by Virna DePaul
“What’s your name?” he asked.
“Mary.” Her voice was already stronger.
“Well, Mary, welcome to hell.”
Try as she might, Mary couldn’t convince herself he had a kind face.
She lay on the bed as he paced, no doubt wondering just what he was going to do with her now that he’d bought her.
Bought her.
She couldn’t think about that too much or she’d start to scream. And that would be no help at all in her current situation. Better to assess her reality: him.
She peered up from under her lashes. He was tall, taller even than Tall Tom who helped her father with odd jobs around the vicarage.
Welcome to hell. His voice was sharp and rough, but she could tell he’d intended to be gentle. She wondered if he’d ever been gentle in his entire life—oh, yes.
He had; when he’d held her, when he’d murmured those soft, soothing noises in that sinful-as-chocolate voice. That was gentleness. And a welcome respite from her own hell. She didn’t remember much of the evening, just her half brother dragging her to this awful place and forcing something down her throat.
People staring at her. Him taking her up a flight of stairs, lying next to her on this bed. Had they really shared such an intimate space?
The warmth his body left behind on the bed was proof, even if she didn’t have her hammering heart to offer testimony as well.
What was he doing here? In this place? Buying women?
She sat up, suddenly too aware of her surroundings. Him.
It was hard to imagine he’d need to buy anything, much less female companionship.
His eyes were green, as light and clear and pure as a stained-glass window on a sunny day. His eyebrows slashed across atop his eyes, two black, uncompromising lines. The bones in his face were sharp, too, the angles and planes making him more than just plainly handsome.
Because he was. Handsome, that is. One of the most gloriously handsome men Mary had ever seen. Just looking at him made her catch her breath. His lips, his beautiful, luscious lips, were full and sensual, in marked contrast to the stark depths of his face. His black hair was long and tousled with a slight wave. It brushed the top of his collar. A collar that to Mary’s knowledgeable eyes was in need of a good cleaning.
Mary’s eyes swept down the rest of him. He was broad shouldered and clearly athletic, his long, well-muscled legs standing in arrogant command.
“If you’re done eying me like a cut of meat, Mary, perhaps you could tell me more about why we have found each other together this evening?” His tone was acerbic. Far from the man who’d held her. Who’d calmed her.
She responded before thinking, in the frosty tone that used to make the schoolgirls she taught quake in their pinafores. “It is not necessary, sir. If you are done with me, done with this”—she rose and gestured around the spare, squalid room—“I can be on my way. There is no need—”
He jerked his arm out and pulled her to him, raking his eyes up and down her body. “And where will you go? You are hardly in a position to say if there is a need or not. Don’t forget, I paid five pounds for you.”
Five pounds. Likely a pittance to him, judging by the way he spoke and the quality of his clothing. A fortune for her, given that she had exactly nothing. Her half brother had made sure of that.
She stared up into his face, noticing the laugh lines running from the corners of his eyes. So he had laughed a few times in his life. He held her gaze for a minute, and it seemed to Mary that his face almost softened. Like he was coming close to smiling.
Which made her even more surprised when he released her abruptly. He walked over to the opposite wall and dropped his head down toward his chest. As though he’d suddenly been defeated.
“I can pay you back,” she said, ignoring the voice in her head that asked just how she intended to do that.
“How will you do that?” he asked. His voice had changed again—softened, but not in the warm way she recalled from before. This time it was more … seductive.
And damn it if she didn’t feel her body react to it.
“I am educated, sir, and if I find a position …”
“What kind of position?” He moved back toward her, predatory, like an animal stalking its prey.
Mary fluttered her hands in the air. “A governess, or a lady’s maid, or whatever is offered to me.”
By now he stood close to her again. “And if I were to offer you a position?”
Mary swallowed. There was no mistaking what he meant—she wouldn’t insult them both by asking if he had children for her to teach.
He reached his hand up and grasped her chin with his fingers. “Perhaps if we are creative we can think of several positions.”
Mary’s mouth opened wide in shock. Which, of course, is just the moment he lowered his head and pressed his mouth to hers.
