He blinked. He’d certainly been called handsome before, cooed over by women in bed or ones that he wanted to get there. But there was something different about this declaration of his supposed beauty. Something that made him turn away, back to his desk.
“I would like nothing more than to seal our agreement in a far more pleasurable way than with a mere handshake, but I wonder if you have some questions for me about your situation.”
“Because you’ve been avoiding me, you mean,” she teased gently as she followed him to the desk and blushed as he righted the items that had skidded across it while he pleasured her there.
“Yes,” he said, lifting his gaze to hers. “Because of that.”
“Have you determined any course of action that might allow me to not hide out for the rest of my life?”
He tried not to reveal his reaction to that question. She was being playful, perhaps to ease her fears, but the suggestion was a real one. It was entirely possible she would have to leave the city, leave her identity behind and anyone associated with it. It wasn’t the solution he wanted for her, but there it was.
“I’ve been working on background on the players,” he said. “Roddenbury was once a member of my club, so my partner Will White is collecting some information on his presence there. I’ve been working on the woman you mentioned, Maggie Monroe. I hadn’t heard her name before in association with the Cat’s Companion, so I’m trying to figure out where she fits into this mess.”
“What will you do once you have the information you need?” she asked.
He clenched his teeth, because that was a more complicated issue. “Why don’t we cross that bridge when we come to it?” he said.
She leaned across his desk, placing her hands flat on the top. “Oscar.”
He met her stare, saw her fear and her questions. “I’m trying to figure that out, too,” he admitted. “The guard is notoriously bad at what it does. And since we’re talking about an earl in the mix of all this, it’s also entirely corrupt.”
She bent her head. “They won’t care about the murder. Or about me,” she said.
“But I do,” he said, reaching out to trace the line of her jaw until she looked up at him with a shiver. “I promise you, Imogen, we’re going to work this out.”
She smiled at him, but it wasn’t that bright sunshine expression he’d come to crave in the short time he’d been exposed to it. This was false, tight, meant to appease him.
“I know you’ll try.” She turned away and paced across the room to the fire. She stood there, silent, her shoulders rolled slightly forward in a position of defeat. Of exhaustion. Of fear.
He wanted so much to relieve it all. And since the answers he had couldn’t do it, he had to do something else instead.
“Come to my bed,” he said softly.
She pivoted toward him, her lips parting at his directness. “Oscar—”
“I can’t solve the problems of the world tonight,” he said as he crossed the room to her in slow, steady steps. “I can’t promise you how this story will end. But I can ease the fear for a few hours, Imogen. I can give you pleasure. I can make you come until you’re weak. Come to my bed.”
He extended a hand, trying hard not to flex it with excitement as he waited for her to take it. She stared at it a moment, then touched her fingertips to his. She traced his fingers, then the back of his hand. It was all so slow, so gentle, that for a moment he forgot he was trying to seduce her.
Instead,hewas seduced. He stared as she caught his hand between hers at last, lifting it. Her gaze caught his, holding steady as she kissed his fingertips, the back of his hand, the inside of his wrist. Then she pressed his hand to her heart. He felt it throbbing under the softness of her breast.
He wanted to make it throb even harder.
“Take me to your bed,” she whispered as she lifted to her tiptoes and brushed her lips to his. “Please.”
He caught her waist then, overcome by the desire she created in him. He dragged her hard against him, his fingers clenching against the middle of her back as she arched against him. He dropped his mouth, reaching for control, fighting for it with every part of his body. And then he kissed her. Soft at first, harder, then out of control as he tasted her tongue and felt the need in her grow as fast and as hot as his own.
“Come on,” he gasped as he broke the kiss and threaded his fingers through hers. “Let’s go.”
Chapter 10
Oscar hadn’t stopped touching her the entire time they moved through the house together. His fingers had gripped her hip, he’d pinned her against a wall for another of those drugging kisses, he’d brushed her backside with his hand until she stumbled. But now, as he opened the door to his chamber, he stopped pushing and allowed her to enter the room without him herding her forward.
She took in the room as she did so. Unlike the study, which was done in dark tones, his chamber was unexpectedly light. White linens, lighter woods, like this place was a reprieve from the mask he wore. The one of command and control and dark intentions.
Dark intentions that became clear again as they looked together toward the bed on the wall opposite the door. A very big bed, indeed. Her breath caught as she looked at it, then at him.
“Still like the terms of your bargain?” he asked, arching a brow almost in challenge. As if he expected her to find some means of escape.
