to know that yet, Mr. Ritchie. Or should I call you Edmund?”
“My friends generally just call me Ritchie …” He paused, watching patterns of assessment cross her face, sharp and wary, but bizarrely stimulating too. “So I suppose you can too.”
Then she laughed—a free, rich sound—and the tension between them snapped like an India rubber band. It didn’t dissipate entirely. No, there was still an edge in the air. But the atmosphere in the room was distinctly lighter.
“Touché, Mr … touché, Ritchie. So shall we sit down and discuss this ridiculous proposition of yours?” With a graceful gesture, she indicated the damask-covered chair he’d been sitting in, and its mate, facing it before the small, cheerful fire set against the early morning chill. “That is when you’ve first explained to me why you’ve arrived in this rather unorthodox manner. Sneaking around the tradesman’s entrance and dressing like a bookmaker or a pieman, rather than wealthy man of business.”
“I wanted you to see another side of me.” He plucked at the lapels of his commonplace houndstooth-checked suit. “See the blunt, plain man rather than the facade of Savile Row tailoring and society manners.”
She gave him a wry look, as if she did indeed see straight through him and any manner of subterfuge he chose to erect. “It must be a very peculiar society that encourages manners like yours, Ritchie.” She acknowledged his shrug with one of her own. “And I still consider your offer quite absurd.”
“Why so?”
Though he took care not to show it, Ritchie felt irrational disappointment. He understood her qualms, but still, the idea of not having her after all hit him like a rabbit punch. “I believe that it’s a generous offer, Bea, but I daresay I could be persuaded to parlay it a little further if you decree it insufficient.”
He watched as she slid her hand into a pocket in her dressing gown and pulled out both his letter, and another envelope, presumably her reply. It was a simple, artless, everyday action, completely without airs, but still his cock throbbed harder at the sight of it. In his imagination, he saw that same pale, beautiful hand sliding elsewhere; slipping inside the unbuttoned fly of his trousers, seeking his flesh.
What would her fingers feel like on his cock? Would they be cool and soothing? Or warm and tantalizingly heated?
Lord, I don’t care! I just want her to touch me!
“It’s absurd simply because it is so generous. Twenty thousand guineas is a disproportionate sum. Not to mention the debts covered, and the annual payment thereafter.” She looked away, sideways, a soft blush gathering on the apples of her cheeks. “I have no illusions as to my own value, Ritchie. I consider myself a gentlewoman, and I’m quite pretty, I think. But I’m just a woman like any other woman, when it comes down to it, with face and limbs and shape … and other parts—” the roses deepened “—and a month of my time is worth far less than twenty thousand.”
Was she toying with him? Angling like a practiced courtesan in a game of advance and retreat? Somehow, he thought not. Despite her recent notoriety and her avid response last night, the impression came again that the Siren of South Mulberry Street was relatively inexperienced. Was that the root of his obsession with her? A yearning to educate an eager acolyte into a new world of exotic bedroom games?
And she had been willing. It hadn’t been a mask, worn as some did, until it was too late.
Compressing his lips, he expunged the dark thoughts again and sought the light instead.
Beatrice Weatherly of the crimson hair, intelligent green eyes and sweet, uncorseted curves. Irresistible temptation in a softly fitted dressing gown.
“Let me be the judge of your value, Bea. I’m usually fairly shrewd in these matters and I always get my money’s worth.”
Those eyes widened into brilliant pools of jungle green, snapping with outrage. It was all he could do not to throw himself bodily at her and begin cashing in his investment right here in this pleasant little morning room. But instead, he held his hand out for the letters. “So, let’s see your counteroffer, shall we?”
CHAPTER SIX
Counteroffer
BEATRICE’S HAND SHOOK as she passed the letters over. Would her sweaty palms have smudged the ink? It was impossible to stay calm and cool around Ritchie. His masculinity was brilliant, as hard and bright as Lady Southern’s newfangled electric lighting, with a heat that singed the unwary woman who got too close. As he studied her swiftly penned response, she had to prevent herself from wrapping her arms around her middle. She felt as if she’d fly apart in pieces any moment.
Either that, or throw herself bodily at this handsome, atrocious man who proposed to buy her.
Ritchie was quite a different fellow this morning, yet fundamentally the same. His suit was a soft, well-worn, workaday checked thing, not the tailored, beautifully cut miracle he’d worn last night. With his curling undressed hair, and the suspicion of unbarbered whiskers, he looked almost the ruffian—piratical, wild and strong. He wore no collar, and the top of his striped shirt lay unbuttoned, baring not only a tantalizing triangle of his throat and chest, but, oh goodness, a few curling wayward wisps of sandy-colored body hair. He might as well have been a Gypsy rover in her morning room, and he certainly didn’t look like the sort of plutocrat who could casually toss away twenty thousand guineas in pursuit of a paramour.
No, you’re more the sort of buck a certain class of woman might lavish twenty thousand on for a month of your bedroom services!
Pressing her hands against the skirt of her robe, Beatrice calmed herself as best she could. She had to remain in control, no matter how intimate matters became. There was pleasure ahead, in the weeks, days and even hours, perhaps. But she still had to keep her wits about her and steer clear of any softer feelings toward Ritchie, for her own safety. Just look what had happened last time she’d thought herself sweet on a man. And yet somehow, Eustace Lloyd had drifted out of focus, like one of his own photographs, completely eclipsed by the man now sitting so calmly reading.
“This is nonsense, Bea. I can’t accept it.”
His voice was impatient, steely. Beatrice’s head shot up, and when she looked him in the eye, her heart sank. His glittering blue eyes were rigorous.
When Edmund Ellsworth Ritchie fixed a price, he fixed a price. Even when whoever it was he was doing business with wanted less!
How could anybody be so contrary?
“But two thousand is more than plenty, surely? It’ll pay mine and Charlie’s immediate bills … I think … with a little left over for me to purchase a typewriting machine and then take some lessons at the Moncrief Street Ladies Secretarial Academy. I saw it advertised in The Modern Woman just the other day, with splendid testimonials.”
“It’s twenty thousand, the debts paid, and the annuity, or nothing,” growled Ritchie, and to her horror, he tore her hastily penned offer into tiny fragments and dropped them like snowflakes into a little china dish that stood on a Malay mahogany side table. “And I’ll throw in a dozen typewriters and a course at your blessed academy and then you can set up a secretarial agency all of your own, if you want.” He smoothed out his own letter and glanced around the room until his gaze finally settled on the leather-topped secretaire in the corner. Striding
