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way one might an animal’s. Every muscle in her stiffened as he looked into her face.
    His hand was hot. Impossibly large. She spoke through her teeth. “Release me.”
    “Your Grace,” he said very softly. “You will address me properly.”
    Properly? He wanted respect from her while he behaved like a common thug? She glared at him.
    He pulled her chin higher. A muscle in her neck protested. Where was Jones? Why was he not interfering? “Your Grace,” he said again, still just as soft. “Do say it, Mrs. Johnson. I am waiting.”
    She would spit in his eye first. “Do dukes behave so?” Her voice came out very hoarsely. “ Gentlemen do not.”
    His eyes roved her face, his own still coldly impassive. “Oh, yes,” he said, “you are very young. Very young and very stupid. I think girl is the only word for you, Mrs. Johnson. Tell me, was there ever a mister?”
    She slammed her lips together to halt their trembling. Until he released her, she would say no more. She did not know which remark might incite him further.
    He lifted a brow, which gave her a weird shock; it was the first animation she had seen on his frigid countenance. “Silence? But a moment ago, you had so very much to say.” He placed his thumb on her lower lip, then made a firm, hard stroke. She tasted the salt on his skin.
    This was not happening. She seemed to moveoutside her body, viewing from above this unbelievable moment: the Duke of Marwick, molesting her.
    He withdrew his thumb. Lifted it to his own mouth. Tasting her. Their eyes met, his impossibly blue, not a speck of hazel or gold to break their electric intensity. A curious prickle spread through her.
    He made a contemptuous noise and dropped his hand. “Disobedience,” he said. “The taste of it does not suit me.” He took another step back, looking at her with sudden cruel amusement. “However. The correction of impertinent domestics has always been one of my skills.”
    Here was why nobody commented on the beauty of his bone structure, the shape of his mouth, or the brilliance of his eyes. Perfection was not always beautiful: sometimes, it was terrifying.
    “Your Grace—” she began in a whisper, but he cut her off.
    “There is no Mr. Johnson, I think. You blush like a virgin. Ma’am .”
    She turned her face away. Staring at the wall, she said rapidly, “The staff assures me that you have never been the kind of cowardly man who abuses his servants—”
    His fist slammed into the wall.
    She opened her mouth. Nothing came out. His fist had missed her ear by an inch, no more.
    “I am precisely that kind of man,” he said bitterly. “Or did you imagine you were dreaming this episode?”
    She darted a horrified glance at him. Something dark and contemptuous had come into his face. He reached for the gas dial, and the lowering light masked him from view.
    She wanted to bolt, but she was not certain her knees would support her. Her breathing would not settle intoan easy rhythm; it jerked in her throat. What kind of man was this? What kind of monster? And she could see nothing, which would make her escape treacherous, for the floor was littered with all manner of—
    Papers.
    She willed her voice not to shake. “It would be easier to keep me on. Otherwise you might have to trouble yourself with terrorizing a new woman.”
    “You must be very desperate, Mrs. Johnson, to want this position.”
    Again, she caught the note of contempt. But it was not for her, she realized. He meant that it would take a desperate woman to wish to work for him. His contempt was all for himself.
    This attitude was so at odds with what she had expected from him (arrogance, vanity, condescension) that she felt at sea. She groped for a reply. “I do not blame you.” What a lie! “Liquor can make us strangers to ourselves—”
    His laugh seemed edged with glass. “But I am sober, ma’am. I have been sober all day.”
    She swallowed a gasp. If he had been sober when he threw the bottle—if he