Charlene touched Manon’s hand. “Thank you.”
“It is my pleasure.” Manon gathered the discarded dress, petticoats, and slippers. “You know? The duke, he doesn’t stand a chance.” She closed the door behind her.
Charlene ran a hand over her breasts, over peaks that stood out against the creamy satin of the negligee. Lower, over her belly and down, between her thighs, to a pulse that beat, faint but steady.
Would he touch her there?
And, if he did, would she be severed from the old Charlene forever?
Her sensible gray dress and worn leather boots had to be in the bottom of one of the trunks, waiting for her. She could find them right now. Run away.
Before it was too late.
She took a step toward the dressing room.
Satin swirled around her legs.
Jasmine and vanilla drifted in her hair.
No fear, remember?
She heard Grant’s chilling voice in her mind. Don’t fight me, little bird. I’ve waited too long for this.
She was no man’s doxy. She would see this through. For Lulu. For her mother. For their freedom.
But also . . . for herself.
She wanted the duke’s hands on her, where her hands had been.
She wanted him.
For her.
Charlene stared at the woman in the mirror.
Two women stared back.
One still closed and barricaded. Wary of her mission and of the duke.
One impatient and ready for sin.
She wanted to go to him.
Hurry up, the wicked self said. Take your fill. Enough to last a lifetime.
Outside the kitchens, Charlene breathed in the familiar scent of chocolate and spices.
The duke.
She stopped for a moment to pinch her cheeks and fluff her hair around her shoulders. Slowly, she pushed the heavy wooden door open, her stomach fizzing.
There was someone cooking chocolate on the range. But it wasn’t the duke. Her throat closed with disappointment and she almost ran away, but Mrs. Mendoza turned her head and saw her.
“Come here.” She motioned to Charlene with her head.
At Charlene’s puzzled glance, the old woman smiled. “See what I’m making.”
Charlene sniffed the mixture. Red chili peppers bobbed in the bubbling liquid. It smelled spicy and thick. The peppers made her sneeze.
Mrs. Mendoza laughed. Even though her face was weathered, and wreathed with deep wrinkles, her brown eyes shone bright and clear.
“Don’t you want to take some chocolate to the duke?” She smiled slyly.
“Do you know where he is?”
Mrs. Mendoza stopped whisking. “Outside. He has been working on the cocoa press. We will make the finest drinking chocolate together. My family’s cocoa beans will be famous in all of England.”
She poured the mixture into a large stoneware mug, placing a towel over the mug and wrapping it tight. She handed it to Charlene and guided her toward the back entrance to the kitchens and out into the night air. “Hurry, or it will be cold. Follow the path. You see his light.”
There was a light wavering in the windows of the structure where the duke had kissed her earlier today.
“But I—”
“Go. Quickly.” Mrs. Mendoza clapped her hands. “Rápido, por favor.”
Charlene clutched her dressing gown closed with her free hand. Was she really supposed to walk across the lawns and disturb the duke? The countess wouldn’t know where to find them.
This was not the plan.
The door closed in her face.
She shivered in the cold air. Began to walk along the path, toward the duke’s light.
His gardens were meticulously maintained. Moonlight glinted on a white marble fountain, and the trim hedges cast long shadows around her. No piece of bracken would dare poke sideways on these ruthlessly perpendicular hedges.
The pathway was lined with red roses. Charlene was more accustomed to roses bound together and stacked in piles in the wheelbarrows of the flower vendors at the Covent Garden market. Here they were rooted in the soil, able to whisper to their sisters at night.
Soon, when the sun warmed them and the rain fed them, they would open. Petal by petal. Unfurling into the sun, offering what they had to give. Color, scent, beauty.
The lives of the girls at the Pink Feather were like those London roses—clipped too early, forced to unfurl. How small their world was. Bordered by soot-stained walls and doors that closed on the commerce of lust.
Charlene wanted them to be able to put down roots. Soak into the soil. They would have a garden at the new boardinghouse.
The door to the duke’s hideaway was closed, but she could see smoke rising from a chimney.
She knocked.
No answer.
She tested the knob, and the door swung open.
The duke was at the far end of the oblong room, heaping wood onto a roaring fire in an iron grate. He didn’t hear her enter because of the grinding of a metal apparatus pumping and whirring behind him.
The strange device bristled with angular pipes and was connected by copper tubing to the stove.
“I’ve brought your cocoa!”
He didn’t hear her over the clanking and hissing.
There was a collection of knives hung along one wall. Curved scimitars, primitive stone tools, jeweled silver daggers. The floor in one corner was covered with a red carpet and piles of cushions, as if he slept here sometimes.
“Your Grace,” she shouted, louder this time.
He spun around.
Sweat dripped down his neck, and his white shirt stuck to his heavily muscled chest. He appeared perfectly at home here, in the flickering inferno, with oil lamps and firelight limning his powerful form.
He mopped a towel over his brow, leaving a streak of soot along his cheekbone that gave him a diabolical air.
He was more devil than duke.
She swallowed.
