“It is a simple transaction, Miss Caulfield,” he said. “You wash your hair, I give you gold. Nothing more. Nothing less.”

“Yes.”

In response, he was silent, not even a nod to indicate that she agreed to his salacious proposition.

Arabella turned her face from him, willing her sixth sense that felt him close to obey. What she could not see or hear would not frighten her.

She bent and scooped a handful of water from the bucket, and as she spread it on her hair and scrubbed, she hoped that he did not see her trembling now, or that if he did, he would think her merely cold.

Chapter 7

The Bath

Shreds of moonlight peeking through the stable door doused her in silver. Luc was as good as his word, but through no particular nobility of character. In truth, he could not have moved if he wished it. The image of the little governess on her knees, her pale, lovely arms stretched up and tightening the damp linen across her breasts, paralyzed him.

Her hair fell in dark rivers down her back and over her shoulders, rivulets of soap sliding down as she worked her hands in it. Eyes closed and lips tight, she moved with purpose, not intending to seduce, yet seduction was inevitable. He had imagined those slender arms, those small breasts, and the curve of her buttock to her thigh, and now they were before him like a banquet.

He was famished.

His body responded. Of course it did. He hadn’t seen an unclothed woman in months. The heir to the duchy of Lycombe did not spread his seed carelessly. No lowborn by-blows must mar the Westfall family tree; that much his uncle Theodore had taught him. As Luc had been content to share his bed with women of experience and discretion, he’d never had need of common tarts. But willing widows were in short supply at sea. It was no wonder that watching the beautiful little governess now made him hard. He was only a man.

She lifted her behind from her heels and spread her thighs to hug the bucket, then bent and submerged her hair once more, and Luc lost his senses. He wanted the bucket gone and her legs wrapped around him. She splashed water onto her head, and her breasts, perfect peaches ripe to be tasted, strained against the chemise. A woman of experience would know what this did to a man—what it was now doing to him. Either this woman was intentionally taunting him or she was a virgin and knew no better.

A virgin. Dear God. He could not bear it.

She twined the stream of hair into a thick cord, dropped it over her shoulder to fall heavily down her back, and stood. Then she turned fully to him.

“I have done it,” she said. “I need only enough to purchase a new gown and shoes and to hire the carriage. Give me only that.”

The pain of complete denial was too great to withstand. He went forward to be closer to her, because he knew now that he could not have more of her.

She stood her ground, her chin tilting up almost as an afterthought. Her arcing throat was entirely bare and beautiful, glistening with moisture, and he thought he might go mad. She put on a brave facade but she was thoroughly innocent, a child playing with a lit taper yet defending her play even as fire burned down the house around her.

He halted close—close enough to touch her if he dared, and close enough for the distance to be torture. His hands wanted her. The soaked linen undergarment clung to her, the soft swell and contours of her breasts and waist on display for him in the moonlight. The thatch of hair at the apex of her thighs showed dark through the wet cloth, and her nipples stood out in taut glory. Cold. Her body was cold, he told himself. But color shone in spots high on her cheeks and along the column of her satin neck down to the clinging chemise. Her lips like raspberries parted, and a soft sound escaped them.

But she was uncertain. Her eyes were luminous, not seducing, instead questioning. Brave, warm, and wary.

“It gleams even in the dark.” His voice was husky. “Your hair. Even wet.” He must make himself speak or he would touch her. “By what conjurer’s trick does it do so? Are you a witch after all, merely disguised as a governess?”

“Yes. But what of you? Are you a prince disguised as a pirate?”

He could not mistake the glimmer of hope now in the cornflower eyes that at other times flashed so sharply.

He stepped back. “Not a prince.” Rather, a man whose mission to produce as many of the most uncontestably ducal heirs as possible should be at the forefront of his desires now, not a bedraggled little underfed governess of uncertain virtue crossing France alone in search of a castle.

As he swung around toward the door, he must have imagined the sinking of her proud shoulders and the light sigh that followed him from the stable.

He went to his bedchamber but could not sleep. Instead he paced like an animal in a cage. As always. But for the first time in years he had cause.

Heirs to dukedoms did not tarry with governesses unless they wished to murder a tradesman or tradesman’s son on a field at dawn. Women like this one inevitably had stalwartly rash fathers or brothers prepared to defend them against the ravages of the libertine aristocracy. At least, such stories were common enough in the gossip mills.

He could not offer her a more permanent arrangement either, not this little thing with a quick tongue and spine stiff with pride. She had proved tonight that in desperation she could be bought. But he did not want a desperate woman in his bed. Even upon the remote chance that she would agree to it, he suspected she would make an exceptionally uncomfortable mistress.

Snatching a handful of shining new coins from his travel bag and a candle from the mantel, he climbed the stairs to her bedchamber. He stood before the door and imagined breaking it down, imagined what he would find on the other side. Would she welcome him? Would she scream for help? Would she even be there?

He really was going mad.

He knocked.

No reply.

He turned the latch and the door gave way. He studied the latch. No lock. Not even a bolt to protect her. Gripon was a worm.

The room was frigid. There was no glow at the hearth, no coals lit for warmth. Nothing more than the stub of a greasy candle already burnt through.

She was curled up at the corner of the bed beneath a blanket thinner even than her chemise. Her undergarments were carefully arranged on a chair by the hearth, too flimsy and thin for travel and now at least one of them wet.

She was so desperate to reach the princess of Sensaire that she had allowed her luggage with all her clothing to sail to another port without her.

At dinner his cousin had interrogated him about his lack of forthrightness with the lady, and asked a question that now pressed at him: Why did he believe that she was who she claimed?

Because he had no other reason to believe otherwise. Honesty lit her eyes when she looked at him. She had put herself in jeopardy to save a starving sailor. And those children in Plymouth . . . He knew she had in fact helped them. He had spoken with his clerk, who assisted her.

The greatest confirmation, though, was her integrity. With her beauty, she might be much grander than a governess. A sennight in the right rich man’s bed could have easily won her a shop, a modiste’s or some other respectable profession allowed to poor gentlewomen. Longer might have merited a house of her own. Gowned and perfumed, she would be a courtesan to drive men wild. But she did not trust men. She had been propositioned before, certainly. She had clearly refused.