A Regency Lady's Scandal: The Lady Gambles / The Lady Forfeits

None of Caro’s plans had worked out at she had expected, of course. No respectable household would employ a young woman without references, nor the dress shops, either, and the small amount of money Caro had brought with her had been seriously depleted, as instead of being taken into the warmth and security of the respectable household of her imaginings, she was forced to pay a month in advance for her modest lodgings.

In fact, until Drew Butler had taken pity on her, allowing her to sing at Nick’s, Caro had feared she would have to return home with her own tail between her legs, before the earl had even arrived in England, let alone been sent on his way by the indomitable Diana!

Dominic had been watching Caro’s expressive face with interest as he wondered what her thoughts had been for the past few minutes. ‘You know, you could simply put an end to all this nonsense by returning from whence you came,’ he said persuasively.

A shutter came down over that previously candid sea-green gaze, once again alerting Dominic to Caro’s definite aversion—maybe even fear?—of returning to her previous life. Once again he wondered what, or who, this beautiful young woman was running away from.

And what possible business was it of his? Dominic instantly rebuked himself. None whatsoever. And yet he could not quite bring himself to insist that Caro must go home and face whatever punishment she had coming to her for having run away in the first place.

What if it were that bullying father she was running away from? Or the brutish husband? Either of whom would completely crush the spirit in Caro that Dominic found so intriguing …

She shook her head. ‘I am afraid that returning to my home is not an option at this point in time, my lord.’

He raised dark brows. ‘So you have already informed me. And between times, is it your intention to continue turning my hair prematurely grey as I worry in what scrape you will next embroil yourself?’

‘I do not see a single grey hair amongst the black as yet, my lord.’ Amusement glittered in those sea-green eyes as she glanced at those dark locks.

‘I fear it is only a matter of time.’ Dominic pulled a rueful face, only to then find himself totally enchanted as she laughed huskily at this nonsense. He realised, somewhat to his dismay, that he was as seriously in danger of falling under this woman’s spell as Butler and Ben—and possibly Osborne—so obviously were.

It was a spell Dominic had no intention of succumbing to. Bedding a woman was one thing; allowing his emotions to become engaged by one was something else entirely. It was about time he changed his tactics; if he couldn’t persuade Caro to leave London by simply asking her, he would have to try a more direct approach …

Caro took an involuntary step back, her eyes widening warily, as Dominic rose slowly to his feet, his movements almost predatory as he moved around the desk to cross over to the door and slowly turn the key in the lock.

‘So that we are not disturbed,’ he murmured as he moved so that he now stood only inches away from her.

She moistened suddenly dry lips as she tilted her head back so that she might look up, fearlessly, she hoped, into that arrogantly handsome face. ‘It is time I was leaving—’

‘Not quite yet, Caro,’ the earl murmured huskily as one of his hands moved up to cup the side of her face and the soft pad of his thumb moved across the pouting swell of her bottom lip.

‘I— What are you doing, my lord?’

‘You called me Dominic earlier,’ he reminded her huskily.

Caro’s throat moved convulsively as she swallowed. ‘What are you doing, Dominic?’ she repeated breathlessly.

He shrugged those broad shoulders. ‘Endeavouring, I hope, to show you there could be certain … benefits to becoming my mistress.’

Caro’s knees felt weak just at the thought of what method this man intended using to demonstrate those ‘benefits’. She so easily recalled the feel of that hard and uncompromising mouth against her own the night before, the feel of his hands as they ran the length of her spine to cup her bottom and press the hardness of his body intimately into hers. ‘This is most unwise, my lord.’

He made no answer as he moved to rest back against the edge of the desk, taking her with him, those strange, silver-coloured eyes fixed caressingly upon Caro’s slightly parted lips, the warmth of his breath stirring the tendrils of hair at her temples.

Dominic was standing much too close to her. So close that she could feel the heat of his body. So close that she was aware of the way that he smelt; the delicate spice of his cologne, and a purely male smell, one that appeared to be a combination of a clean male body and musky heat, uniquely his own.