Keep calm. There’s no danger. The water is shallow. She repeated his words from the boating accident in her mind as she crossed the long room, entering deeper into the devil’s lair.
James wiped the sweat from his forehead.
He’d been thinking about Dorothea constantly and here she was, wrapped in a quilted pink silk dressing gown, with her hair unbound and streaming around her shoulders in a golden halo.
His thoughts made flesh.
She held out a mug. “I brought you some chocolate.”
He blew on the hot liquid before taking a sip. Chili pepper burned his lips, dissipating quickly, leaving the chocolate liberally mixed with sugar and milk. “Josefa sent you to me?” he asked.
“Yes.” Her eyes were unfathomable dark pools in the dim light.
“She likes you.”
He liked her. Far too much. No use denying it any longer.
She eyed the steam press. “What is this?”
The press clanked and shuddered behind them.
He took another sip of chocolate. “It’s supposed to be a steam-powered cocoa press. It uses the same principles as the steam engine you saw at the factory today. On a smaller scale, of course.”
“You made this?”
“With Van Veen’s help. We can’t seem to get it quite right. It doesn’t apply enough pressure. It’s supposed to take the chocolate liquor, created from crushing the beans, and press out all the fat.”
James showed her the thin trickles of amber-colored oil trailing into catch basins on either side of the tall machinery, which held a series of interconnecting bowls designed to apply pressure to the chocolate liquor.
“Van Veen says if we can press the fat out, the cocoa left will be easily powdered and far more soluble. It won’t go rancid so swiftly,
either.”
The amber liquid was cooling quickly into a yellow waxy substance. He dipped a finger into the catch basin. “This is the fat, called cocoa butter, because it cools at room temperature into a solid but melts on contact with skin.”
He rubbed the butter between his fingers. “A useful product in itself. Edible. And a natural moisturizer that women use to achieve a youthful glow.”
“Really? May I try some?” she asked.
Dear God above. Her innocent request filled his mind with provocative images.
Dorothea. Naked. Slick with oil and desire. Moaning his name.
He’d been fighting the obvious until this moment, but when a beautiful woman—this particular beautiful, maddening, gloriously clever woman—invaded his inner sanctum, offered him chocolate, and then asked him to rub her with cocoa butter . . . there could be only one outcome.
He wasn’t going to fight it any longer.
James brushed the back of his knuckles across her cheek, down her throat, and into the opening of her robe.
Blue eyes swirled with smoke.
She stepped away, and his heart lurched. Don’t leave. But she stayed, gazing into his eyes, and slowly unknotted the sash at her waist.
The dressing gown slid to the floor, revealing a creamy satin-and-lace confection designed to capture a man’s soul and bring him to his knees.
Burnished gold curls spilled over thin straps and bare shoulders.
A gilt-framed invitation to paradise.
Damnation. He wanted her.
Her spirit. Warmth. Courage.
Those full breasts that fit perfectly in his palms.
She wrapped her arms around his neck and melted into him with a throaty moan that shredded the last of his control. He filled his hands with her soft breasts, kneading her nipples until they contracted into tight peaks.
The scent of her filled his nostrils, something floral with an herbal edge that drove him wild.
Wet steam in the air. The wetness of her mouth, her tongue and his, miming the thrust of the metal pistons convulsing beside them.
There was an ear-piercing whistle, and a cloud of steam erupted next to them.
He’d forgotten the press.
He wrenched free.
He had to stop the press from overheating and exploding.
Chapter 19
The duke leapt toward the machinery, tearing off his shirt to use as a barrier between his hands and the searing metal while he unloosened valves and twisted knobs, releasing steam.
Charlene didn’t know how to help. She grabbed a book from a table and started fanning the hissing contraption.
When all was quiet, he leaned against the table, breathing heavily. “That was close. But there’s no danger now. I’ve stabilized it.”
No danger. Charlene nearly threw back her head and burst into helpless laughter.
The press might be harmless now, but the duke was one hundred flavors of dangerous. With damp hair curling around his neck and condensed steam dripping down the daunting width of his bare chest. Down, across his firm abdomen, disappearing into buckskin stretched across muscular thighs.
He caught her staring, and a lazy smile lifted the corner of his mouth. Her cheeks grew warm. The satin of the negligee clung damply to her body, and the pulse between her thighs beat stronger.
“Why don’t you come over here?” He patted the wooden table, his eyes gleaming.
The air was heavy with steam, fragrant with cocoa, replete with the promise of his invitation.
She hesitated. There was a nearly sick feeling in her belly. If she went to him, there would be no turning back. Maybe the countess wouldn’t even find them. Charlene had to believe he was honorable enough to offer for her if . . . if she succumbed to her wicked self.
Oh, how she wanted to give in.
He is yours tonight. Take your fill. Don’t fear tomorrow.
She ran damp palms down the fine fabric of the negligee, loving the way his eyes darkened and his gaze followed her hands.
He wanted her, but there was also a reverence in his gaze. He saw her as a promise, not something to be plucked and forced to flower early, tied in bundles, sold to the highest bidder.
