Page 5 of A Bet with a Duchess (The Gambling Dukes #1)

FIVE

Fynn

The room was hot and I was tired.

No, tired wasn’t quite right. Exhausted. Frustrated. A little hungover, in that way that tendrils of memory, reminding you just how much you drank last night, kept intruding in my mind, distracting me from the task in hand.

As if the woman in the gorgeous white muslin gown wasn’t doing a good enough job.

“You have everything you want, then?” asked Lady Cartice, a smile on her face that threatened to make me forget all my good intentions, my professionality, all the promises I had made to myself as I had stumbled upstairs last night after drinking far too much and saying even more.

I raised a hand to my chin to stroke it, feeling the stubble, trying to earth myself.

This was Wednesday. I had been at Dalhurst Manor since Saturday, and this coming Saturday my welcome would officially run out. That was all the time I had, a few more days at best.

I had to find something. Not permit myself to be distracted by the soft skin, warmed by the sun, that was tantalizingly close.

“I think so,” I said, leaning back in my seat, the chair squeaking.

This was another room, another in the seemingly endless place the Gambling Dukes called home. Bureaus and cabinets ran along one side of the clean light room, a large table opposite set aside, I presumed, for card games. The door was open, not obscuring the view—not that there was anyone to see in the corridor.

This room was right at the end of the wing. There were no casual passersby.

We were completely alone.

“Pretty loyal servants you’ve got in this place,” I said, pulse throbbing in my ears as I tried to think of something else to say.

Lady Cartice. Georgiana. She would leave, I knew, the moment our conversation ended. That was what she had done yesterday and the day before, and a strange desire tugged at my heart to keep her talking.

Another minute, another moment in her presence. Whatever it was that drew me to her, it wasn’t just physical. I had discovered that yesterday in that damned private drawing room of theirs.

I liked her. I liked them.

If things had been different…

“We depend on loyal servants to keep our secrets,” said Lady Cartice with a smile, slipping into the chair beside me. Her knees brushed against mine, a shot of heat rushing through them up my breeches and toward?—

“Because you’re hiding something?”

“Because our information is valuable, Mr. Monroe,” Lady Cartice said with a gentle laugh. “You’re determined to see shadows and secrets everywhere, aren’t you?”

I shrugged. A habit of the job. “Once you’ve lived my life…”

Only then was I able to stop myself, biting my lip as I did so. Damn. I had already revealed far too much, already given away some of the armor I had protected myself with for the last few years.

Armor I could do with, around this intoxicating woman.

A flicker of something different glimmered across Lady Cartice’s face. Concern. Care. Directed toward me.

My heart skipped a painful beat.

“I was sorry to hear about…well,” she said awkwardly, pushing a stray strand of hair back behind an ear. She only did that when she was nervous. I was noticing far too much about Lady Cartice. “You must tell me his name. Your stepfather. So that I can remove him from our list, if he’s there.”

I laughed dryly. “Please, you don’t have to give me that, I know business is business.”

I was no fool—at least, I wasn’t anymore. I had already tried to have his creditors pull in debts, tried to enlighten his business connections on his bad practices.

No one had cared.

My hand suddenly rushed with heat, blazing, like I had been branded and I gasped, unable to help myself, a low murmur that seemed to echo around the locked room.

Lady Cartice. Georgiana. She had placed her hand on mine, her delicate fingers stroking—no, I was imagining it, I thought wildly, head spinning. She wouldn’t—but she was. Her dark blue eyes met mine as her fingers tightened around my own, lying on the desk.

“Business is business, but nothing is more important than what’s right,” she said urgently, her voice low.

My throat was dry, mind empty, but I had to speak. “You can’t mean that.”

“You know why I studied the law? Something that ladies are not supposed to do?” Lady Cartice spoke quietly, urgently, as though she was imparting something secret to a close friend.

As though we were close. As though this wasn’t a mission to save my reputation, reclaim my position in the newspaper, bring down her club to be rewarded with higher wages.