Caro made every effort to gather her scattered senses. ‘Dominic, I have no intention of allowing you to—oh!’ she gasped as he encircled her waist and pulled her in between his parted legs, her thighs now pressed against him, as her breasts were crushed against the firm muscles of his chest. She placed her hands upon his shoulders with the intention of pushing him away.

‘I think not,’ Dominic murmured as he realised her intention, his arms moving about her waist to hold her more tightly against him, quelling her struggles as he looked to where her hair was secured in that unbecoming nunlike bun. ‘Remove the pins from your hair for me, Caro.’

She stilled abruptly. ‘No!’

‘Would you rather that I did it?’ He quirked dark brows.

‘I would rather my hair remain exactly—oh!’ She gave another of those breathless gasps as Dominic reached up and removed the pins himself. It was a breathless gasp that he found he was becoming extremely fond of hearing.

‘Better.’ He nodded his approval as he reached up to uncoil her hair and allow it to cascade in a wealth of golden curls over her shoulders and down the length of her spine. ‘Now for the buttons on this awful gown—’

‘I cannot possibly allow you to unbutton the front of my gown!’ Caro’s fingers clamped down over his, even as she glared up at him.

Dominic found himself smiling in the face of this display of female outrage. ‘It has all the allure of a nun’s habit,’ he said drily.

‘That is exactly what it is supposed to—’ Caro broke off the protest as she saw the way those silver eyes had narrowed to shrewdness.

‘Do … ?’ Dominic finished softly for her. ‘As no doubt the wearing of that unbecoming bonnet was designed to hide every delicious golden curl upon your head?’

‘Yes,’ she admitted.

He shook his head as he resumed unfastening the buttons on the front of her gown. ‘It is a sacrilege, Caro, and one I am not inclined to indulge.’ He folded back the two sides of her gown to reveal the thrust of her breasts covered only by the thinness of her shift above her corset.

Caro had no more will to protest as she saw the way those silver eyes glittered with admiration as Dominic gazed his fill of her. Indeed, she found she could barely breathe as she watched him slowly raise one of his hands to pull aside that gauzy piece of material and bare her breast completely. Her cheeks suffused with colour as, even as she watched, the tiny rose-coloured nub on the crest of her breast began to rise and stiffen.

‘You are so very beautiful here,’ he said huskily, the warmth of his breath now a tortuous caress against that burgeoning flesh. He looked up at her enquiringly. ‘I wish to taste you, Caro.’

She found herself mesmerised by the slow flick of Dominic’s tongue across his lips. Mesmerised and aching, the tip of her breast deepened in colour as it became firmer still. In anticipation. In longing, she knew, to feel that hot tongue curling moistly over it.

Where had these thoughts come from? Caro wondered wildly. How was it that she even knew the touch of Dominic’s lips and mouth against her breast would give her more pleasure than she had ever dreamt possible? Woman’s intuition? A legacy of Eve? However Caro knew these things, she surely could not allow Dominic to—

All thought ceased, any hope of protest dying along with it, as he gave up waiting for her answer and instead lowered his head to gently draw the now pulsing tip of Caro’s breast into the heat of his mouth. His hand curved beneath it at the same time as he laved that aching bud with the moist heat of his tongue, and sending rivulets of pleasure into her other breast and down the soft curve of her abdomen to pool between her thighs.

Caro was filled with the strangest sensations, her breasts feeling full and heavy under the intimacy of Dominic’s ministrations, the muscles in her abdomen clenching, that heat between her thighs making her swell and moisten there. She discovered she wanted to both squeeze her thighs together and part them at the same time. To have Dominic touch her there and ease that ache, too.

Her back arched instinctively as his hand moved to capture her other breast, the soft pad of his thumb now flicking against that hardened tip in the same rhythm with which he drew on its twin.

Dominic’s lovemaking had been intended as a way of showing Caro that she did not belong here in London, that she was no match for him or other experienced men of the ton. Instead he was the one forced to recognise that he had never tasted anything quite so delicious as her breast, the nipple as sweet as honey as he kissed her there greedily, the hardness of his erection pulsing in his pantaloons testifying to the strength of his own arousal.

He drew back slightly to look at that pouting, full nipple, stroking his tongue across it before moving slightly to capture its twin, drawing on it hungrily before looking up at her flushed face and feverishly bright eyes. ‘Tell me how you wish me to touch you, Caro,’ he murmured against her swollen flesh.

