The Devil You Know (The Devil DeVere #3)(46)

Diana looked befuddled. “What on earth are you talking about?”

“When Vesta revealed to me that she was determined to have Hew, I agreed to lend some small assistance in the matter.”

“That’s ludicrous! Vesta hasn’t even had her come-out. It is far too soon for her to be thinking of anyone!”

“Nevertheless.” He shrugged.

“Is that all you have to say?”

“For the nonce. Conversation is not my chief pursuit at the moment, but should you be inclined to join me...” He surveyed her with a slow and deliberate appraisal meant both to insult and incite. He was pleased to note the rapid rise and fall of her breasts, proof that his power to inspire her lust had not waned in the least.

“You revile me!” Diana spat. “I will expect your call with a full explanation at nine o’clock on the morrow.”

“An ungodly hour,” he replied. “I doubt I shall have risen before two.”Diana spun toward the door. “You will call, my lord, or you will much regret my methods of rousing you.”

“I doubt that, my dear,” he replied. “You may rouse me any way you like.”

The room rumbled with snickers and guffaws.

She had meant it as a threat, but Ludovic could picture her face behind the veil, the high color in her cheeks, the passion lighting her green eyes, marking her righteous indignation, the very things that had appealed to him four years ago. He had determined the moment he first saw her that he she would be his. She had been a challenge, but he had, indeed, claimed her. Several ways, in fact, but still not enough to satisfy him. She was the only lover with whom he hadn’t grown bored. He told himself it was only the brevity of their liaison. It hadn’t had sufficient time to grow monotonous.

Though he’d only meant to taunt her further, he felt himself growing rock-hard at the vision of her once again in his bed, proof positive that he hadn’t had his fill of her yet. The notion had sprung from nowhere, but there it was, just as she, staring him in the face.

“A tolerable, handsome figure,” Lord Malden remarked to her departing back, “but a tongue like a shrew.” He added sotto voce, “Perhaps you can teach her a better means of employing it, eh, DeVere?”

Oh, he had done that and more. He had taught her many things, and she had proven both eager and wonderfully sensuous, but her education remained incomplete. Unless... He wondered with an unfamiliar stab of something he didn’t care to identify if Diana had taken other lovers in his absence. He paused to examine that question. Would it really matter if she had? In the end, he found it didn’t diminish his desire for her in the least. His brother was now out of the picture, not that he would have allowed that courtship to have progressed any further.

With one hand on the door, she spun around to confront her de-tractors. He could almost see her livid gaze penetrating through her veil. “Better a shrew than a sheep, my lord. For hapless sheep are devoured by ruthless wolves.”

So that is the way of it. He chuckled as the door clicked behind her.

He had introduced her to passion and left her to her own devices, and for that, she resented him. He had felt her bitterness as a living, breathing force. Yet, there was no doubt in his mind that this sheep desired nothing more than to be devoured slowly and deliberately by a wolf’s mouth, and he would be only too happy to oblige her.