She couldn’t do anything for a few seconds but stand there, in shock, as his lips made contact with hers. Her first thought was that his mouth was so warm, in such stark contrast to his cold words and expression.
And then his tongue licked her lips, a quick swipe that drew a gasp from her in response.
She remained stock still, not moving, not touching him anywhere but where their mouths were joined. A part of her knew she should be pushing him away, but she was frozen. And yet warm—so warm from him, his mouth, the body heat that was seeping into her skin.
And just as suddenly he pushed her from him so abruptly she stumbled, and he turned his head away.
But not before she saw the look of despair on his face.
“Go outside for a minute.” He spoke in a ragged whisper.
“Where?” Hadn’t he just said she had nowhere else to go? Or had their kiss befuddled him as much as it had her?
“Just leave!” he barked. “Wait outside until I call for you.”
When she didn’t move, he advanced toward her as if he would physically remove her. She turned and fled out the door, slamming it defiantly behind her.
Out in the hall she fumed at her lack of options. And his unnecessarily commanding tone. But what else should she have expected? Matthias had made her future inevitable. She had no money, no family, no future. Just a tiny thread of hope.
She rubbed her mouth where he’d kissed her. Her first kiss—at least the first one that had mattered. Not quite as she’d imagined it would be. She could not think about it.
As she had a million times since she’d discovered the truth, she clung to the thought of her mother, the woman she’d never known. Alive. In London. What did her mother look like? What did she know of her daughter?
If she could just get to London and locate her mother, she would find out. Mary’s future would be—what? Better than this, certainly. It had to be. The alternative was unthinkable.
She sagged against the door frame, her head pounding as she realized just what had happened in the past hour: she’d been drugged and sold at auction, and then she’d shared a bed with a man who wasn’t her husband, who had given her her first kiss before sending her into the hallway as if she were a misbehaving child.
It was hard enough discovering she was the illegitimate daughter of a vicar; being the homeless, penniless, illegitimate daughter of a vicar was almost enough to make her lose hope. Almost.
Mary smiled to herself as she realized the village’s nickname for her—“Merry Mary”—was being tested in perverse ways.
Her thoughts returned to the man on the other side of the door. Her master. “What is he doing in there?” she muttered to herself.
While she waited, her analytic brain cycled through the events of the last hour, the last week, the last month, until her head hurt. Or perhaps that was the aftereffect of whatever Matthias had given her. Just as she was starting to feel the rising pangs of panic, the door swung open and he stood there, one arm leaning arrogantly on the frame of the door. At least it seemed arrogant; she wasn’t sure if arms could be arrogant, but if they could, his defin
itely was.
“You’re still here.” Could he sound any more bored? And where else would she have gone? Back downstairs to those leering men? He, at least, was clean, and there was only one of him. “Come in,” he said.
He turned around and went back inside without waiting for her. She followed, kicking the door shut with her foot.
“Sit down.” He gestured toward the bed.
Mary made her way over to the small, rickety-looking chair in the corner and perched on it, tucking her feet under the rungs. She didn’t want to return to that bed—it reminded her of her shame. He shrugged and sat down on the mattress, placed his elbows on his knees and leaned forward.
“Tell me. I can wait as long as you like. Trust me, I’ve nowhere to go.”
A spark of the spirit Matthias deplored flared up. She shrugged. “What do you want me to say? I’m a duke’s daughter on the run from a marriage with a lecherous old man? An heiress whose evil uncle has imprisoned her, and I’ve had a run of bad luck? I wish it were that simple.”
He paused for a long moment before speaking. “So how is it complicated?” His gaze, while still focused on her, was less intense than it had been before he’d shoved her out of the room; he had a slightly dreamy smile on his face, which was at odds with his previously autocratic mien. Although he was less intimidating than before, he also seemed—different. Odder.
Was he insane? It would explain why someone of his obvious station would be in a place like this. Why he’d kissed her so unexpectedly. And why no one was taking care of his collar.