Her fingers dug into his shoulders. ‘Dominic!’ she groaned a throaty protest.

He took pity on her shyness. ‘Do you like this?’ He swept his thumb lightly over that pouting nipple.

‘Yes!’ she gasped, shuddering with pleasure.

‘This?’ He brought his mouth down to her breast once more, even as he allowed his hand to fall to her ankle and push her gown aside and began a slow caress to her knee.

‘Oh, yes!’

‘And this?’ Dominic ran his tongue repeatedly over that swollen nipple even as his hand caressed higher still to weave a pattern of seduction along her inner thigh, the heat of her through her drawers, her dampness, telling him of her arousal.

Nothing in Caro’s life had prepared her to be touched with such intimacy. How could it, when she had never realised that such intimacies existed? Such achingly pleasurable intimacies that she wished would never end.

‘I would like you to touch me in the same way, Caro,’ Dominic encouraged gruffly.

She swallowed hard. ‘I—’ She broke off her instinctive protest as someone rattled the door handle in an effort to open the locked door.

‘My lord?’ Drew Butler sounded both disapproving and concerned at this inability to enter his own office.

Dominic turned his head sharply towards the door. ‘What is it?’

‘I need to speak with you immediately, my lord.’ The other man sounded just as irritated as Dominic.

He scowled his displeasure as Caro took advantage of his distraction to extricate herself from his arms before turning away to begin fastening the buttons of her gown with fingers that were shaking so badly it took her twice as long as it should have done. What had she been thinking? Worse, how much further would she have allowed these intimacies to go if not for Drew’s timely intervention?

‘Caro—’

‘Mr Butler requires your attention, my lord, not I!’ Caro protested, her cheeks aflame.

Dominic’s gaze narrowed in concern on her flushed and disconcerted face, knowing, and regretting, being the obvious cause of her discomfort. He had not meant things to go so far as they had. As for demonstrating to Caro how ill equipped she was to withstand the advances of the gentlemen of the ton, Dominic knew full well that he had been the one seriously in danger of overstepping that line! ‘Caro—’

‘Mr Butler requires you, my lord,’ she reminded him.

Dominic stood up impatiently to stride over to the door and unlock it, his expression darkening as the other man’s gaze instantly slid past him to where Caro stood with her back towards the door. Dominic deliberately stepped into the other man’s line of vision. ‘Yes?’

Speculative blue eyes gazed back at him. ‘There is … something in the main salon I believe you should see.’

Dominic frowned. ‘Can it not wait?’

‘No, my lord, it cannot,’ Drew stated flatly.

‘Very well.’ He nodded before turning to speak to Caro. ‘It appears that I have to leave you for a few minutes. If you will be so kind as to wait here for me—’

‘No.’

Dominic’s eyes widened. ‘No?’

‘No.’ Caro rallied, still embarrassed by the intimacies she had allowed this man, but determined not to allow that embarrassment to render her helpless. She carefully lifted her cloak and bonnet from the chair she had placed them on earlier. ‘Mr Butler, is Ben available to escort me home now?’

‘Yes, he is.’

‘I would prefer that you wait for me here, Caro,’ Dominic insisted firmly.

She met his gaze unflinchingly. ‘And I would prefer that Ben be the one to accompany me to my lodgings.’

A nerve pulsed beside that savage slash of a scar on Dominic’s left cheek. ‘Why?’

Caro looked away as she found she could not withstand the probing of that narrowed silver gaze. ‘I would simply prefer his company at this time, my lord.’

‘Drew, could you wait outside for a moment, please?’ Dominic did not even wait for the man’s compliance before stepping back into the room and firmly closing the door behind him.

‘I have nothing more to say to you, my lord—’

‘Dominic.’

Caro gasped. ‘I beg your pardon?’

The earl gave a graceful shrug. ‘You did not seem to have any difficulty calling me Dominic a few minutes ago,’ he reminded her wickedly.

