Read In the Flesh for Free Online Page B

hard, warm, alive. His penis throbbed as if it had a sentience all of its own. Beatrice’s mouth watered, remembering Sofia Chamfleur’s enthusiasm, and she rubbed her cheek against him, the response purely instinctive. She had no idea precisely how her action would feel to him, but his low gasp of pleasure was educational
    “My dear…my dear…” Ritchie’s voice was ragged, not that of the man who taunted her and who seemed to control her so effortlessly. Now he was teetering on the edge of his own precipice, and the idea of that was both thrilling and alarming.
    Ritchie had so much power he could simply throw her on the carpet and ravish her, and even though the throbbing ache between her thighs told her she wanted that, and wanted it badly, some self-preserving thread told a different story.
    Don’t give yourself away quite so easily. Always, always remember how Eustace duped you. From now on, you must not let a man take the upper hand.
    With one last buss of her cheek against his groin, she broke his hold on her, and wriggling like an eel, she slid sideways and out of the chair. Shooting to her feet, she skipped across the room. Out of his reach.
    “I’m afraid that nothing you have is sufficient to tempt me, Mr. Ritchie.” With a twist of her lips, she stared pointedly at the lingering bulge in his trousers.
    “I wonder.” He didn’t look down, but his imperious brows quirked.
    “I’m quite certain.” It was dangerous to be here with him. She had to get out. “Now, if you have nothing more to say to me, I’ll return to the ballroom.”
    Whirling, she sped for the door, not waiting for an answer. She was close. Escape was in sight. She almost had her fingers on the key in its lock.
    Ritchie’s hand closed around hers, enveloping it.
    How had he moved so fast? And with no sound? Was the wretched man possessed of strange occult powers of bilocation or blink-of-an-eye speed?
    “Stay, Beatrice. Let me make you an offer.” He turned her, his ungloved hand on her bare upper arm again. The hot feel of it sent strange sparks rushing through her veins, heading for her deepest, most responsive zones. She opened her mouth to say there was nothing he could offer, to lie in effect, but before she could, he went on in a low, hard voice. “If I can’t tempt you solely with my amenable personality or my prowess as a lover, perhaps I can offer you a more businesslike arrangement?”
    It was difficult to breathe. And when she did, the gasps made her breasts rise and fall alarmingly in the low, newly stitched neckline of her dress. Ritchie flashed a glance downwards, and his lips parted on a gasp of his own.
    “Please let me go, Mr. Ritchie. There is nothing you can offer that I want.”
    “You’re a liar, my dear. Your eyes and your blushing face and the way you’re panting all tell me otherwise. But that’s by the by.” He narrowed his eyes at her, suddenly all ruthlessness, “I’m offering to pay your and your brother’s debts. Which are considerable and far more than you realize, by the way. I’ll also settle an annual sum of money on you both that will keep you comfortable for the rest of your lives.”
    Beatrice’s mouth opened and closed, like one of the fish in the conservatory pond. She knew she looked foolish, but there were no words she could utter.
    The debts were perilous, she knew that. Many were inherited from their late father, a dear man but a poor manager, who’d caused them to lose Westerlynne on his demise.
    But other debts were more recently incurred. Charlie liked to think he was keeping things from her, but he was as good as using a lace handkerchief to mop up a swamp. Her offers of help in planning a stratagem were always brushed aside with mutters of “gentlemen’s business.”
    There was no hiding what Ritchie wanted in return for his assistance. She knew it. And she knew he knew she knew. It was a transaction as old as time, and one could either shudder over it or accept it