As though we were something to each other. As though the rushing tensions and dark desires I held for her could be tasted, viewed by her blazing eyes, and she liked it. Oh God, if only she liked me.

“No,” I managed to breathe, my voice low. “No, I don’t know, Lady Cartice.”

Her smile was far too knowing. “Georgiana, please.”

Dear God, she was perfection. “Then please, call me Fynn.”

Georgiana smiled, a necklace of opal at her throat, and I tried desperately not to look at it.

Big mistake.

My gaze drifted lower, to the high soft peaks of her breasts, hardly encased in the light gown she’d chosen that morning.

A small moan escaped my lips and I jerked my eyes back to hers. Was that a knowing look in those blue pupils?

“Because I know what’s right, and what’s wrong,” Georgiana said quietly. “I believe in truth, and justice, and all that other stuff my friends tease me about. I believe doing business with the right people isn’t everything—that you have to do what’s right.”

I stared. God, she was beautiful; not just her body, which was outstanding as far as I was concerned.

But it was more than that. Far from finding a dull old man in the role of Chief Legal Counsel, or a flighty young whippersnapper only given the job because he happened to have the right name, here was a woman with morals, principles.

Principles she would stand on to walk away from a potential prize, if she thought it the right thing to do.

“You always know what’s right?” I found myself saying.

Georgiana nodded. Her hand was still on mine and I dared not move a muscle in case she remembered, removed her hand, removed the connection that weighed on me like an anchor.

“You have such a keen moral center, you would only permit yourself to do what was right, am I correct?”

She nodded again, her liquid eyes fixed on me, a small smile tilting her lips. “You are asking these questions for a reason, I have to assume.”

I glanced at the door. Open, but in the almost hour we had already spent here, I’d not seen a single person walk past.

“No one would come in here, right?”

I ached when Georgiana broke our gaze, turning to the door just for a moment before turning to look back at me.

She shook her head, a slight questioning look in her eye.

“So no one is likely to interrupt us?”

A delicate change in her face, a slight line between her eyes as she attempted to understand the reason for my questions. Desire rushed to my manhood, strengthening the longing already surging through it.

God, she’d know in a moment.

“No,” she said softly. “No one can—Fynn!”

I had been quick.

Well, not quite. If I had been as quick as I had wanted, I would have pounced on the woman within five minutes of arriving at this godforsaken manor, but as it was I had bided my time, tried to prevent myself from doing what I knew could ruin the very reason I was here.

But I didn’t care. Not anymore.

Georgiana, the Dowager Duchess of Cartice was beautiful and passionate and good, and I wanted to know how she tasted.

Placing my hands swiftly on her hips and lifting her out of her chair, ignoring her squeal of surprise, I placed her on the desk and quickly moved myself between her legs.

“Fynn!” Georgiana gasped, looking up at me with wide eyes.

Wide, hungry eyes. I knew that look. She wanted this, perhaps more than I did. That knowledge stirred an even greater response in me, and I quickly crushed my lips on hers.

I almost moaned with sweet relief at tasting what I had known, but could not prove: that Georgiana, the Dowager Duchess of Cartice was the best kiss I had ever had. Soft yet willing, achingly eager for me, her lips parted almost immediately and a bold tongue met mine.

Shivering, I did only what my instincts told me. Her ankles had already crossed behind my buttocks, keeping me close, and my fingertips met as I placed my hands around her waist.

I could feel her warmth, feel her hunger as I kissed her again, tilting her head back to gain greater access, flickers of pleasure rushing through my lips through my chest to my manhood, everything connected as I wanted?—

“Fynn,” Georgiana said, breaking the kiss and pushing me back.

Well, not entirely back. She kept me trapped between her legs, a place I very much wanted to be, but there was a sharp look on her eyes now as she placed a hand warningly on my chest.

I was panting. Dear God, I was gasping for her. “What?”

“We shouldn’t?—”

“Why?” I interrupted, desire hazing my eyes but my view of her clear. My view of what I wanted, what we both wanted, clear.