Caro’s cheeks burned with mortification as she recalled the most recent circumstances under which she had called this man by his first name. ‘I do not even wish to think about just now—’

‘Do not be so melodramatic,’ Dominic interjected. ‘Or perhaps, on consideration, it is the hideousness of my scars you would rather not dwell upon?’ His voice hardened even as he raised a hand to his scarred cheek.

‘I trust I am not so lily-livered, my lord,’ Caro protested indignantly. ‘No doubt you obtained that scar during the wars against Napoleon?’

‘Yes.’

She nodded. ‘Then it would be most ungrateful of me—of any woman—to see your scar as anything less than the result of the act of bravery it undoubtedly was.’

Dominic was well aware that some women found the scar on his face unsightly, even frightening. He should have known that the feisty Caro was made of sterner stuff. ‘I will endeavour to conclude my business with Butler as quickly as is possible, after which I will be free to escort you home. No, please do not argue with me any further tonight,’ he advised wearily as he saw that familiar light of rebellion enter those sea-green eyes.

‘You are altogether too fond of having your own way, sir.’ She frowned her disapproval at him.

And his efforts to frighten this young woman into leaving London had only succeeded in alarming himself, Dominic recognised frustratedly. ‘And if I once again add the word please?’

‘Well?’ she prompted tartly as he added nothing further.

Dominic found himself openly smiling at her waspishness. ‘Please, Caro, will you wait here for me?’ he said drily.

Her chin remained proudly high. ‘I will consider the idea whilst you are talking to Mr Butler.’

Dominic shot her one last exasperated glance before striding purposefully from the room. He forgot everything else, however—kissing and touching Caro, her response to those kisses and caresses, his own lack of control over that situation—the moment he entered the main salon of the club and saw a bloodstained and obviously badly beaten Nathaniel Thorne lying recumbent upon one of the couches there …

Chapter Five

‘Dominic, why—?’

‘Not now, please, Caro,’ he cut in as he sat broodingly across from her inside the lamp-lit coach.

Not that the lamp was really necessary, dawn having long broken, and the sun starting to appear above the rooftops and chimneys of London, by the time they had delivered Nathaniel safely to his home. The two of them had remained long enough to see him settled in his bedchamber and attended by several of his servants before taking their leave.

Caro had given a horrified gasp earlier when she’d ventured from Drew’s office and entered the main salon of the club to see a group of men standing around Lord Thorne as he lay stretched out upon one of the couches, with blood covering much of his face and hands and dripping unchecked on to his elegant clothing.

Not that Dominic had spared any time on the pallor of her cheeks or her stricken expression as he’d turned and seen her standing there. ‘Someone take her away from here!’ he had ordered as Caro stood there, simply too shocked to move.

‘Dom—’

‘Stay calm, Nate.’ His voice softened as he spoke soothingly to the injured man, some of that softness remaining in his face as he turned back to Caro. ‘It really would be better for all concerned if you left, Caro.’

‘I’ll take her back to my office,’ Drew offered before striding across the room to take a firm hold of her arm and practically drag her from the room.

She barely heard the older man’s comforting words as he escorted her to his office before instructing Ben to remain on guard outside the door. Caro had paced the office for well over an hour whilst the two men obviously dealt with the bloody—and Caro sincerely hoped not too seriously injured—Nathaniel Thorne.

Dominic had grimly avoided answering any of her questions when he’d finally arrived to escort her home. Caro had gasped in surprise as he had thrown his cloak over her head just as she was about to step outside. ‘What are you doing?’

He had easily arrested her struggles to free herself. ‘Continue walking to the coach,’ he had instructed.

Caro had thrown that cloak back impatiently as soon as she’d entered the carriage, any thought of further protest at Dominic’s rough handling of her dying in her throat as she saw Lord Thorne reclining upon the bench seat opposite, the dressings wrapped about both his hands seeming to indicate that he had received the attentions of a doctor since she had seen him last. His face had been cleansed of the blood, revealing his many cuts and bruises, injuries that could surely only have been inflicted by fists and knives.

Caro felt herself quiver now as she remembered the full extent of those numerous gashes and bruises, and the imagined violence behind them. ‘How—?’

‘I am in no mood to discuss this further tonight,’ Dominic rasped, the attack on Nathaniel having been a brutal awakening, a timely reminder that there was no place for a vulnerable woman like Caro in his world.

