Isabel took a deep breath at the sound of the soft knock, and then called out permission to enter. Gray came in, pausing on the threshold, a telling moment of hesitation she’d not seen from him before. Lord Grayson never waited. He leaped into action the moment he thought of something, which is how he often landed into mischief.

He stared at her, long and hard. Enough to where she regretted her decision to receive him in her dressing gown. She had debated internally for almost half an hour, and in the end had decided to act as much as possible like she had before. Surely, the sooner they settled into their usual routine, the more comfortable they both would be.

“I believe the water is most likely cold by now,” she murmured, turning away from the gilded vanity to sit on the nearby chaise. “But then I was always the one who drank tea.”

“I preferred brandy.”

He closed the door, giving her a brief moment to savor the sound of his voice. Why she should notice its slight rasp now, when she hadn’t before, puzzled her.

“I have it here.” She gestured toward the low table where a china tea set, brandy decanter, and goblet waited.

Gray’s mouth widened in a slow smile. “You are always thinking of me. Thank you.” He looked around. “I am pleased to find the space exactly as I remember it. With the walls and ceiling draped with white satin, I have always felt like I am standing in a tent when I am in here.”

“That was the effect I wanted,” she said, relaxing into the low back and curling her legs next to her.

“Is that so?”

He sat across from her, tossing his arm across the back of the settee. Isabel couldn’t help but remember how he used to do the same to her shoulders. At that time, she had thought nothing of it. That version of Grayson had merely been exuberant.

He also hadn’t been quite so large.

“Why a tent, Pel?”

“You have no notion of how long I’ve waited for you to ask that,” she admitted with a soft chuckle.

“Why didn’t I ask before?”

“We did not talk about such things.”

“No?” His eyes laughed at her. “What did we talk about then?”

She moved to pour him a brandy, but he shook his head.

“Why, we talked about you, Gray.”

“Me?” he asked with raised brows. “Surely, not all the time.”

“Nearly all the time.”

“And when we weren’t talking about me?”

“Well, then we were talking about your inamoratas.”

Gray grimaced, and she laughed, remembering how much fun she used to have in simple discourse with him. Then she noted how he looked at her, as if he could not quite put his finger on something about her. Her laughter faded away.

“How insufferable I was, Isabel. How did you ever tolerate me?”

“I quite liked you,” she said honestly. “There never was any guessing with you. You always said exactly what you meant.”

He looked past her shoulder. “You still hang Pelham’s portrait,” he mused. Gray returned his gaze to hers. “Did you love him so very much?”

Isabel turned, and looked at the painting behind her. She tried, truly tried to dredge up some remnant of the love she’d once had for him, but her bitter resentment was too deep. She couldn’t reach below it. “I did. I cannot remember the feeling now, but once I loved him desperately.”

“Is that why you avoid commitment, Pel?”

She turned back to face him with her lips pursed. “You and I did not discuss personal things either.”

Gray’s arm left the back of the chair and he leaned forward, resting his forearms on his knees. “Could we not be better friends now, than we were then?”

“I am not sure that would be wise,” she murmured, once again glancing at her wedding band.

“Why not?”

Isabel rose and stood at the window, needing to put distance between herself and his new intensity.

“Why not?” he asked again, following her. “Do you have other, closer friends that you share things with?”

He set his hands atop her shoulders, and it took only a moment for his touch to heat her skin, and his scent to reach her nostrils. When next he spoke, his voice came close to her ear. “Is it too much to ask that you add your husband to your list of trusted friends?”

“Gray,” she breathed, her heart racing with her distress. Her restless fingers brushed the satin billowing beside the window frame. “I do not have friends like you describe. And you say the word ‘husband’ with an import we never gave to it.”

“How about your lover, then?” he pressed. “Does he hear your thoughts?”

Isabel attempted to pull away, but he held her fast.

“Why a tent, Pel? Can you tell me that, at least?”

She shivered at the feel of his exhale against her nape.

“I like to imagine it is a part of a caravan.”

“A fantasy?” Gray’s large hands slid down her arms. “Is there a sheik who goes with this fantasy? Does he ravish you?”

“My lord!” she protested, thoroughly alarmed by the way her skin was prickling with sensual awareness. There was no way to ignore the hard male body that bracketed hers.

