One Night of Sin by Gaelen Foley Page A

floor.
    “I . . . I waited for you.” She scanned his face in guarded suspicion, but quickly concluded by his guileless look that he had not found the ruby.
    Thank God.
    “I see,” he said amiably. “So, you were coming to tell me to hurry up.”
    She smiled, the tension slowly easing from her. “Those weren’t to be my exact words, but the sentiment’s the same.”
    “Here I am.”
    “Come, your soup is getting cold.” She captured his hand and tugged him over to their feast.
    “You don’t have to share with me, Becky. It’s for you.”
    “You’re much too generous. I could never eat all this by myself.”
    “Ma’am,” he murmured, politely pulling out a chair for her at the table.
    She gave him a gracious nod and took her seat. With a warm smile, he sat in the chair next to her, his thighs sprawled loosely.
    “I hope everything is to your liking. Watier’s is famous for their dinners here in horrible, hateful London Town.”
    She sent him an arch smile. “It’s all very good,” she replied as she lifted her spoon to her lips. “Almost as good as my own country cooking.”
    “You can cook—food?” he exclaimed.
    Nodding, she pointed with her spoon to the place she had set for him. “Eat.”
    He did not obey; she had a feeling he rarely did. Instead, he propped his elbow on the table and just watched her with an odd little smile on his face.
    “What is it?” she asked with a spoonful of soup halfway to her lips.
    “Hm?” he murmured.
    “You’re staring.”
    “You’re the only woman I know who can cook food,” he said matter-of-factly, then took the towel off his shoulders and used it vigorously on his still damp hair.
    Becky couldn’t help smiling when he was through. He looked so adorably tousled and boyish.
    “Shall I open the champagne?”
    “Oh, would you?” she asked eagerly, then confessed, “I have never tasted any before.”
    “Well, then, you must do so without delay.” He rose and undertook the task. “If you intend to make your fortune as a fine London courtesan, my girl, you’re going to have to get used to the stuff.”
    She offered no reply, guiltily letting him maintain his wrong assumptions.
    She was trying not to think yet about what lay ahead tonight, and she had the distinct impression that Alec knew she was nervous and was determined to soothe her with his teasing and his easygoing charm.
    She supposed it was going to hurt, despite his skill as a lover.
    Her mother had died when Becky was fourteen, still too young to have certain matters explained to her; and the ultra-pious Mrs. Whithorn probably didn’t know the facts of birds and bees, herself; but whatever instruction the female adults in Becky’s life had left neglected, the brazen country girls in her village had explained in wicked, astonishing detail.
    Sally, the red-haired tavern wench, and Daisy the milkmaid, both fetching, knowing, brazen girls, were local experts on the subject of the “amorous congress.” Any male with whom one of them dallied had to be sampled by the other, as well. The two girls were both rivals and friends, and thoroughly relished sitting around and debating their comparisons afterward, much to the scandalized delight of the other young people in Buckley-on-the-Heath. The older folk pretended to be oblivious to the younger set’s explorations, for, after all, mating was a key part of country life, from the butterflies courting amongst the meadow flowers, to the kestrels coupling violently in midair, to the orderly annual breeding of Farmer Jones’s prize sheep. Sex was everywhere. God knew there was little else to do in rural England, except work.
    Though Sally and Daisy had both gone up to the hayloft with nearly all the local farm boys and, of course, their favorite, the local squire’s insufferable eldest son, Becky had never even felt tempted. The extent of her experience was through hearing her lowborn friends’ accounts, and truthfully, she did not believe