Page 14 of A Story of Love

“Lord Severn!”

He ignored her gasp of mortification and gestured to the bed a few feet away—he’d seen the way she’d been sneaking nervous glances at it—which was well-mussed from his pleasurable labors with Meg earlier that night. “If you’d rather, we could retire to the bed. You could strip off what remains of that gown, get on your hands and knees, and let me have my rakish way with your delectable body.”

Her eyeballs threatened to roll right out of her head as she gawked at the huge four-poster bed and the sensual red and gold velvet coverlet.

“You are—” her voice broke and she cleared her throat, her pulse fluttering wildly beneath the thin skin of her throat.

“Well?” he asked, cocking an eyebrow. “What am I, pray?”

Her emotions were as easy to read as a child’s primer and Fast could see the exact moment when she recognized the seriousness of her predicament. She was half-naked, captive in a brothel, and utterly at the mercy of a man she believed to be completely depraved.

“Are you going to—” again she broke off, moistened her lower lip with the tip of her tongue, and opened her mouth.

“Am I going to fuck you?” he asked before she could speak, purposely employing vulgar phrasing.

Her jaw sagged even lower, and her horrified expression was so comical that it was almost painful not to laugh.

“You wouldn’t!”

“Only if you beg me.”

Fast had not believed it possible for her to look even more appalled.

“I—you—how—”

As amusing as her horror was, he decided to have mercy on her. “You needn’t worry, Miss Fontenot: I do not, as a rule, fuck virgins, so you are quite safe here.” When she merely gawked, Fast gave her a look of exaggerated surprise. “Why, Miss Fontenot! Is that disappointment I see on your face?”

The mocking words acted like the prod of a red-hot poker, and she jumped to her feet, forgetting the state of her gown in her outrage. “It most certainly is not disappointment—it is disgust!”

Fast stood and gazed down at her, allowing himself a nice long look at her lush bosom, which was quivering with each labored breath, her ripe breasts threatening to escape her plain white stays.

“Lord Severn!”

“Hmm?” He reluctantly pulled his gaze from her delicious tits and stared into her furious green eyes.

“You—you cannot do this to me!” she sputtered.

“I can’t? Because it seems to me that I can do whatever I wish to you.”

“I—I—”

“You are in this situation thanks to your own reckless behavior, Miss Fontenot. I didn’t force you to sneak onto my property and spy in my window.”

“I demand you release me, my lord. Immediately,” she added, her voice high-pitched but admirably stern.

“No.”

She made a half-yelping, half-snarling sound but appeared to be stricken speechless.

He gestured to the chaise longue. “Sit down, Miss Fontenot.”

She held her ground for at least a minute before giving an irritated huff and dropping gracelessly onto the chaise.

Fast resumed his own seat. “What do you want, Miss Fontenot?”

“I want you to release me!”

“And I want you to tell me why you are following me. Watching me. Bothering me and interrupting my amorous entertainments.”