Treacherous Temptations(2)

His name pitched in her throes of ecstasy awoke him to startling recognition.

He withdrew from her so abruptly she had to grasp the wall to keep her legs from failing. “Barbara! What the hell are you doing here? And who let you in? Where the devil is Vincenzo?”

“What kind of greeting is that for your dear step-mama?” she crooned. “As for who let me in? Your valet, of course. I have since sent him off to bed. I told him his presence was de trop – but a bit peevish he seemed.”

“No doubt he was offended by your provincial notions,” Hadley scoffed.

“Your meaning?”

“In England three may be a crowd, but in Venezia, it is simply a cozy ménage.”

“Have you succumbed to the lure of the Venetian catamites, Hadley? How delightfully depraved!” Barbara chortled. “No wonder Vincenzo was put out. You must let me watch. Or better yet…” She gave him a wicked look.

“Why are you here?” he demanded.

“I’ve missed you unbearably, Hadley,” she answered with a petulant look. “And you’ve cut me to the quick by failing to answer my last two letters.”

“You sent no money,” he snapped. “You have a generous jointure from your beloved departed husband, yet you ignore my requests, though I clearly expressed how dire was my need.”

“But darling, you are unjust,” she protested. “I did receive word, but given your sudden departure from Paris for Venice, I perceived no real urgency.”

His gaze narrowed and his voice took on a frigid overtone. “You think I left Paris under my own volition? Pray let me correct your misapprehension, madam. You see, I’ve traded on my good name a bit too long and was induced to leave before my creditors installed me in the Bastille.”

“Is it truly as you say, Hadley?” She regarded him with overt skepticism. “What of your annuity? Do you mean nothing remains?”

“Latera ecfutut,” he replied darkly.

Her blank look forced him to translate with a mirthless laugh. “Fucked away, my dear. Literally and completely.”

Her frown deepened. “How can you expect to continue living large across the Continent at my expense, while I’m forced to suffer alone in London playing the mournful widow under the disgrace of a ruined name?”

“Mournful widow, eh?” Hadley raked her with a blood-shot gaze that lingered on the brilliant gems adorning her hands, ears, and neck. He reached out to stroke her collarbone, tracing the diamonds resting above the milky white flesh of her bared breasts. “You don’t appear to have suffered.”

He grasped an erect nipple, indolently rolling it between thumb and forefinger, an act that elicited a convulsive shiver from her body and a low moan from her lips. Remarking the lust-filled glitter in her eyes, Hadley cupped both of her breasts and dipped his head to lick the length of her neck. While his tongue played in the delicate hollow behind her ear, his hands went to work deftly removing her necklace. “Ah,” he pocketed it with a smirk. “This should just about cover tonight’s losses.”

“You bastard!” Barbara shrieked. “You would steal the very jewels from my body?”

“Needs must…” he shrugged. “Right now, I would steal the gold from a dead man’s teeth. There are no depths to which one will not descend when in want.”

“Is that so? Then my arrival is Providential.”

“Unless you intend to leave me a very full purse, I don’t glean your meaning.”

“I have achieved an ally in the office of the Exchequer.”

His heart raced. “Do you mean to say I’ll be restored?”

“No darling.” She pursed her lips. “Sadly, there’s nothing more to be done to that end. However, when I petitioned on your behalf, Sir Richard put forth an ingenious proposition for your ongoing maintenance.”

“Sir Richard?” he balked. “You can’t mean the very same bastard who deprived me of my birthright?”

In actuality, his father’s suicide had provided the needed scapegoat to appease the public accusations of fraud within the South Sea Company. To shelter the truly guilty, his fortune, lands, and even his title had been confiscated by the crown. Whether out of pity, or shame for their misconduct, the Lord of the Treasury and Chancellor of the Exchequer had awarded Hadley a lump sum and small annuity. It had been only a temporary balm. And now it was gone.

“But darling, you are unjust! For Sir Richard has pled your case with the new Lord of the Treasury—”

“The hell you say!” Hadley paced the room in a mounting rage. “Pretty damned audacious, considering he was the chief engineer behind the entire scheme, and benefitted most by my loss!”

Hadley’s family had once held a half-dozen estates and one of the largest fortunes in England, but with his title revoked, his lands confiscated, and a once noble name forever besmirched, he’d had little choice but to go abroad. Barbara’s appearance only rekindled his bitterness and re-opened old wounds.

“But darling, you must try to be reasonable. There’s naught to do about the past. We can only look now to safeguard the future. Our future. This proposal is one I believe you will deem eminently acceptable.”

He spun to face her. “What do you mean? What manner of proposition?”