And then she’d released the strap altogether, her weight in his arms and her fingers in his hair, holding him tight against her, encouraging his caress, begging him for more, urging him to give her everything he could.
He was hard and aching, loving the way she directed him. The way she took her pleasure with abandon. He wanted to give her everything for which she asked.
He pressed her to the wall of the room, his hands everywhere, pulling them up, higher and higher, his fingertips sliding against stocking and then glorious smooth skin, tracking the curve of her thigh up . . . up until he could feel the heat of her. Wicked, promising warmth guarded by perfect, soft curls. A promise he could not wait to uncover. To explore.
He paused there, lifting his lips to find her eyes.
She gasped. “Yes.”
He’d never in his life heard such a glorious word. Never received such coveted permission.
“Say it again,” he said. To be certain.
“Yes.” The word coursed through him, her fingers tight in his hair.
He would give anything for a night with this woman.
But had he already done so?
The icy thought tore him from her, placing distance between them. Hating her all over again even as he felt nothing near hate. Nothing so cold. “Tell me,” he shoved his fingers through his hair, trying to erase the memory of hers. “Did we do this? Were we—”
Lovers.
For a moment, he thought she would answer him. He thought he saw it there. Sympathy. Worse. Pity.
Fuck.
He didn’t want her pity. She’d stolen that night from him, and she refused to give it back.
And then the emotion was gone from her gaze, and he knew what she was about to say.
He raised his voice before she could speak. “Tell me!”
“You know the cost of that information.”
Vaguely, it occurred to him in that in another place, at another time, he would find this woman perfect in every way. There was something strong and firm and fearless about her.
The same something that had drugged him on their first meeting. And their second. The same something that had sent her fleeing into the darkness the prior evening.
The same something that had set him up to be a murderer twelve years ago.
The same something that would no doubt attempt to thwart him again.
But it was this place. This time.
And he had never been so infuriated in his whole life. “I will give you this, Mrs. MacIntyre, if the orphanage fails, you’ve a tremendous career as a whore.”
She stilled like a doe on the hunt for a half second, before she moved, her hand flying fast and true and landing with remarkable precision on his cheek, stinging with her anger and his shame.
He didn’t dodge or duck or feint. He took the slap as his due, feeling a dozen times an ass. He shouldn’t have said it. He’d never said anything so insulting to a woman before. The apology was nearly on his lips when a bell rang above the door leading to the ring. She lowered her hand, the only sign of the blow the slight increase in her breath and the way her words shook in her throat. “What is that?”
What were they doing?
He turned away, refusing to touch the place where a furious red mark no doubt blossomed. “My opponent is ready. We shall continue this after the bout.”
She inhaled, and he hated the way the soft sound filled the room almost as much as he hated the way she said, “I hope he wins.”
He returned to the table, lifting the wax, molding it into two long strips. “I’m sure you do. But he won’t.” He inserted first one strip, then the second, into his mouth, and he did not hide the way he molded the wax along the edge of his teeth, daring her to look away.
She watched the coarse movements for a long moment before firing her own parting shot. “Good luck, Your Grace.”
Chapter 10
The unmitigated gall.
The unmitigated ass.
He’d called her a whore.
With the insidious arrogance that came of being a wealthy, unencumbered man. A duke. He’d suggested that the idea that she provide him the information he required for a price made her a trollop.
If she’d been a man, the word wouldn’t have occurred to him. If she’d been a man, he never would have said it.
If you treat me like a whore, you pay me like one.
So, she’d used the word first. This was different. He’d turned her inside out with his touch. He’d tempted her. He’d made her like him.
And then he’d called her a whore.
He deserved an immense setting down. The great, unbeatable Temple deserved to be beaten. By her.
Seething, a masked Mara followed the guard to whom she’d been assigned through a winding, curving passageway that kept her from view of the club’s members. She was too angry to care where they were going or what came next—too lost in her mental evisceration of Temple.
Until her guide waved her into a new space and closed the door behind her, leaving her alone in a sea of people. Of women. Surprise coursed through her. Women did not belong in a men’s club. In a casino.