“What do you want, Gray?” she asked, her mouth dry.

“Have you suddenly decided to change the rules?”

“And if I have?”
“We would end up apart, our friendship ruined. You and I are not the type of people who find love ever after.”

“How would you know what type of man I am?”

“I know you kept a mistress while professing to love another.”

His hot, open mouth pressed against the side of her throat, and her eyes slid closed at the seductive touch.

“You said I’ve changed, Isabel.”

“No man changes that much. Regardless, I…I have someone.”

Gray turned her to face him. His hands around her wrists were hot, his gaze hotter. Lord, she knew that look. It was the look Pelham had brought her to heel with, the look she made certain none of her lovers gave to her. Passion, desire—she welcomed those. But carnal hunger was something to be avoided at all costs.

That famished gaze swept over her body from head to toe and back again. Her nipples ached and tightened as his heated examination passed them, until she knew they must be visible even through her gown. His perusal paused there on the upward journey, and a low growl rumbled in his throat. Her lips parted on a panting breath.

“Isabel,” he rasped, his hand lifting to cup her breast, his thumb brushing across the tight peak. “Could you not give me a chance to prove my worth?”

She heard her own needy moan, felt her blood heat and grow sluggish. His mouth lowered to hers, and she titled her head back, waiting.

And wanting.

A soft scratching at the door broke the moment. She stumbled backward, breaking free of his slackened hold. Her fingers covered her lips, pressing hard to hide their quivering.

“My lady?” came the soft query of her abigail from the hallway. “Should I return later?”

Gray waited, his breathing harsh, the crests of cheekbones flushed. There was no doubt in Isabel’s mind that if she sent her maid away, she’d be flat on her back and
mounted within moments.

“Come in,” she called, wincing at the note of panic thatshe could not hide.

Damn him. He’d made her want him, this new spouse of hers. Want him with the type of need that made her ache, a need she had thought herself too old and too wise to ever feel again.
It was her worst nightmare come to life.

Her husband closed his eyes a moment, collecting himself, as the abigail swept in and went straight to the armoire.

“Shopping tomorrow, Pel?” he asked, his voice maddeningly calm. “I do need new garments.”

The most she could manage was a jerky nod.

Grayson sketched an elegant bow and retreated, but his presence lingered in her mind long after he had gone.

“Do you truly intend to steal your best friend’s mistress?”

Gerard Faulkner, the sixth Marquess of Grayson, kept his eyes on the woman in question, and smiled. Those who knew him well also knew that look, and its wicked portent. “I certainly do.”

“Dastardly,” Bartley muttered. “Too low even for you, Gray. Is it not sufficient to cuckold Sinclair? You know how Markham feels about Pel. He’s lost his head over her.”

Gray studied Lady Pelham with a connoisseur’s eye. There was no incertitude about her suitability for his needs. Beautiful and scandalous, he could not have designed a wife more suited to irritating his mother if he’d tried. Pel, as she was affectionately referred to, was of medium height, but stunningly curved, and built for a man’s pleasure. The auburn haired widow of the late Earl of Pelham had a brazen sultriness that was addicting, or so rumor said. Her last lover, Lord Pearson, had gone into a long decline after she ended their affair.

Gerard had no difficulty seeing how a man could mourn the loss of her attentions. Under the blazing lights of the massive chandeliers, Isabel Pelham glittered like a precious jewel, expensive and worth every schilling.

He watched as she smiled up at Markham with a wide curving of her lips, lips which were considered too full for conventional beauty, but just the right plumpness to rim a man’s cock. All around the room, covetous male eyes watched her, hoping for the day when she’d turn those sherry-colored eyes upon them, and perhaps select them as her next lover. To Gerard, their longing was pitiable. The woman was extremely selective, and retained her lovers for years. She’d had Markham on a leash for nearly two now, and showed no signs of losing interest.

But that interest did not extend to matrimony.

On the few occasions when the Viscount had begged for her hand, she’d refused him, declaring she had no interest in marrying a second time. Gray, on the other hand, had no doubts whatsoever that he could change her mind about that.

“Calm yourself, Bartley,” he murmured. “Things will work out. Trust me.”

“No one can trust you.”

“You can trust me to give you five hundred pounds if you drag Markham away from Pel and into the card room.”

