Page 7 of Tantalizing the Duke (Wayward Dukes Alliance #22)
CHAPTER SEVEN
A s he did most evenings, Dainsfield scanned the list of members who reserved a private room for the evening. He trusted his staff to ensure the rules were followed in who was allowed a room, but he never wanted to be surprised if a problem arose. Midway down the short list, he saw a name that surprised him. Parham.
There was no reason the man shouldn’t be at the club on any given night. Dainsfield hadn’t heard of any arrangement being made between Milly and the earl regarding a marriage. Nor had Milly said anything about the couple deciding they didn’t suit.
For that matter, Milly might not object to Parham continuing to spend time in these rooms after they married.
Milly might even join him there.
Dainsfield rose with unusual haste, finding his steady hand faltering as he reached for his door latch. This uneasiness followed him through the dimly lit corridors of the servant areas and staircases. As he neared Parham’s assigned room, he took a moment to collect himself, then looked through the small spy window, half dreading, half hoping. He observed Parham with a naked woman spread across his lap, her blonde cunny on open display.
Dainsfield’s relief was instantaneous, flooding him with an unbidden warmth that dissipated his distress as the woman’s nether hair proclaimed her distinctly to not be Milly. His muscles, so taut with anxiety, relaxed with a strange and unfamiliar warmth. The woman in the room, though unabashed in her exposure, was not the one Dainsfield feared seeing, and this realization left him unsteady.
Parham might be as free with his appetites as Dainsfield suspected, but he had not yet involved Milly in such promiscuity. Dainsfield’s relief made him stagger back from the door with the awkwardness of a man unused to feeling it. He gathered himself, resettling the folds of his waistcoat and the perfect alignment of his cravat. He’d been absurd, he decided, to allow this unease to dictate his actions. It would not happen again.
And yet, as he walked away from the room, a small voice within him refused to be silenced. Had he assumed Milly’s attendance as an excuse to see her? Was he so weak, so inattentive to his own inclinations, that he could no longer trust himself?
Dainsfield needed to see her. He had no valid reason for doing so, but he could list a dozen or more foolish ones. He didn’t care. Her name wasn’t on the list like Parham’s was, but he didn’t think she’d ever reserved a room before. She usually found a willing playmate downstairs and shared his room. Of course, she didn’t spend every evening here at Sutcliffe’s, so she might not be here tonight.
That logic didn’t stop him from going downstairs.
He found her within fifteen minutes of entering the large gaming room. The roulette table seemed less the center of Milly’s attention than she was the center of its players’. Dainsfield felt a perverse awe at how effortlessly she gathered the eyes, the affections, the unguarded selves of the men around her. The swell of her breasts and the wayward charm of her laughter proclaimed her refusal to play by rules even more elemental than those of propriety.
Her low-cut gown left Dainsfield in little doubt of the territory she wished to explore. She placed a careless bet and then, rather than watching her number, leaned toward the nearest man as if he were her prize. The duke’s chest tightened, exasperation battling with an unexpected pride at the force of her nature.
Dainsfield watched how Milly let her hand drift toward the arm of another handsome gentleman, her eyes sparkling with mischief. She laughed again, and the gentleman’s attention fastened to her with the eagerness of a moth circling a flame. It was a boldness that only she could provoke, and the heat of Dainsfield’s frustration burned hotter than any spurned lover’s.
He noted how the man leaned toward her, captivated, and felt a perverse compulsion to measure how far she would go in this audacious experiment. That the man was Parham’s height, with hair as thick and brown as the earl’s own, did nothing to settle the turbulent mixture of emotions surging through Dainsfield. Didn’t she know how precarious her situation was? Each sweep of her long lashes seemed a provocation, each brush of her fingers an invitation that could so easily spiral into scandal. How was he to find her a husband when she behaved this way?
He began to make his way toward her, the weight of his determination guiding his steps. Patrons glanced his way, aware of his presence, but he barely registered their acknowledgement.