He saw her as a living, breathing rose.
Or rather, he saw Dorothea as that rose.
Something to be nourished, tended, coaxed.
She wanted to be near him, as if he were the sun and the rain. She wanted to open for him.
“Come here,” he growled.
She gave him an arch smile. Her wicked self gained more control with each step until she stood before him.
“Turn around,” he commanded.
In her last defense test, she’d been blindfolded, and Kyuzo had attacked her from behind. She’d acted on instinct with an elbow jab to his gut, her senses alert and quick. She was trained to anticipate the unexpected. She had to will herself to trust the duke. Trust that he wouldn’t hurt her.
He thought she was an innocent debutante. He would be honorable and ask her to marry him before anything spiraled too far out of control.
She turned and presented her back to him.
He hooked a finger under the flimsy strap of the negligee. Followed the line of the strap down her shoulder, sliding the negligee down several inches. Her neck and upper shoulders were exposed, naked.
Out of the corner of her eye, she watched him reach over, dip his fingers into the catch basin, and scoop up some of the butter.
When his hands spread the slick substance over her neck, she tensed.
“No need to be nervous,” he said.
Her shoulders slackened as he kneaded her flesh in slow circles.
“That’s right,” he urged. “Relax.”
There was the slight scrape of the calluses on the pads of his fingers. His hands knew guitar strings. The heft of an axe. They knew work. And they certainly knew pleasure.
The knots in her shoulders began to ease. He rubbed the balm into her shoulders and massaged until her tension evaporated.
She took a deep breath, marveling at the small cracks and pops of her bones moving within her skin. She’d never been so aware of her body. He dug his thumbs into a tender spot, and she startled.
“Shhh . . .” he soothed.
He shaped her, molded her into a new substance, pressing away doubt. He lifted her hair and lowered his head into the hollow of her neck. His lips found her neck, her cheek, her earlobe.
He tugged the negligee lower. It pooled around her waist, baring her back.
Her back was bare.
Abruptly she twisted away from him. Not fast enough.
“What’s this?” He traced the small mark under her left shoulder blade. The place Grant had tried to brand.
She’d forgotten to hide her tattoo.
This is why she couldn’t relinquish control. She had too many secrets to hide. When he saw his bride didn’t have a mark, he would know without a doubt that Dorothea wasn’t her. Ultimately it wouldn’t matter, of course; he only needed a business partner, and sweet, feminine Lady Dorothea would be perfect.
She glanced over her shoulder, feigning confusion. “Oh, that? Only a . . . wager I lost.”
“Must have been some wager. I’ve only seen these on sailors. How strange that a lady would have one.” He traced the small, angular black characters. “What does it mean?”
Warrior.
Kyuzo had many similar marks on his arms from his years at sea. He’d said they were his way of proclaiming freedom, of immortalizing his will to survive and escape.
After Grant tried to brand her, Charlene asked Kyuzo to give her a mark as well, to symbolize that she would never be owned by the baron. Kyuzo had sterilized a needle in candle flame, dipped it in ink, and pierced her skin. It had hurt, but it had been a way for her t
o immortalize her resolve.
When Grant returned, she would be ready for him. She’d never be his plaything. Never sell her body for a man’s pleasure. She was a warrior. Strong. Uncompromising.
She was being compromised right now. She shrugged the duke’s hand away, repositioning her hair over her back.
“They tell me it means ‘butterfly.’ ” She tried to make the lie sound flippant and careless. So many lies accumulating like soot in a chimney. She would never come clean.
He pushed her hair aside and outlined the tattoo with his tongue. The soft touch made her body turn liquid.
“What other secrets are you hiding, butterfly?” He nuzzled her neck. “Hmmm?”
Don’t ask me that.
He wouldn’t let her turn to face him. He held her against his body with one strong arm around her waist, while the other hand spread fragrant cocoa butter over her collarbone. Moved lower to shape her breast and rub butter across her nipple.
There was no way to remain passive. She arched into his hand, a moan escaping her lips. He tugged gently on her nipple, and the pulse between her thighs accelerated.
Fingers slipped beneath satin, questing lower, smoothing her belly and thighs, moving perilously close to the source of her need.
“You’re so exquisite,” he whispered in her ear. “I’ve been dying to touch you.”
His body rested on the table, supporting her weight. The hard length of his arousal pressed against her from behind. She dissolved against his solid chest, and her head fell back against his shoulder.
She gasped as he found the seam between her legs.
“Open for me,” he murmured.
The pulse marched faster.
“Dorothea. Don’t be afraid.”
Even hearing the wrong name on his lips couldn’t jar the pleasure away. It was too strong now, this need.
There was only his finger, not quite touching her, in that secret place. She tilted upward slightly. He rewarded her with a light flick that sent shocks rippling through her whole body.
“Oh,” she breathed.
He rewarded her again, this time stroking long enough to establish a rhythm.
He stopped. Hovered. Teased.
No, no. “Please . . .” she moaned.
