Page 8 of A Duchess Bound (Dukes of Dominance #2)

G erard rubbed his jaw, considering the ledger again. He had made the most foolish error: writing a figure rather quickly and clumsily. Now, he could not discern what that cluster of ink was meant to be. He thought that it might be forty-eight.

Or maybe it was seventy-nine.

It was vexing either way. Gerard grimaced and raked his hand through his hair.

There was a knock at his study door. “Enter,” Gerard said, not looking up from the accursed ledger.

Maybe the sum was meant to be forty-nine, actually?

“You have a visitor, Your Grace.”

Gerard’s head snapped up. Nathanial Halls, Gerard’s butler, stood in the doorway.

Gerard had never been particularly fond of Nathanial, but then, Gerard seldom felt genuinely fond of anyone.

He kept Nathanial on his staff because the man possessed uncommon tact and dutifully ignored every conquest that Gerard brought into his townhouse.

“Who is it?”

The only person who might visit him was Pontoun, but he would simply enter. He did not wait for Nathanial to offer any formal introduction.

Gerard’s breath caught in his throat, and he craned his neck, vainly attempting to see around Nathanial’s broad figure. He hoped it was her , but he doubted it. A respectable spinster like Lady Dorothy would never come unaccompanied to his estate and certainly not so quickly.

“It is Lady Dorothy,” Nathanial said.

The words were like a spell. Gerard stood, eyes wildly and eagerly fixed upon the door. “I will see her at once.”

Nathanial bowed and stepped aside. After a heartbeat, Lady Dorothy entered. Gerard inhaled sharply. She wore a pale blue gown that matched her icy demeanor and brought out the roses over her cheeks. Beautiful.

He dared to consider the possibility that she had dressed like this with the thought of him seeing her. Gerard shivered. If he had dressed Lady Dorothy, of course, she would be clad far more indecently than that.

She curtsied. “Your Grace.”

“My lady.” Gerard waved a dismissive hand. “Nathanial, you may go.”

A respectable butler would have likely protested or at least given him a warning look, for Gerard was now left alone with a lady.

That was the height of impropriety. Nathanial simply did not care, though.

All ladies were the same to him—fleeting occupants in Gerard’s townhouse and often the subject of his lord’s desires.

“To what do I owe this pleasure?” Gerard drawled, clasping his hands behind his back.

Color spread across Lady Dorothy’s face, and her fingers twitched, as though she was thinking of striking him.

She looked as though she was torn between fighting him or doing something else entirely.

Gerard could not quite say if something else might involve the lady atop his desk with her skirts hitched past her waist, but he hoped it would.

He licked his lips. “No answer, my lady?” he asked, slowly stepping from behind his desk. “How disappointing. I seem to recall you being so articulate during our last encounter.”

Gerard crossed the room, giving her a wide berth. He quite enjoyed the sight of her standing on his rug, her eyes wary and her back straight. If she were his, he would make her stand there for no reason other than that it pleased him. A shiver traced the path of his spine.

“Brandy, my lady?” he asked, gesturing to the decanter.

“No thank you.”

“Ah, she speaks.”

Lady Dorothy smiled thinly. “I have come to speak to you about my sister.”

Her sister ? Gerard might have scowled, but he remembered that he was playing a game. Instead, he arched an eyebrow and feigned a look of utter innocence. “I should think it is obvious, my lady.”

Lady Dorothy took a step forward. “I will not let you ruin my sister. I have made it abundantly apparent?—”

He laughed, and she stopped speaking with a vexed look. “My lady, I have no intention of ruining your sister. On the contrary, my designs for Lady Bridget are to bed her sister. That might harm her reputation a little, I will concede, but it would be a blow from which she would soon recover.”

Lady Dorothy blushed furiously, the color sweeping over her so suddenly that it took Gerard’s breath away. It was not a pretty sight, certainly nothing that the poets would write about. She looked nearly feverish.

But the force of it! The passion of her emotions took his breath away and left him aching with need. It took all his restraint to remain a respectable distance away from the lady, and every beat of his heart made his restraint grow weaker and weaker.

“What do you mean?” Lady Dorothy asked, her voice somewhere between scandalized and confused. “You cannot—Catherine?—”

“ Catherine ?” He laughed. “My lady, you are not some blushing maiden who has only just blossomed. You must know what I mean. I want to bed Lady Bridget’s sister , but not the Duchess of Sarsen.”

Her eyes were wide, and she took a step back. Gerard grinned and stepped forward. They moved together, like they were in some strange dance. For every step that Lady Dorothy took backwards, he took one forward.

“But you have sought out my sister,” Lady Dorothy said frantically. “You have expressed interest in Bridget. You asked to dance with her, and in the park, you wished to introduce her to your friend, the Duke of St. Claire.”

“I did,” Gerard said. “Because I wanted a convenient excuse to be near you . Haven’t you realized that? I did not send Lady Bridget letters, much less invitations to my townhouse.”

“I—I just assumed…” Lady Dorothy’s back struck the wall, and she started, as if surprised to see where she had ended up. “But why would you—I would never succumb to your charms!”

