like a pebble in a shoe throughout the concert, she was relieved that at least one concert was over for the night.
Act Two involved a performance for the Marquess, albeit from a script that she had yet to compose. Feeling uncharacteristically agitated, her nerves on alert, she could sense somehow that he’d already arrived. She pictured him in her mind’s eye, his broad-shouldered form moving through the crowd, his dark blue eyes hunting her down. Hunting her down for that elusive, potentially explosive score.
Which she didn’t have.
Seduce Le Comte, Blackburn had ordered. Leaning onto the cool wall for support, she squeezed her eyes shut at the horror of the thought, her throat constricting in panic.
But then again, what would it feel like to hang? Unconsciously fingering the emeralds lacing her neck, she cursed both the Marquess and Le Comte for the tenth time that day.
From the top of the stairs, the cringe of hinges and a door opening and closing. She made herself deliberately small, observing from the corner as a tall man strode down the stairs, his face thrown into sharp relief by the glare of light from the crystal chandelier overhead. Devon would have recognized that strongly etched profile anywhere and, pulse accelerating, she grabbed the gossamer of her skirts, holding her breath, wondering if he would pass by. It was as if, ridiculous notion, they had somehow catapulted into one another’s orbit, destined to collide.
The flicker of recognition was immediate, a lightning charge in the quiet corridor. Dark and supremely elegant in his evening clothes, Blackburn unerringly found his way to her side, like a bullet to a target. His hair was disordered, slanting over his ears and forehead, and his formal dress did absolutely nothing to conceal the breadth of his shoulders, the lean musculature of his body. Her nerves rattling, Devon tried to deny that in addition to being lethal, the man was stunningly, disastrously handsome.
“Mademoiselle Caravelle.” The low words were a growl. His smile wasn’t a nice thing and sent fingers of awareness tripping up her spine.
“I was searching for you,” she tried, her voice a low whisper. Her blood pumped fiercely at the prospect of his dragging her from a London ballroom to a prison when he discovered that she didn’t have the Eroica. “I thought that I might find you here.”
“In a shadowed hallway?” His eyes were a cold blue and locked into hers. He was standing so close that she could breathe in his warm scent. It was an outrageous thought, but if she reached out she could trace the faint lines bracketing his wide mouth, stroke the hard line of his jaw. She was mesmerized, on the brink of a strange madness.
“You do have a marked preference for the dramatic I’ve noticed in our brief acquaintance, Mademoiselle.”
“Believe me, not by choice.” She tried to keep her voice calm, and as an outlet for her nervousness, she took a look over his shoulder and down the still deserted corridor.
“I don’t believe you. In any case, the truth is rarely helpful in these instances.” His eyes skimmed her body. “Although I’ll admit you’ve chosen well—an out of the way spot to hand off the score.” His glance took in her scantily clad form, lingering on the emerald choker around her neck. “But it’s obviously not on your person.”
“A brilliant deduction,” she said defensively, studying the blinding whiteness of his cravat to slow her pulse. They were entirely alone and it would take nothing to have him haul her off to some dank cell at Newgate to await the hangman. She was seconds away from full-blown panic.
Swallowing the lump in her throat, she had to remind herself to keep breathing, the air was so thin between them.
“Look, I don’t have the score…” The words left her lips in a rush and she wished desperately that he wouldn’t stand so close to her. She felt his incredible heat as he leaned in toward her, saw his nostrils flare, and heard his indrawn breath. She found herself staring into his dark eyes and, inexplicably, a sense of female boldness filled her, a form of insanity, she was convinced, almost obliterating her panic.
Blackburn crossed his arms, his face wiped clean of expression save for a cynical curve to his lips. “That’s not what I came to hear. You really leave me with no choice.” His voice was dark and Devon waited, shivering with dread and a strange, unwelcome desire.
“I tried…” she said, turning away.
One step and he had her, pulling her up rough and hard against his chest. “Trying’s not good enough, Devon.” His intense scrutiny was a slow burn on her skin. Shadows glanced across the bridge of his nose, his wide mouth, and the angle of his jaw.
“Give me more time, then.”
“Time was never an option.”
She was unyielding, stiff in his arms and he waited a moment to see what she would do. From what seemed a long distance away came the chime of crystal and laughter. Devon glanced furtively over her shoulder, the black and white tile swimming before her eyes, before she returned to Blackburn’s suffocating gaze and embrace. “This isn’t the right time or place for this discussion,” she said pushing away from him.
He let her go, but she could see the effect of her words in the darkening of his eyes, his mood dangerous. “I’ll make myself clearer, then. I’m not interested in further discussion and there’s no use putting off the inevitable, Mademoiselle.” His smile was deadly as he took her by the bare arm as if they were about to engage in a quadrille. His hard palm burned her bare skin and she sucked in a startled breath in response, attempting to pull away. A moment later he thrust her under the light of a wall sconce, his gaze ruthlessly searching her face.
“You may not have the Eroica in your possession right now, but you damn well know where it is.” In an insulting glance, he took full stock of her trembling form in her wretchedly revealing dress. His eyes locked onto hers, refusing to let her look away. “You’re a beautiful woman—there’s not much Le Comte would deny you.”
“I already told you that I don’t have it.” She was exposed to his merciless gaze in the unsparing glare. His long fingers didn’t tighten on her arm, but they didn’t have to.
“Then we’re going to have to do something about that—but not here.”
Devon braced herself against the wall. Protest was stillborn on her lips as Blackburn’s hard palm slid from her arm to around her waist, his long fingers spanning her hipbone through the thin fabric of her dress. She tried to retreat backward, but that only brought her once again flush against the hardness of his chest.
Very deliberately, his hand slid around her neck, the contact squeezing her heart. His gaze caught hers and held. “Such a lovely, slender throat.” He stroked her softly, feeling the coolness of her skin against the contrasting heat of his palm. “What a shame it would be to see you hang, Devon.” The caress stopped for a moment before he resumed the mesmerizing rhythm again, and then his hot hand slid down her neck to rest on her back, an inch away from her breast.
Devon stopped breathing, a new, wilder rush of dread invading her senses. “What do you want me to do?”
The words were a strange combination of boldness and vulnerability.
He didn’t answer, his hand burning through her rib cage, the pressure searing and light at the same time. Devon couldn’t breathe as he studied her with the intensity of a wild animal before he lowered his head toward her, obliterating the world around them.
She
