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“Are you coming out tonight?” her fellow seamstress asked after Madame had withdrawn to her apartment upstairs. “There’s to be dancing at the assembly rooms.”
“Not tonight, Fanny. You go on ahead.”
Emma didn’t have to offer twice. Fanny was out the door as soon as she could blow a kiss.
Another time, she might have enjoyed a rare evening of dancing, but not tonight. Not only was she worried sick for Miss Palmer, she was still reeling from her own encounter at Ashbury House.
The duke was probably laughing at his own cleverness even now. Marry a seamstress? Ha-ha-ha. What a joke.
How dare the man? Really.
Emma shook off the memory, telling herself not spare the duke another thought. She had more important things to do.
She took a stub of a candle from Madame Bissette’s drawer, placed it on the counter, and struck the flint as quietly as possible. After rummaging for a discarded scrap of brown paper, she ironed it flat with her hands and chewed on a stub of pencil, thinking. Waistlines had started to drop this season, moving away from Empire silhouettes. Concealing an expanding belly would be more difficult, but Emma would do her best.
She placed pencil to paper and began to sketch. Miss Palmer would need a corset with extra give toward the bottom . . . perhaps a frock with small buttons inside the waistline, to gather or let out the skirts. A fetching pelisse was a must—the right embellishments would draw the eye upward.
The task absorbed her attention so fully, she didn’t notice how much time had passed until someone knocked at the door.
Thump-thump-thump.
Emma jumped in her skin and crumpled the sketches into her pocket. “We’re closed.”
The rapping only grew louder. More insistent.
Thump-thump-thump-thump.
With a sigh, Emma went to the front of the shop. She turned the key in the lock and opened the door just an inch.
“I’m sorry, I’m afraid we’re shut for the eveni—”
“You’re not shut for me.”
She found herself pushed aside as a man bulled his way through the door. He wore a dark cape and a tall hat with its brim pulled low, concealing most of his face—but she knew him at once. Only one man would have behaved in such a presumptuous manner.
The Duke of Ashbury.
“Miss Gladstone.” He inclined his head in the slightest possible nod. “I told you we’d meet again.”
Oh, Lord.
Emma closed the door and turned the key. There was nothing else to do for the moment. She couldn’t leave it ajar and risk being seen alone with a gentleman.
“Your Grace, I can’t admit visitors after hours.”
“I’m not a visitor. I’m a customer.” He strolled around the darkened shop, prodding a headless dressmaking form with his walking stick. “I need a new waistcoat.”
“It’s a dressmaking shop. We don’t offer gentlemen’s attire.”
“Very well, I’m here to order a gown.”
“A gown for whom?”
“What does it matter?” He made an annoyed gesture. “For a particularly ugly woman, approximately my size.”
Good heavens, what could this man be after? Was his mockery yesterday not enough to satisfy him? He couldn’t actually want to retrieve Miss Worthing’s gown.
Whatever his aim, Emma meant to exact a price in return. Today, he was welcome to share in the humiliation.
She drew a box to the center of the floor—the one ladies stood upon to have their hems pinned—and waved him toward it. “Up you go, then.”
He stared at her.
“If you want a gown—”
“It’s not that I want a gown.”
“If your very ugly, duke-sized friend wants a gown, I will need measurements. Sleeve, torso, hem.” She arched an eyebrow. “Bosom.”
There. Surely he would retreat from that.
Instead, the unscarred corner of his mouth tipped with amusement. He set his walking stick aside. He removed his hat. Then his cloak. Next his gloves. And, finally, his topcoat. Without breaking her gaze, he stepped onto the box and lifted his arms to either side, palms up. Like an actor on a stage, expecting applause.
“Well?” he prompted. “I’m waiting.”
Emma retrieved her measuring tape. She’d begun this little farce, and she couldn’t back down from it.
“How did you know where to find this shop?” she asked, suspicious. “Did you follow me?”
“I am a duke. Of course I didn’t follow you. I had you followed. It’s an entirely different thing.”
She shook her head, unfurling the measuring tape. “And yet no less disturbing.”
“Disturbing? Yesterday you turned down a lifetime of wealth in favor of two pounds, three shillings in ready coin, and then fled from my house as though it were afire. Has it not occurred to you that I might have pursued you out of some genuine concern for your well-being?”
She gave him a doubtful look.
“I’m not saying I did. Only that it should have occurred to you.”
Emma moved behind him and stretched her measuring tape from his left shoulder to his wrist, ostensibly taking the length of his sleeve. In actuality, most of her concentration was consumed with ignoring his closeness. Only a single layer of fine, crisp linen separated her touch from his body, and she had no desire to relive that buzzing shock of connection they’d shared in his library.
You can’t leave now. We’re just starting to have fun.
She took the measurement from one shoulder to the other. When she inhaled, she drew in the masculine scents of shaving soap and rich cologne.
None of this was helping with her focus problem.
“You’re not writing these measurements down,” he said.
“I don’t need to. I’ll remember.”
Unfortunately. Whether she wished it or not, Emma knew this encounter would be burned into her memory forever. Or if not forever, at least until she was sufficiently old and feebleminded to hold conversations with a squash.