He tilted his head, considering her. “Is that so? I seem to recall a kiss in the gardens.”

“You caught me unaware.”

“And now,” Gerard continued slowly, “you have come to my townhouse, seemingly without any companion. You have allowed yourself to be in a room unchaperoned with me. I think you are succumbing to my charms.”

He took another step and stood a hair’s breadth away from Lady Dorothy. “Stop!” she exclaimed.

She pressed her hands against his chest, and he halted. Lady Dorothy’s palms were so small and warm. She touched him lightly, gently even. If she had wanted, she might have pushed him away—or tried to—but she did not.

They were so near that she had to crane her neck to meet his eyes.

Gerard let his own gaze drift lower, to the bodice of her gown.

Lady Dorothy’s chest rose and fell quickly.

He dug his nails into the palms of his hands.

It was so tempting to take her breasts between his hands, to tease them from the confines of her stays, and coax her nipples into small, hard peaks. But he would refrain.

Seduction was an art, and it could not be rushed. Fortunately, experience had made Gerard a patient man.

“You are confusing my sister,” Lady Dorothy said.

“Is that still the defense you wish to cling to?” Gerard asked softly. “My dearest lady, I do not believe I can make myself any clearer.”

“But she—if she desires you?—”

“Denial!” Gerard exclaimed, smiling in amusement. “I am quite certain that you have already turned your sister against me. Besides, she has so many other suitors from whom she may choose. Do you truly believe that a couple of conversations will change her mind?”

Lady Dorothy’s breath came in quick pants of air. “It might.”

Gerard shook his head. “I do not even affect your sister. Shall I tell you how I know?”

He gently clasped his hands around Lady Dorothy’s wrists. She did not fight him.

“How?” she asked.

“Because there are signs when a woman is impassioned by a man. Her skin is flushed as red as a rose.”

And Lady Dorothy’s was.

“Her breathing is quick and warm.”

As was hers. The lady’s lips parted slightly, and she inhaled audibly.

“She gazes at him as though she wants him to be her entire world,” Gerard continued, pitching his voice lower. “She behaves recklessly and does foolish things, like coming to him alone in the middle of the day.”

“That is different,” she whispered.

Gerard shook his head. “Do not deny it, my lady. You know what this is. You did not come here to defend your sister’s honor. You came here for me .”

“You are wrong!”

He took her wrists and pinned them over her head. Lady Dorothy gasped, and he pressed himself hard against her. She was so slight beneath him, and he ached to tear away all the skirts and petticoats so that he might touch the bare skin beneath.

“Do not lie to me. You came here because you want me to treat you like one of my conquests,” he said. “Admit it, my lady. You have been thinking of me day and night. Have you thought of me when you are in bed at night? Have you touched yourself while thinking about me?”

“I would never!” she gasped.

Lady Dorothy shifted beneath him, drawing her thighs tightly together. She bucked her hips. The movement was small, subtle. Gerard smiled wolfishly. Was she trying to find pleasure by rubbing against him like some wild thing?

“Oh, my lady ,” he purred.

Lady Dorothy arched her back and sighed. “You are saying the cruelest things to me, Your Grace. You should stop. Have mercy on me.”

He tightened his grip on her wrists, not nearly enough to hurt but simply to remind her that it was he who held her. If all went according to his wishes, he would soon see the lady bound to his bed.

He would torment her for hours, stroking her breasts and pinching her nipples, until she writhed against the bedcovers, desperate for him to grant her release. Gerard would give her precisely what she desired. Eventually. He was not a monster, after all.

“Mercy?” he asked. “Did you have mercy on me when you said those awful things about me to your sister? Did you give even a second’s thought to how I might feel at being branded as a rake?”

“Y—you are,” she rasped, stammering over her words.

“If I am a rake, what does that make you, my lady?” he asked.

Lady Dorothy groaned and shifted against him. Gerard hissed between his teeth as she brushed against his sensitive cock, already tight against the fabric of his trousers. He could take her right there.

But sometimes, delayed satisfaction was best. How would he feel if he took the lady right then and there, only to have her continue spitting at him with such fire and defiance? No, the pleasure would be greater if he tamed this creature and molded her into the perfect, obedient lover.

“You have done this to me,” she said.

“You are far too old to blame others for your errors, my lady,” he purred against the side of her neck.

He wanted her begging, and she was not ready for that yet. Lady Dorothy still wanted to deny her own desires. She still wanted to blame him , as though he was the serpent in the garden and had come to tempt Eve with an apple.

He would change that. Gerard bucked his own hips very slowly, letting her feel his hardness against her stomach. Lady Dorothy groaned raggedly. “I cannot bear it!”

“All you must do is ask me to stop,” he said. “I promise that I will.”

Her breath came in hot gasps for air, and her lips remained parted, as if she meant to speak. “Please,” she whispered raggedly.

“Please? Please, stop?”

Lady Dorothy shook her head. “No, I—I do not want you to stop.”

“How wonderful,” Gerard said. “You are about to receive a rare education, my lady. I hope you are ready for your first lesson.”