Dainsfield’s attention was so absorbed in the way she toyed with her latest admirer that he barely noticed the rush of sensations battering him. Anger at her lack of restraint, concern for her reputation, and a darker, more possessive need to ensure she was not lost to anyone else’s folly, least of all Parham’s. They jostled in his mind, each demanding prominence, but none more insistent than the undeniable allure she held even over him. He was closer now, her daring becoming a challenge that pulled him in as surely as it did every other man there.
He didn’t understand how he, so controlled in all things, now felt as helpless to resist as the men vying for her smiles. What force propelled him forward? Anger or admiration, resentment or desire? Whatever its name, it drew him in with an urgency that defied logic, defied dignity, defied everything he thought himself immune to. He pressed on, each step driven by something more elemental than pride, more raw than reason.
He was near enough now to catch her words. “And what do you think, sir? Will my luck hold out?” Her voice, as rich and inviting as the glances she gathered, reached him above the clamor of the room. Before her latest conquest could answer, Dainsfield reached her side. His fingers found her elbow, the contact electrifying.
She looked up, surprise and something like curiosity flashing across her face. “Dainsfield!” she exclaimed, as if it were the last name she expected to hear, the last presence she anticipated. Her expression was that of a child caught misbehaving, yet delighting in the discovery. The other gentlemen, sensing the change in dynamics, began to retreat, leaving the center of attention to its new, unyielding focus.
He was breathing faster than he liked, his control over both his body and his intentions slipping with every heartbeat. “You’re coming with me,” he said, voice edged with the intensity of his restraint. Milly’s eyes sparked in response, a rebellion that threatened to pull her away but a curiosity that held her in place.
She offered a token protest, her voice part teasing, part genuine. “Can’t you see I’m enjoying myself?” Her hand fluttered, indicating the crowded room, the gaming table, the quickly departing admirers. But Dainsfield’s grip, while not harsh, allowed for no argument.
She moved with him, her steps unhurried yet unresisting, as though amused by this unexpected turn in the game she played. Other guests glanced their way, some smirking, some disapproving, all watching with an interest that threatened new rumors by morning. Dainsfield kept his focus ahead, driven by the need to remove her from this display before it was too late for them both.
His grasp firm, his resolve firmer, he led Milly through the throng and toward the more private areas of the club. He might not be sure what she was to him, but he knew with excruciating clarity what she could never be to anyone else. The door to his office closed behind them, marking the boundary between the reckless world outside and the imminent confrontation within.
Milly had the infuriating audacity to look pleased with herself, a look that grated on Dainsfield as surely as the heat of her flesh was beginning to grate on his own composure. “You have no sense of what you’re risking,” he said, not caring to disguise the hoarse edge in his voice.
“Why, Dainsfield,” she said, arms crossed in a gesture that was half defiance, half provocation, “you’re beginning to sound like you care.”
He did not know which broke first—his control over the words that flew from him or the last strand of propriety that had held him in place. “You need to restrain yourself,” he said, taking two steps toward her, knowing they were two steps toward an inevitability that frightened him less than her easy dismissal of it.
“I need to enjoy myself,” she countered.
Dainsfield was so furious, so tempted, so overwhelmed by both that he could scarcely see the line between anger and desire. He paced like a caged animal. “You need to be married. Parham or someone else will come to their senses if you stop these outrageous games. Or is your intention to scare them all away so you must marry Crampmoore, after all?”
Milly’s smile was too smug. “I thought it would please you. Parham may say he wants a wife, but it seems even he likes to sample the goods.”
Her words hit him harder than they should have. Dainsfield, pausing in his furious circuit, turned to face her. His anger, his ever-mounting awareness of what she was to him, all of it rushed to the surface. “This isn’t a game. Stay at home unless you’re invited somewhere respectable, and definitely do not come to Sutcliffe’s, which is so well known for the promiscuity that goes on here.”
She was more than he could manage, more than he had prepared himself for. Milly moved toward him with an insouciance that belied the seriousness of his concerns. “I’m bored. I need to enjoy myself as much as possible before settling down to one man.” Her voice was both a challenge and a dare, the light in her eyes as reckless as the words that sent Dainsfield past any hope of control.