She turned the tape vertically and put one end to the nape of his neck. A mistake. Now, atop all these unwanted memories, she’d added the feel of his shorn hair. It had the texture of expensive velvet, with a dense, luxurious pile.
Velvet, Emma? Really?
“Almost finished. I’ll just measure your chest now.” She held the end of the tape on one side of his rib cage, and then turned to circle him in the opposite direction, drawing the tape across the satin backing of his waistcoat and all the way around, meeting both ends at his breastbone.
She cinched the tape. He winced.
Good.
There, now. She had the beast on a leash.
So why did she feel like his captive?
It wasn’t his scars that intimidated her. Quite the reverse. When she stood this close, her gaze couldn’t take in both halves of him at the same time. She had to choose a side.
Emma knew with a sinking heart which one would capture her. There were two approaches to successful dressmaking—to find flaws and conceal them, or to bring out the hidden beauty. She’d always believed in the latter method, and oh, it came back to bite her today.
Don’t do it, Emma. Don’t give your foolish heart an inch of rope, or it will have you tied in knots.
But it was too late. Now, as she looked up at him, all she could see was a man. One with searching blue eyes and a hidden heart beating in a strong, defiant rhythm.
A man with wants, needs. Desires.
A man who’d reached out for her yesterday, and now . . .
And now gave every indication of leaning in for a kiss.
Chapter Three (#ulink_46476cd6-0cb4-5f3b-b184-3e9594edd939)
Ash had never wanted to kiss a woman more.
He wanted to kiss her so badly, he could taste it. He’d devour the pink sweetness in those lips, stroke all the tart words from the tip of her tongue. Teach her a lesson or two. Leave her breathless. Rattle her to her bones.
He wanted to do far more than kiss her, of course. As he leaned forward, he could peer through the gap of her fichu and catch a glimpse of the valley between her breasts—that dark, fragrant rift that held so many promises of pleasure.
By Venus’s hand.
A few years ago, he would have kissed her, and more. He would have seduced her with a campaign of little trinkets and witty teasing. She would have come willingly, even eagerly, to his bed, where they would have enjoyed one another. Thoroughly.
But that was in the past. His once-charming wit had been replaced by smoldering anger, and his once-attractive face had been rearranged. No woman would be wooed by the kisses of a bitter, disfigured wretch.
It didn’t matter. He didn’t need to woo a lover. He needed to secure a wife. Wed her, bed her, and, once she was swelling with his heir, tuck her away in the country. The end.
He straightened, arching a sardonic eyebrow. A fortunate thing, that he still had one eyebrow intact. What was being a duke, if not arching a sardonic eyebrow?
She released the tape. “Choose your fabric at the draper’s and have five yards sent over. With your coloring, I suggest a pink brocade.”
His tilted his head. “Really? I was thinking of peach.”
She gathered his hat, cloak, gloves, and walking stick and pushed them into his arms. “And now I must ask you to leave. I need to be getting home.”
“We can accomplish both those things at once. I’ll take you home. My carriage is just outside.”
“Thank you, I prefer to walk.”
“More convenient still. My feet are even closer than the carriage.”
She headed for the rear exit of the shop. Ash replaced his topcoat, cloak, gloves, and hat, then followed her out into a dank, reeking alleyway. With his long strides to her short ones, he quickly made up the ground.
Her shoes tapped over the cobblestones at an irritated clip. “I will not be your mistress. My body is not for let.”
“That can’t be entirely true. You’re a seamstress, aren’t you? Your fingers are for let.”
“If you don’t know the difference between a woman’s fingers and her womb, I would definitely not share a bed with you.”
After a moment’s stunned pause, he laughed. It was a rusty, unappealing sound. He supposed he was out of practice.
“I do know the difference.” He reached for her ungloved hand and brushed his thumb over each of her fingertips. “You can trust I won’t confuse the two.”
He stroked a callus on the tip of her second finger. It made him angry. A gentleman’s daughter should have soft hands, but life had hardened her in these small ways. He had disturbing fancies of lifting her hand to his lips and kissing all that hurt away.
She sucked in her breath, as if she could read his thoughts. Or maybe her own thoughts had startled her.
She withdrew her hand. “What is your aim? Simply to torment me further?”
“No, that is not my aim. Though I suspect, over time, it will be an unavoidable consequence.”
She gave a little growl.
Ash found it wickedly arousing. Not that he would tell her so. He was too distracted by the way she hugged herself and shivered. “Where is your cloak?”
“I left it at your house yesterday.”
“Well. I hope that teaches you a lesson about making dramatic exits.”
Ash removed his own cape and twirled it about her shoulders, tucking in the ends until she resembled a penguin. “Come along, then.” He swiveled her by the shoulders and nudged her into a waddle.
Offering her his cloak was not mere gallantry. It was self-protection. He had gloves, but the leather was too fine, too supple. Without the barrier of the cloak, he could still feel her. He didn’t wish to relive the visceral shock that had rocketed through him in his library.
“Now,” he said, “perhaps you’ll pay attention. I don’t recall saying anything about a mistress. I believe I used the word ‘duchess.’” He gestured at their bleak surroundings. “I would not trouble to come here for any other purpose.”
“You can’t be serious. Not really, truly, honestly, earnestly, properly.”
He allowed a few moments to pass. “Are you quite done listing adverbs? I should hate to interrupt.”
