How To Distract a Duchess by Mia Marlowe Page A

finished.”
    “Why?” He parted her robe, clearly disinterested in her answer, and slid his hands in to caress her breasts. She couldn’t find the will to cover herself again, not when he tormented her with his thumb circling a pink areola. Then he dipped his head to claim a nipple with his mouth.
    “Oh!” A jolt of desire streaked from her breast to her womb. She had to explain something to him, but for the life of her, she couldn’t remember what. His tongue twirled circles around her sensitive nipple, robbing her of rational thought. When he switched to her other breast, she grabbed a slice of sanity and held on.
    “We must wait. Once the painting is finished, then I can set you up in a nice little townhouse, someplace in Mayfair, I think,” she said breathlessly. She buried her fingers in his dark hair. Her legs were trembling so, it was a wonder she was still upright. “Close enough to be convenient and far enough to be discreet.”
    “Set me up?” He straightened to his full height.
    “Of course.” Artemisia craned her neck to look up at him. Her nipples demanded his mouth once more, but he hadn’t reduced her to begging. Not yet. “Isn’t that how these things are done?”
    “What do you mean by ‘these things’?” His eyes narrowed.
    “Just as I told you. I intend to take a lover. I wish that lover to be you.” She pulled her robe closed, gathering her shredded dignity with it. How could he run so hot and then so cold in mere seconds? “I would agree to a generous stipend, of course.”
    “A stipend,” he repeated.
    “That way you wouldn’t have to continue working for the counting house.”
    “So I’d be available whenever you need me,” he said flatly. “To perform for your pleasure when you wish.”
    “Exactly, clever boy.” She wished he didn’t sound so doubtful about it. She could already imagine furnishing a little love bower, a place apart from the rest of the world where she and Thomas could plumb the depths of delight without fear of interruption or discovery. “We could even draw up a contract, if you like. Some men do when they take a mistress, I’ve heard tell.”
    “I see.” He ran his hand through his hair, but one lock fell back down on his forehead. She reached up to push it away, but he grasped her hand and held it tightly.
    Too tightly.
    “So I’m to be available to rut you on command?”
    “There’s no need to be vulgar.” She tried to pull her hand away, but his grip was firm.
    “What if we agree on a good roll thrice a week and maybe a quick swive or two as needed?” he suggested, his face hard as English oak. “I’m pretty good with my hands, I’m told. Perhaps we should write a diddling now and then into the damned contract, too.”
    “Why are you so angry?”
    “Because, madam, I am unable to enter into a service contract of that nature with you,” he said coldly.
    “You don’t find me attractive?”
    “That is beside the point.”
    “Then what is the point? Men enter into this type of arrangement with women every day of the week.” She finally worked her hand free. He’d left her knuckles red and aching. “Why are you making everything so difficult?”
    “Because, Your Grace, you are not a man and I am not a woman. I cannot be your kept mistress.”
    “Semantics, Mr. Doverspike.”
    “Reality, madam.” He knotted the sash at his waist. A muscle in his jaw worked furiously. “And now, if you would please clothe yourself, I will assist you with your corset. Then I find I must absent myself from this house before I do something I will later regret.”
    His dark eyes glinted dangerously. Then he turned and waved a hand toward the tall windows where the sun was reaching its zenith and disappearing over the manor house’s steep gables.
    “As you can see, Your Grace, we have already lost the light.”
     
     

Chapter 10
     
     
     
    “The manifest of the Valiant , the disposition of her cargo and the final tally of profit from the