Georgiana’s breath was shallow, her breasts moving most distractingly against my chest. “We shouldn’t kiss, it isn’t—it isn’t right.”

“Right? Right?” I repeated, lowering my head.

She didn’t stop me, her hand on my chest splaying out as she gasped, as I kissed Georgiana on the collarbone, a place I had wanted to kiss for far too long.

Her head lolled back, the pleasure I was giving far too much to resist.

“Fynn…”

There it was. She had breathed my name, unable to help it as my hands moved up her back, achingly close to her breasts but not quite, and my manhood twitched, she must have felt it.

“This is right,” I murmured as I kissed along her collarbone, allowing my lips to drift temptingly close to the tops of her breasts. “You know this is right, Georgiana, because you always know. Does this feel wrong?”

Georgiana’s breath hitched in her throat, I felt it was well as heard it, and shivered. Dear God, if we were really alone here, never to be disturbed, I could take her right?—

“Fynn, we mustn’t?—”

“Do you want me to stop?”

I had pulled back. I may be a cad, I may take kisses from a beautiful woman like Georgiana because I could see in her eyes that she wanted it, but I wasn’t a rake.

I wasn’t about to make a woman do something she had no desire to do.

Georgiana’s eyes were confused, vague, yet sharpened as they met mine. “I beg your pardon?”

A lopsided grin seared my face. “I’ll stop if you want me to stop, Lady Cartice, or I’ll keep kissing you if you ask me. You’ve got to tell me. Tell me…what you want.”

Georgiana swallowed, a small moan escaping her lips as I leaned closer to her, so close I could feel her breath on mine, but I pulled away as she leaned toward me.

Oh, no. She had to ask me for it now.

“You’re not being fair,” she breathed, her hands moving to the nape of my neck, trying to pull me closer.

“You’re the one who said you’ve stacked the deck.”

“I didn’t know you’d be the dealer.”

My jaw tightened. I didn’t think either of us really expected the other, had we?

And yet here we were, the dowager duchess and the journalist determined to ruin her, and all I wanted to do was rip off this gown and?—

“Kiss me, Fynn.”

I didn’t need more invitation. I captured Georgiana’s lips with mine, glorified in the soft warm moan of welcome, of recognition that this was what she wanted, and our ardor overtook us.

I pushed her back, back onto the desk, paperwork flying everywhere as I covered her body with mine and she arched into me, the kiss if possible deepening as I gave her everything, everything I had within me, more than I even knew.

God, she was beautiful. I could feel every inch of her through that pathetic gown, and tingles of pleasure were flickering across my skin as my tongue met hers once again, eager and hot and desperate, and I knew if we were left alone for much longer I could remove my breeches with one hand and?—

“Georgiana?”

We leapt apart.

I stared around for Kineallen, the voice I’d heard, as Georgiana lay on the desk panting, unable or unwilling it appeared to move. Her gown was a mess, all pushed up so that I could see just the hint of her thigh.

I groaned. “What the hell?—”

“Georgiana, we have a visitor, please come to the entrance hall,” came Kineallen’s voice, echoing down the corridor. “Thank you.”

Glancing at Georgiana, I watched as she pushed herself upright then slipped off the desk. I was pleased to see her legs a little unsteady.

I did that to her. By God, I would do that to her again.

“This was a—a mistake.”

Georgiana’s words didn’t quite register in my mind, and I had to blink a few times before I took them in. “What?”

She brushed her gown with quivering hands and would not meet my gaze. “I got carried away, by—you’re here to ruin us, Fynn.”

The simplicity of her words cut deep into my heart. “I—you don’t?—”

“I think it’s best if we just forget this,” said Georgiana sharply, all control returning as she walked to the door. “I’ll leave the door open. Spend all the—the time you need.”

“Georgiana—”

“This was a mistake,” she breathed, her eyes wide, pain in them I had not expected to see, and then she was gone.

I watched helplessly as she strode down the corridor.

Only then did I speak into the empty, silent study, where I was supposed to find information that would ruin not only her club, but her reputation.

“Well, damn.”