“Well, then.” Bartley straightened his spine and his waistcoat, neither action capable of hiding his widening middle. “I am at your service.”

Grinning, Gerard bowed slightly to his greedy acquaintance who took off to the right, while he made his way to left. He strolled without haste around the fringes of the ballroom making his way toward the pivotal object of his plan. The journey was slow going, his way blocked by one mother and debutante pairing after another. Most bachelor peers similarly hounded would grimace with annoyance, but Gerard was known as much for his overabundance of charm, as he was for his penchant for mischief. So he flirted outrageously, kissed hands freely, and left every female in his wake certain he would be calling on them with a formal offer of marriage.

Casting the occasional glance toward Markham, he noted the exact moment Bartley lured him away, and then crossed the distance with purposeful strides, taking Pel’s gloved hand to his lips before the usual throng of avid admirers could encircle her.

As he lifted his head, he caught her eyes laughing at him. “Why, Lord Grayson. A woman cannot help but be flattered by such a single-minded approach.”

“Lovely Isabel, your beauty drew me like a moth to a flame.” He tucked her hand around his forearm, and led her away for a walk around the dance floor.

“Needed a respite from the ambitious mothers, I assume?” she asked in her throaty voice. “I’m afraid even my association won’t be enough to make you less appealing. You are simply too delicious for words. You shall be the death of one of these poor girls.”

Gerard breathed a deep sigh of satisfaction, an action which inundated his senses with her lush scent of some exotic flower. They would get along famously, he knew. He had come to know her well in the years she’d been with Markham, and he’d always liked her immensely. “I agree. None of these women will do.”

Pel gave a delicate shrug of her bare shoulders, her pale skin set off beautifully by her dark blue gown and sapphire necklace. “You are young yet, Grayson. Once you are my age, perhaps you will have settled down enough to not completely torment your bride with your appetites.”

“Or I can marry a mature woman, and save myself the effort of altering my habits.”

Arching a perfectly shaped brow, she said, “This conversation is leading somewhere, is it not, my lord?”

“I want you, Pel,” he said softly. “Desperately. Only an affair won’t quite do the job. Marriage, however, will take care of it nicely.”

Soft, husky laughter drifted in the air between them. “Oh, Gray. I do adore your humor, you know. It is hard to find men so deliciously unabashed in their wickedness.”

“And it is lamentably hard to find a creature as blatantly sexual as you, my dear Isabel. I’m afraid you are quite unique, and therefore irreplaceable for my needs.”

She shot him a sidelong glance. “I was under the impression you were keeping that actress, the pretty one who can’t remember her lines.”

Gerard smiled. “Yes, that’s true. All of it.” Anne couldn’t act to save her life. Her talents lay in other, more carnal activities.

“And honestly, Gray. You are too young for me. I am six and twenty, you know. And you are…” She raked him with a narrowed glance. “Well, you are delectable, but—”

“I am two and twenty, and could ride you well, Pel, never doubt it. However, you misunderstand. I have a mistress. Two, in fact, and you have Markham—”

“Yes, and I am not quite done with him.”

“Keep him, I have no objections.”

“I’m relieved to have your approval,” she said dryly, and then she laughed again, a sound Gray had always enjoyed. “You are quite mad.”

“Over you, Pel, definitely. Have been from the first.”

“But you’ve no wish to bed me.”

He looked at her with pure male appreciation, taking in the ripe swell of her breasts above the low bodice. “Now, I didn’t say that. You are a beautiful woman, and I am an amorous man. However, since we’ll be bound together, when we decide to fall into bed with one another, isn’t really an issue, is it? We shall have a lifetime to make that leap, if we decide it would be mutually enjoyable.”

“Are you in your cups?” she asked, frowning.

“No, Isabel.”

Pel stopped, forcing him to stop with her. She stared up at him, and then shook her head. “If you are serious—”

“There you are!” called a voice behind them.

Gerard bit back a curse at the sound of Markham’s voice, but he faced his friend with a careless smile. Isabel’s countenance was equally innocent. She truly was flawless.

“I must thank you for keeping the vultures at a distance, Gray,” Markham said jovially, his handsome face lit with pleasure at the sight of his paramour. “I was momentarily distracted by something that proved not to be worth my time.”

Relinquishing Pel’s hand with a flourish, Gerard said, “What are friends for?”