Chapter nine
In Which Consent Is Given, Cheeks Are Scored, and a Maestro Rises
The hammam shimmered with heat and triumph.
Wanton lay sprawled across a heated stone slab, every inch of her basking in the righteous glow of justice, steam, and scandal. Her limbs floated somewhere between exhaustion and smug delight. Beads of moisture clung to her skin like well-earned medals, glistening in places that had no business looking quite so self-congratulatory.
“I deserve this,” she whispered to the domed ceiling, which said nothing but glistened approvingly.
Solving a crime of that magnitude—under towel duress, no less—was no small feat. Who knew she could be such a brilliant sleuth? Perhaps she wasn’t just an explorer of ancient ruins and unexpected dukes. Perhaps there was room for Wanton Wallflower, Consulting Detective.
When she wasn’t tangled in silk sheets or navigating secret passageways, she could take on a case or two. Crimes of passion.Stolen hearts. Missing corsets. Mysterious drafts in library wings…
The steam curled around her thighs like a fond sigh. She was a goddess on a plinth, or a mushroom in optimal humidity.
She stretched luxuriously, one leg bent, arms overhead, basking in the delusion of peaceful solitude.
Until she heard the door open and then measured steps. Heavy. Purposeful.
Her breath caught. Her skin prickled in warning. Her toes curled.
The steam shifted like it, too, recognized that walk.
The Duke of Arsbury entered the hammam.
His robe hung open at the collar. His chest glistened with damp heat. And his expression—oh, it was unreadable only if one had never studied wrath, lust, and feral discipline under ducal lighting conditions.
Wanton knew that relaxation was no longer on the menu.
She sat upright on the edge of the stone slab, towel slipping just slightly off one shoulder. “Lost something else, Your Grace?”
He paused. Took her in like a general surveying an enemy position—or a dessert he had no business devouring.
“Yes,” he said, voice low. “My dignity.”
She looked around, unbothered. “I’m afraid the ducal's dignity is not currently present. Perhaps try the lost and found?”
He was on her before she could finish the sentence, hand circling her wrist with firm, merciless intent.
She gasped, spine straightening as he pulled her to her feet.
“Miss Wallflower,” he said, with terrifying calm, “you have tested every limit I possess.”
She blinked, faux innocent. “Well. One must always know one’s parameters.”
“I intend to turn that deliciously insolent backside of yours into a percussion instrument.”
Her stomach did a waltz. Her breath hitched. Her thighs clamped with scholarly interest.
“But first, you will tell me. Clearly and unmistakably.” He paused, his gaze searching hers—not a flicker of humor, just that low, volcanic restraint she was beginning to recognize as ducal foreplay. “Do you want this?”
The air thickened between them. Charged like a laboratory just before the experiment went magnificently wrong.
Wanton’s lips parted. Her brain, for one valiant moment, attempted logic. Was this advisable? Morally sound? Covered in any version of the Flowery Spinsters’ Handbook?
And yet… Some events in life required immediate, unquestioned participation. Observing Halley’s Comet from a mountain peak; hearing Beethoven’s Ninth performed on original instruments; witnessing Krakatoa erupt at dawn—preferably from a safe, scientifically responsible distance. Being spanked, thoroughly and with scholarly intent, by a duke whose glutes had their own marble fan club.
This wasn’t recklessness. This was empirical urgency. Wanton’s pulse thudded like a field drum. Her thighs shifted like tectonic plates of consent. Her voice, when it emerged, was pure academic conviction laced with sinful anticipation.
