Explosive. Charlotte MedeЧитать онлайн книгу.
It stands to reason your loyalty rests with him. No doubt he’s compensating you handsomely. And no doubt he sent you to secure my cooperation,” Blackburn said brutally, wondering what securing that cooperation might entail. His erection lengthened at the thought, primed as a pistol. “I will quadruple whatever he’s offered you.” It seemed to him that she flinched.
But she maintained a mutinous silence, thick lashes at half-mast over her spectacular eyes.
“While I find your antics charmingly cloak and dagger,” he continued, forcing himself to ignore the heaviness in his groin, “I have neither the time nor the patience to work under your direction, as you charmingly suggested earlier. Now you’re the one who hasn’t a choice.”
Her face paled from cream to alabaster. “Look, you don’t understand.”
“Of course I do, Mademoiselle,” he said callously. For some reason he didn’t fight the urge to touch her and flicked a careless finger along the smoothness of her cheek. Her breaths came even faster. “It’s quite simple. You work for me against Le Comte.”
“And if I refuse?” She suppressed a shiver as she felt his caress.
In response, he forced her against the door, resting one hand casually over her head and effectively caging her with his body. One fraction closer and she would feel another kind of physical threat. “I don’t think you will, Mademoiselle. I’m sure a damp prison cell is as much to your liking as it is to my liking, wouldn’t you say?”
“You mean to throw me to the magistrates?” She was so close he felt the warmth of her breath in the dark.
“Yes, I would—tonight, as a matter of fact. They’d be more than pleased to stretch your neck. Capturing the daughter of an infamous traitor; moreover, a daughter who was involved in her father’s rather important work? And of course, I would be available to testify that you had me abducted in order to help you with your treasonous plans.”
It was as if he had cracked her veneer, hit a nerve. “Get away from me.” Her voice filled with pain and an odd undertone of protectiveness. “Don’t dare ever mention my father again.”
“As you wish.” He turned to block the door with his back, arms crossed over his chest. “But I believe I have your answer. And don’t worry, Mademoiselle. De Maupassant will never know you’re working against him, rather than for him—as long as you cooperate with me, of course. And for this deception you will be reimbursed handsomely. Don’t look so shocked,” he added, watching her rooted to her spot in the gloom. “I’m sure you’re accustomed to treachery for the right price. So—you will have the score for me tomorrow evening at the recital your generous benefactor is hosting to showcase your considerable charms.”
Devon Caravelle took a breath and raised her chin. “What if he refuses to relinquish it to me?”
Blackburn’s expression was derisive as he deliberately surveyed her form, from her glorious hair and mobile mouth to the slender body alluringly hidden beneath swatches of brown wool.
His voice was rough, his breath soft on her ear. “Seduce him—what else? Return to your lover tonight and beguile, captivate, and lie as fluently as I’m sure you can. Simply pretend all is going according to plan.”
His smile was distinctly unpleasant as he pulled himself away from her. “Now go—because I’m sure he’s expecting you.”
It was as though the impossible had occurred and he had shocked her, her profile frozen ivory. “You disgust me,” she whispered, gathering her cloak and grabbing the latch of the door to pull it open.
“Don’t forget your pistol.” He picked it up from the floor and held it out to her. She quickly snapped up the weapon with a gloved hand, afraid to touch him. But Devon Caravelle didn’t call for the guards.
“Tomorrow evening,” said the Marquess of Blackburn throwing her an indifferent glance, as though getting ready to depart from an unexpectedly tedious reception rather than walk out of a prison.
For the briefest of seconds he wondered whether he should let her go back to Le Comte. The thought of their being lovers did more than usual to fuel his natural cynicism. Bloody hell, he wanted a drink, wanted to sit by himself and cool his response toward a woman who could easily destroy him. It was time for his exit as he obviously needed a brandy to clear the pounding in his head.
He stepped over the threshold into a narrow hallway, consciously leaving the shadow of Devon Caravelle’s disturbing presence behind him.
“And do whatever you have to do to get the score—to keep the magistrates and the hangman at bay, of course,” he said by way of a parting shot. “I’m sure you know how, Mademoiselle. All too well.”
Chapter 3
Devon Caravelle’s hands shook as she shrugged out of her cloak. Her suite of rooms at Le Comte’s lavish town house in Mayfair was already lit by one of the many servants the Frenchman kept in dancing attendance. The illusory comfort of the flickering wall sconces did little to allay her anxieties.
They’d be more than pleased to stretch your neck.
The richly patterned wall, draped in watered silk, danced before her eyes.
She didn’t have the score.
Worse still, she hadn’t any idea where it possibly could be found in Le Comte’s town house and she’d been surreptitiously searching for weeks. She shivered, missing the warmth of her cloak just as she heard the knock. Walking to the door and turning the handle, she felt every nerve standing at attention.
Le Comte was already lounging in the hallway, taking in the young woman displayed before him like the finest jewel amid the sumptuous luxuriance of the boudoir. He stepped into the room adorned in the palest cream and amethyst fabrics and raised his eyes to a baroque mirror that reflected the perfection of creamy skin and dark red hair.
He smiled thinly at her reflection in the oval above her vanity as he began to remove one of his pristinely white evening gloves.
“You look somewhat disheveled, ma chère. I hope the Marquess did not give you any undue trouble. Where is he—still rusticating in that cell I arranged for?” His voice was reedy with mockery, his face appearing next to hers.
She saw herself in Le Comte’s gaze, a worldly woman, an intellectual who had the key to something he wanted desperately. Her vision blurred and all she could see was the image of the Marquess of Blackburn. The most strikingly beautiful man she’d ever encountered, a portrait of contrasts, a combination of overwhelming physicality and concentrated intellect. Focused on her.
He was too tall, his shoulders too broad, the jaw too strong for fashion. And it had taken all her control to keep from reacting as he’d surveyed her with those midnight blue eyes. Her pulse raced at the memory of an indefinable energy permeating the cell, pulling her closer to him against both her reason and her will.
Devon dragged herself back to the present, aware of Le Comte’s image in the mirror beside her and all too aware that lying and deception was the only way out.
“I believe you’ll find everything proceeding to plan.” She kept her voice low, infusing resignation and desperation in her tone. “The Marquess, under duress, committed to working with me.”
To distract herself from the lie, Devon picked up a silver comb on the vanity. For a moment the room’s opulence shimmered in the mirror; the door of her dressing room opened to reveal the spill of silks and satins, gifts from de Maupassant, every last one given with a purpose in mind, a small voice reminded her.
“My dear Devon, I am so pleased to hear the good news.” Le Comte began casually to remove his other glove before tossing both aside and lowering himself into a flounced and beribboned chaise. “Although I also heard that you allowed him to waltz out of the prison I so thoughtfully arranged for him, or so my men have informed me. And I take it he’s not waiting for us at the apartments I’d organized for the two of you on