Sea-green eyes gazed back at him reproachfully. ‘But why would someone do such a thing to Lord Thorne?’

‘I should have realised that asking you for silence, even for a few minutes, was an impossibility.’ Dominic sighed heavily. ‘The simple answer to your question is that I do not know. Yet,’ he added grimly. But he had every intention of discovering who was responsible for the attack on Nathaniel and why.

Caro flinched. ‘He appeared to be badly injured …’

Dominic nodded curtly. ‘He was beaten. Severely. Repeatedly. By four thugs wielding knives as well as their fists.’ He knew more than most how strong a fighter Nathaniel was, but the odds of four against one, especially as they had possessed weapons, had not been in his friend’s favour.

She gasped as her suspicions were confirmed, one of her hands rising to the slenderness of her throat. ‘But why?’ She appeared totally bewildered.

Nathaniel had remained conscious long enough to explain that he had been set upon the moment he’d stepped outside the club earlier, the wounds on his hands caused both from the blows he had managed to land upon his attackers, and defensively as he’d held those hands up in front of him to stop the worst of the knife cuts upon his face. Once he’d fallen to the ground, he had not stood a chance against the odds, as he was kicked repeatedly until one of those blows had caught him on the side of the head. After which he knew no more until he awoke to stagger back inside the club and ask for help.

Considering those odds of four against one, Dominic was sure that if murder had been the intention, then Nathaniel would now be dead. Also, his purse had still been in his pocket when he’d regained consciousness, the diamond pin also in place at his throat, so robbery was not the motive, either. From that Dominic could only surmise that the thugs had achieved what they had set out to do, and that the attack had been a warning of some kind.

But a warning to whom exactly … ?

The words of caution Gabriel had given Dominic before he’d left Venice, in regard to Nicholas Brown, the previous owner of Nick’s, had immediately come to mind. Dominic was well aware of the other man’s violent reputation; while publicly Brown behaved the gentleman, privately he was known to be vicious and vindictive, his associates mostly of the shady underworld of London’s slums. Also, the other man had been most seriously displeased to lose Nick’s in that wager to Dominic.

No, the more thought he gave to the situation—when Caro allowed him the time to think about it, that was—the more convinced he became that Nicholas Brown was somehow involved. That tonight’s attack might not been meant for Nathaniel at all …

Dominic had left for Venice only days after winning the wager that had cost Brown his gambling club, only returning back to London two days ago, a fact that would no doubt have reached the other man’s ears as early as yesterday. As such, it would have been all too easy for the four thugs lying in wait outside the club to have assumed that the gentleman leaving alone, long after the last patron had left, with his face hidden by both the darkness and the hat upon his head, was Dominic himself.

He had discussed the possibilities briefly with Drew, the older man having agreed that his previous employer was more than capable of sending some of his paid thugs to attack Dominic. Except those thugs had not dealt the lethal blow to the man they had attacked. Drew had offered the possibility that it might not have been a case of mistaken identity at all; that Brown could well be deliberately hurting people known to be associated with Dominic, as both a threat and a warning, before later extracting his revenge from Dominic himself.

Dominic gave a grimace as he anticipated Caro’s reaction to what was to be the subject of their next conversation. ‘I have no idea as yet. But in view of the fact that the attack occurred outside Nick’s, it has been decided that, for the next few days at least, all of us associated with the club should take the necessary precautions.’

Caro stared across at him blankly. ‘But surely I am in no danger? No one except you, Lord Thorne, Drew Butler, and Ben Jackson has even seen the face of the masked lady singing at Nick’s. That is the reason you threw your cloak over me when we were leaving the club earlier!’ she realised suddenly, looking shocked.

He nodded grimly. ‘It is not my intention to frighten you, Caro.’ He frowned darkly as she obviously became so. ‘But, until we know more, Drew and I are agreed that the masked lady must disappear completely, whilst at the same time every precaution taken to ensure the safety of Caro Morton.’

‘Perhaps I might go to stay with Mr Butler and his family?’

‘Drew and I dismissed that possibility,’ Dominic explained. ‘Unfortunately, Drew and his family share their modest home with both his wife’s parents and his own so there is simply no room.’