The distance between them shrank with a frightening speed, the heat of their desires burning propriety to ash. Dainsfield could see nothing, feel nothing, want nothing but her. “You need—” he began, but Milly’s mouth on his finished the sentence with an urgency more honest than anything he might have said. They moved together with a force that surprised them both, as if all their arguments, all their resistance, were so much kindling for the fire that consumed them now.
His hands found her shoulders, pulling her close, feeling her body arch against him with a responsiveness that was neither coy nor ashamed. Her lips met his, fierce and eager, opening to his as the last barriers between them broke. They struggled, passion more real than resistance, more reckless than reason, and the buttons nearly flew from his waistcoat as she pulled it open with abandon.
“Are you going to punish me, Dainsfield?” she asked, a breathless mockery that only inflamed him further. Her hands were in his hair, pulling him down, pulling him in, as desperate to hold him close as she was to taunt him.
“Yes,” he said, because it was the only truth he could speak. “Yes.”
Her dress tore as she shrugged out of it, falling to the floor as Dainsfield laid her back against the hard surface of his desk.
They moved with an intensity that brooked no hesitation. He shoved her chemise up, baring skin that was as soft as her gasps were sharp. Controlling in a way that only she could drive him to, he caught her wrists in one hand and held them above her head. Her legs, spread wide, invited him to seek satisfaction.
“You need to restrain yourself,” he said again, the words now a claim rather than a warning, a promise rather than a prohibition.
Milly’s eyes, dark with defiance and desire, met his with the wildness of one who refused to be controlled. “Then control me,” she said, and he did. He quickly bared his throbbing erection and entered her in one move. His thrusts were as demanding as her pleas, their rhythm as insistent as the beating of his heart, as the force of their shared rebellion.
Her breath came fast and unguarded, her body arching beneath him as she urged him on. The desk shook with each urgent motion, papers scattering, ink bottles rattling, his orderly life as upended as the woman beneath him. Dainsfield felt her shudder, her voice high and free as the last of her resistance shattered. The sound drove him harder, faster, losing himself in her in a way that left no room for apology, no room for regret.
They climaxed together, her body pulling his over the edge of reason and control, her voice in his ears, her taste on his lips. They came undone in each other’s arms, an unraveling of need that left them panting, astonished at their own recklessness. For a moment, there was nothing but the shared rush of breath and the echo of the desire they seemed powerless against.
The awareness of what he had done hit Dainsfield with more force than even the desperate culmination of their desires. “I apologize,” he said, and it was as much an apology for his words as for the raw intensity of their shared recklessness. He watched the change in Milly’s expression, watched satisfaction melt into something hollow and unsteady, as if he had pulled the earth from beneath her feet.
She reached for her gown, and the confusion of her movements, so different from their prior certainty, was more accusation than her words could ever be. His waistcoat still hung open, his shirt covering the open placket of his trousers, a reminder of how completely she had undone him, of how quickly he had responded.
“Milly,” he started, but she had already gathered herself, gathered the tattered remains of their passion, and fled. The empty space where she had been was unbearable, worse even than the fear of finding her at Sutcliffe’s with another man. The door was ajar, just as the recklessness of his actions had left him, and he moved to close it with a resignation that weighed heavily on his chest. He rang for a footman before straightening his clothing.
When the servant appeared, Dainsfield’s voice was a study in control, even as his mind was not. “Ensure Miss Nichols gets home safely.”
The footman nodded, and Dainsfield was glad he did not have to explain more, that he did not have to voice the confusion that ran deeper than even his desire.
He was alone again, the reality of it worse than he could have prepared himself for. Dainsfield sank into his chair, the physical weariness nothing compared to the emptiness he felt at her absence. His head fell into his hands, an uncharacteristic gesture that mirrored the resignation of his heart.
The scent of Milly, like the rest of her, refused to leave him. It lingered in the air, on his clothes, in every breath he took, a reminder of how completely she had consumed him and how completely he had managed to destroy what had always seemed so indestructible.
It was a desperate, cruel twist, that he should have achieved the very thing he never realized he feared—losing her—through the intensity of wanting her. The uncertainty of what would come next gnawed at him, but even worse was the certainty that she might never let him explain. It was an unbearable awareness, and he wondered if the rest of his life would feel as empty as this room.