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illuminating candle flame dipped and spurted under the force of his emotions.
    This man had loved another man’s wife. He had paid dearly for his love.
    As Rose continued to pay for hers.
    “I don’t,” she said quietly.
    Rose did not for one moment think she was more moral than another woman.
    In the distance Big Ben struck: It was eleven o’clock.
    “Prove it,” Jack Lodoun abruptly commanded.
    Rose’s heart skipped a beat. “Prove what?”
    “Prove that a woman’s passion is worth a man’s reputation.”
    Cold, wet air snaked underneath Rose’s gown and crawled up her naked legs. “It is a woman who bears the stigma of divorce, Mr. Lodoun, not a man.”
    “As you reminded me earlier, Mrs. Clarring, I am a member of Parliament.” The misty rain softened the harshness of night; there was no softness inside the dark eyes that stared down at her. “I assure you, every situation I accept affects my career.”
    Impossible hope was tempered by hopeless reality.
    “And if I should prove to you that passion is as worthwhile as position?” Rose asked.
    “I’ll consider your situation.”
    But he would not commit to her situation.
    “I’ll consider your offer—”
    “Now.” There was no compromise in the dark eyes. “Or never.”
    “I’m not dressed.”
    “I know what a woman looks like.”
    Inexplicable anger arced through Rose.
    “But you don’t know what I look like,” she retorted.
    No man had ever seen her naked.
    She and Jonathon had been equally virginal, equally clothed in their marriage bed, she shrouded in a gown, he in a nightshirt.
    Shadow flickered inside the too-dark eyes. “Do you want me to?”
    Did she want this man to see her nakedness?
    “No.”
    “Then there’s no need to worry, is there?”
    Every fiber inside her body screamed that there was, indeed, a need to worry: He was an inebriated man who was not fully in control of his actions, and she was a vulnerable woman who was naked in her emotions if not completely in her dress.
    Rose stepped backward. Jack Lodoun stepped forward.
    He filled the foyer.
    The door closed with an ominous click; she did not lock it. “How did you know where to find me?”
    Rose had only given her address to her parents and her husband—
    “A clerk gave me your change of address this morning,” he said shortly.
    —and to a clerk when she had registered at the courthouse, Rose belatedly remembered.
    The candle flame flickered and fluttered, darkly revealing shadowed walls devoid of decoration.
    Her progress was silent, naked feet softly impacting hard wood. Jack Lodoun’s footsteps echoed behind her, hard wooden heels a jolting reminder of the damage he was capable of inflicting.
    Rose stepped through yawning darkness.
    Pain exploded inside her right foot, toes slamming into leather-covered wood.
    Hot wax scalded her thumb and forefinger. Simultaneously the tilting candle slid free of her hand.
    Rose straightened, fighting back tears. She suddenly felt as young as the child the barrister had accused her of acting like.
    Gas hissed to life. Light aureoled a stooped figure, turning black into gray: a coat . . . a bowler hat.
    Diamond-bright drops of water shimmered on gray felt.
    The grip of an umbrella hooked a small, round table beside a heavy brass lamp base.
    To the left of a masculine hip materialized a blue damask settee, a remnant of the former row house’s occupants; to the right a sullen iron fireplace formed out of the darkness.
    Jack Lodoun straightened. Turned. Underneath the brim of the rain-misted hat, purple-blue eyes snared her gaze. “Why is it that you answered the door, and not your butler?”
    “I leased the house yesterday.” The empty row house creaked a warning; innate honesty stiffened her spine. “I haven’t had time to hire servants.”
    “Some would say, Mrs. Clarring”—his eyelids lowered, dark lashes shadowing his cheeks; blatantly his gaze fingered . . . cupped . . . weighed her breasts—“you’ve created