The Devil's Match (The Devil DeVere #4)(26)

“Your mother?” She gaped again.

“Yes. It was a most unsettling revelation.”

“I suppose so! And your father...er...Lord Richard...what of him?”

“The blighter still manages to live, despite the fact that his mind and half his face have rotted away.”

“Good God,” Diana murmured.

“Sometimes I wonder how good,” Ludovic replied cynically. “So you see? My very birth defies all that is right and true. Perhaps you better understand now my aversion to wed? To reproduce? For I carry in my blood an entire legacy of corruption and sin. My entire existence is one great lie, Diana. My blood is tainted and my life a fraud.”

“That’s ridiculous!” she exclaimed. “You only use your history as a convenient excuse to do as you please.”

“That’s right, my dear. I live for pleasure because it’s my legacy to do so for I am damned either way. ‘Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished; he punishes the children and their children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation.’”

“If you wish to elicit sympathy from me, I am sorry to disappoint you.”

Ludovic shrugged and dropped his mask comfortably back into place. “The only thing I wish to elicit from you, my dear, are screams of rapture.”

“Back to that again, are we? You waste your breath. Now why did you bring me here?” Diana demanded.

“You challenged me last night, Diana, taunted even, when you know damn well I never take such a thing lightly. So I wish to know what you propose by way of a wager.”

“Perhaps I haven’t had sufficient time to think on it,” she hedged.

“Don’t dissemble when we both know you had already something in mind before you even spoke.”

“All right, my lord. I will tell you. I would very much like to rebuild my former racing stables, but I have not the means to do so without a quality breeding stallion.”

“A woman has no business with a racing stud.”

“Perhaps that is my concern and not for you to judge, my lord.”

DeVere quirked a brow. “Very well. Then what are you asking? You wish me to wager one of my stallions?”

“Not just any stallion. I wish to you wager Centurion.”

“The sire of my best prospect for the Derby?”

“I thought it would be more than you would be willing to chance.” She turned for the door.

“I have not yet decided,” he retorted. “I would first know what I might stand to gain from this wager.”

“You once expressed interest in Cartimandua,” she suggested.

“An unequal bargain,” he replied. “A brood mare may produce a single foal per year at best, while a proven stallion can sire a hundred offspring at a considerable profit. No, my dear, you must offer a much greater incentive than that.”

“But I am not a wealthy woman, and you know as well as I that you acquired that stallion through dubious circumstances. You owe me the opportunity to win him back!”

“I owe you? I seem to recall only recently your great affront at just how much I have already paid you.”

“That is not what I mean! You owe me the opportunity to redeem my honor, my lord. Were I a man, we would have settled this long ago on a dueling field.”

“You still have a taste for my blood, madam? On second thought, you need not answer.” He touched his lip with a bemused smile. “So it is now your honor that’s at stake?”

“Yes.” Diana faced him with her hands braced on her hips.

He laughed, a low rumble. “Ironic indeed, when your person is the only thing that remotely interests me.”

Her gaze narrowed. “You wish me to wager myself?”

He shot one brow up. “How badly do you want the stallion?”

“What are your terms?” she asked.

“If I win, you will be mine for a week...to take whenever and however I please. No conditions. No constraints.” Ludovic was prepared for a reaction of shock, outrage, or at least righteous indignation. Instead, to his amazement, she appeared calm, pensive, even calculating.

“A very tall order,” she remarked. “If I were to agree, do I have your assurance that afterward you will never harass me again?”

He inclined his head with a half smile. “If that is your wish.”

“I know my own mind.”

“Then let it be my object to change it.”

“So be it then,” Diana said. “It’s inconsequential anyway, for I don’t intend to lose. Let us meet, just you and I, on the down at dawn tomorrow.”





Chapter Eleven





They met early in the morning, while the dewy swirls of mist of still danced over the down, the mounted riders facing one another with a duelist’s salute.

“Where is your jockey?” DeVere asked with a puzzled frown.

“Did I not say? I intend to ride.”

“You? A woman in a sidesaddle?” He scoffed.

She met his mocking gaze with defiance. “It is how I am accustomed to going. Perhaps you’re not up to the challenge, my lord?”

“Oh, I’m always up, my lady...for any challenge. I only exercise care for your neck.”