Nicola Cornick - Notorious

Dev smiled lazily at her through the darkness. “Fitz is easily distracted,” he said. “You are going to have to exert a greater hold on him if you wish to have his sole attention.”

Susanna turned her gaze on him. “Fitz is like a small child in a confectionery shop,” she said. She made no effort to hide her exasperation and Dev found he almost liked her for it. There was no artifice in her—no pretence that she had any regard for Fitz other than for his title, and Dev had a reluctant admiration for that honesty. If she had pretended to any affection for the Marquis he would have despised her hypocrisy.

“An apt metaphor,” he said. “Sweet and pretty confections do catch Fitz’s eye.” He allowed his gaze to travel over her appraisingly. “No doubt he sees you as a particularly nicely wrapped treat.”

“Well, he won’t be helping himself to this treat anytime soon,” Susanna snapped.

“I imagine not,” Dev said. “If you withhold your favors for a while you are likely to gain far more from him.”

That won him another flash of those vivid green eyes. “Thank you for the advice,” Susanna said. “I assure you I prize myself far too highly to become Fitz’s mistress too easily.” She turned her face away from him, gazing instead out of the grimy window at the rain-streaked streets. Her profile was exquisite beneath her saucy little feathered hat, eyelashes thick and black, the line of her cheek pure and sweet, her lips tilted always as though on the edge of a smile. A cluster of ebony curls nestled against her throat, so silky and black that Dev felt a physical urge to run his fingers through them to see if they were really as soft as they looked. It was extraordinary, he thought cynically, how someone as venal as Susanna Burney could look so alluring, extraordinary that her ruthlessness did not spill out in some way, spoiling the pretty picture of the captivating widow. Yet that, he supposed, was part of her skill. She did not attempt to compete with the innocence of debutantes. Her appeal lay in her sophistication and charm. In truth she was little different from a courtesan, a very high class, very talented, very beautiful courtesan, but available to the highest bidder all the same, as long as it was marriage he was offering.

“Do you intend to seduce Fitz into marriage?” he asked.

Her gaze came back to his face, mocking him. “What a very vulgar question, Sir James. I have no intention of answering.”

“As you have said yourself, a widow may use certain experience to her advantage.”

A smile touched Susanna’s lips beneath the shadow of the bonnet. “Very true,” she said. “Just as a rake may use his knowledge and skill to trap a debutante heiress.”

There was silence between them, thick and taut, in the dark, enclosed world of the hackney coach. The rain drummed hard on the roof. The wheels splashed through the puddles on the road outside.

“You’re staring,” Susanna said coolly. “Try the window instead.”

“I see London every day,” Dev said. “I was admiring you.”

Susanna laughed. “I doubt that very much.”

“I meant in the aesthetic sense,” Dev said. “You are very beautiful. I’m not telling you anything you don’t know,” he added.

“You can spare me the compliments,” Susanna said dismissively. She smoothed her skirt with a gloved hand. “I am quite comfortable with silence.”

“I was trying to play nicely,” Dev said.

She cast him another glance, disdainful. “I doubt you do anything nicely, Devlin.”

“I make love very nicely indeed,” Dev said. “Do you not remember?”

“No.” She turned her face away again so that he could not read her expression. Her voice was cold but Dev sensed some emotion beneath her words. Discomposure? Discomfort? Surely so experienced an adventuress as Susanna could not be embarrassed by a reference to their mutual past so perhaps she was simply annoyed to have given him the opportunity to raise the subject of their passionate, shameless lovemaking. He felt a sudden strong urge to bait her further.

“You must surely remember it,” he said. “You were as wild and wanton in your response to me as any woman I have ever met.”

For a moment he thought she would win the encounter simply by ignoring his provocation but this was too blatant for her to let it go. He saw her eyes flash as she rose to his challenge and felt a stab of triumph to be able to force a reaction from her.

“How sweet of you to recall it after all this time,” she said cuttingly. “But I am afraid that for me it was in no way memorable.”

Liar.

The word hung on the air between them. Dev saw a tinge of color sting her cheeks as though he had spoken aloud. He shifted on the seat, shrugging.

“Perhaps the experience has been superseded by so many others that your memory fails you,” he said politely.

She looked at him with contempt. “Perhaps you confuse my romantic past with your own, Devlin. I heard that you were scarcely fastidious in your choices before your engagement to Lady Emma. Quantity over quality was your motto, so I believe.”

Touché. He had indeed been an enthusiastic rakehell.

“Once again I am flattered by the attention you give to my life,” Dev said. “Are you very interested in my romantic career?”

“Of course not!” Susanna said. Her face was very pink now; hot, angry, animated.

“All evidence to the contrary,” Dev said. “It is perhaps an odd preoccupation for my former wife—”

“You always did have good opinion of yourself,” Susanna interrupted. “Or perhaps I mean a boundless conceit.”

“I plead guilty,” Dev said. “But there are some things at which I do excel.”

Susanna rolled her eyes. “Why do men feel the need to brag of their sexual prowess?”

“I could demonstrate my prowess rather than simply talk about it if you prefer,” Dev offered blandly.

Now it was Susanna’s smile that was edged with scorn, her eyes vivid with challenge. “You would try to seduce me? I don’t believe you would have the nerve, Devlin.”

Dev laughed. “It’s dangerous to dare me.”

Susanna shook her head. “You are all talk. You would not do anything to put your betrothal with Lady Emma at risk.”

“She wouldn’t know,” Dev said. He’d behaved like a monk for the past two years not, he was obliged to admit, for reasons of honor but simply because Emma would give him hell if she heard any rumors of infidelity. Emma would never tolerate the discreet liaisons with courtesans to which other wives and fiancées turned a blind eye. She was far too possessive. Her demand of fidelity was, Dev knew, nothing to do with her feelings but another sign that she had bought him and could dictate his behavior.

But Susanna was the one woman who could never betray him because he knew too many of her secrets.

The idea stole his breath. He liked it; he liked it far more than he ought. When Chessie had suggested earlier that he should try to take Susanna away from Fitz he had not entertained the idea seriously. Now he did. To make love to Susanna again, to uncover her body to his gaze and his touch, to press his lips to that silken skin, to taste her again and feel her response … His body hardened again at the mere thought of it.

“I would tell Lady Emma you tried to seduce me,” Susanna said, her words cutting through his most intimate fantasies.

“I know too much about you,” Dev said. “You’d never denounce me for fear I would betray you.”

Their eyes locked in mutual dislike and an equally blistering and sudden mutual desire. It seemed to heat the small dark carriage, scalding the air between them.

“You don’t like me,” Susanna said. There was a thread of something in her voice now that made Dev’s blood burn. She could deny an attraction to him for as long as she wished but he knew better. He had wanted her from the moment he had seen her walking across the ballroom toward him and he knew she felt the same.