He rose and walked over to her, reaching her before she could react. He knelt to the floor and lifted her gown. Mary pulled her feet up in response, but not quickly enough.
He slid his hand—his large, elegant hand—over her shin. She flinched where the bruise was. He glanced up at her, his verdant eyes intense.
“Who hit you?” His voice was soft. As though he cared. “Why are you here?”
Her mind scrambled through what she could tell him. Something close to the truth, but not quite—she could always tell when her charges out-and-out lied, but if they just obscured a few of the details, she was much less likely to figure it out.
Why she felt the need to lie to him was something else entirely.
She’d had enough of trusting men. Any men, no matter how beautiful they were, or how much they’d paid for her.
He still had his hand on her leg. It felt shockingly good, sending tiny sizzles up her spine.
Well,” she said, biting her lip, “my father was a vicar. He died a month ago.” Her throat tightened at the thought. “My brother ran up quite a lot of debt, so”—she spread her hands out, palms up—“I am here.”
Here because she had no choice. Matthias had made certain of that—her reputation was destroyed. Her only hope was to get to London. And there was no guarantee the woman who was her mother would want to have anything to do with her.
She longed to tell him everything, to confide the truth to someone, anyone, but she’d already said too much to her half brother. She couldn’t trust someone else so soon, not before she’d seen her mother for herself.
His lips thinned. He took his hand away. She felt the loss, the sudden chill where his skin had warmed hers. “You mean you and your brother decided the best way for him settle his accounts was to sell your virginity at auction?”
She suppressed a rueful smile. If by decided you mean that he threatened me until I agreed, then yes, decided would be the word.
“Yes.” It would not do to reveal the extent of her weakness. She knew he knew the truth, he had to, but her pride wouldn’t allow her to share it. To trust him.
Now his eyes were half-closed, and he looked as though he were about to fall asleep. What was happening? Mary wondered. Was he ill?
He rose, awkwardly, so different from the authoritative, powerful man who had marched her out of the pub just a few hours before. He flopped backward onto the bed. Mary leapt out of her chair to help him, but stopped short when he began to laugh. No, giggle. He sounded like the girls at church when the handsome vicar from the next parish came to preach.
He sighed and went silent. “You never said who hit you,” he murmured after a few minutes. His voice sounded like it was coming from far away. His eyelids dropped down over his eyes and she didn’t bother responding. He began to snore.
Shaking her head, Mary returned to her seat and folded her hands in her lap. She wasn’t quite sure what to do—he had bought her, and she couldn’t get anywhere without money.
And she was so tired. Of course that meant sleeping with him. In that bed. She knew she wouldn’t be able to sleep on the floor, and honestly, after today, it wouldn’t matter. She was ruined. The damage was done, in all eyes but theirs. Also, he was still wearing his clothes, and she doubted he was in any shape to remove them even if he wanted to.
She rose and crept toward the bed. His eyes rolled frantically underneath the lids in the throes of a dream.
As she gazed down at him, it was hard to believe her nightmare had only started a month ago.
Why did her father have to confess everything on his deathbed? He’d held the secret for so long already. Would she truly wish to have remained ignorant of the truth, though?
If it meant not going through this, then, yes. “Sleep well,” Mary muttered as she nudged him over to one side. She lifted the sheet, trying not to think about its state of cleanliness, and got underneath, keeping her body at the absolute edge of the bed.
He rolled over and flung his arm over her, nestling his head in her neck. Mary felt a rush of yearning to be held like this forever: Even if this wasn’t hell, he was definitely the devil.
Tempting, sinful, and totally wrong.
Love stories you’ll never forget
by authors you’ll always remember.
THE RANDOM HOUSE PUBLISHING GROUP
PRESENTS
BRAND NEW NOVELS AND REISSUED
ROMANCE CLASSICS
AVAILABLE ONLY IN EBOOK
AT IRRESISTIBLE PRICES.
Visit us at www.ReadLoveSwept.com
Join the Romance@Random Facebook community
THE RANDOM HOUSE PUBLISHING GROUP
