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for whom he held the animosity. She had her
back to the other gentleman and so could not see his answering
stare of hatred.
    The duke looked down at
her, saw her tears, and swore softly. Then, louder, “If you want to
live to see tomorrow, Grey, you will leave now and await me in the
study.”
    “And miss all the fun?” he
queried silkily. “I think not.”
    Raven could hear him
approaching and cringed at the thought of coming face to face with
Lord Greyden Cramshaw again after all these years. He had been a
persistent admirer of hers when she’d first started acting and had
offered her whatever she could have wanted in exchange for her
favors. But something had always held her back from accepting the
handsome young man. She had sensed something wasn’t quite right
with him, something possibly dangerous. And now, here she was about
to face him again and pretending to be someone else and someone of
the peerage at that. If he should threaten to turn her over to a
magistrate, what could she possibly do to save herself?
    “I will kill you, Grey,”
the duke bit out carefully. Raven looked up into his eyes and
shivered. She believed him.
    Evidently, Grey did too. He
stopped advancing on them and said, “Very well, Tris. I will leave
if you want. But I recommend taking her to your bed. It is rather
uncomfortable to make love in this mausoleum.” He turned and walked
away from them.
    Raven tightened her hand on
Tristan’s arm, as he would have lunged at his brother for that
crude comment. He looked down at her in annoyance. “Let me kill
him, Rae. I promise I’ll clean up the mess.”
    “If you are serious, I am
leaving this instant,” she returned, drying her tears with the
handkerchief he handed to her. “But since I am sure you could never
do such a hateful, mean, horrid, immoral, illegal thing, I will
pretend I am amused and stay.”
    “Why did you cry?” he asked
abruptly, effectively changing the subject.
    “I don’t know,” she said,
only half-truthful. “Perhaps I really am sickening for
something.”
    “That doesn’t do much for
my amore propre, you know,” he remarked dryly. “I apologize if I
frightened or offended you, with either the kiss or the scene with
my brother. It was not my intention, believe me.”
    “And what, sir, was your
intention when you kissed me?”
    “Merely to prove to myself
that I could,” he said, his face and eyes devoid of expression.
“And isn’t it the right of every man to kiss a beautiful woman? And
you, my dear Rae, are the most beautiful woman in
existence.”
    “Looks are fleeting,” she
replied philosophically, “and too much value placed on them leads
to heartache and misery. I would prefer to be ugly, my lord, with a
squint and hunched-back and loved solely for my mind and spirit and
heart, believe me.”
    “What would you say if I
told you I already love your mind and your spirit and your heart?
And now I would like to love your form and appearance?” he asked.
His face was intent and lacked all signs of jocularity or even the
slightest amusement.
    “If you are asking me to
become your mistress,” she answered, trying to control her
disappointment and anger, “I thank you for the honor but I cannot
accept. I am done with selling my body just to satisfy my
lust.”
    These words made his brows
arch in shock, she noticed with a certain amount of satisfaction.
Ladies were not supposed to have feelings of lust, that emotion
common only to the lower orders and members of the demimonde, of
which she was part. She knew this was not actually true. She had
enough friends among the upper reaches of society to know there was
not an ounce of truth in the belief, not to mention plain common
sense would tell one that women were women no matter what social
station they possessed. Any serious thoughts he may have harbored
about her being in actuality the missing Lady Rachael Eliot should
be firmly nipped in the bud now.
    He seemed very thoughtful
but not necessarily