Gideon's Bargain by Christine Warren Read Free Book Online Page B

laid bare, with nothing left to cover the ache of need inside her. "Would you care to inspect my teeth? I trust you are already familiar with my bloodlines and my breeding potential."

His lips twitched in a smile he quickly suppressed. "Yes, indeed. Your father made very sure I knew what a bargain I was getting in a wife and future mother of my children. Quite the merchant he is. But just a word of advice, madam. Most men prefer to see a woman with her mouth closed. Or at least occupied with something other than words." He again gestured for her to turn. "Now, if you please. A slow circle."

She felt her eyes narrow, weighing for a moment the bare seconds of freedom she would gain by running against his reaction to her flight. She knew he would come after her, would give chase like the cat she had compared him to. She wanted to think the indignity of being pursued through the halls of her new home stayed her, rather than the excitement the idea sent shivering through her. She pictured running, heart thumping in her chest, his footsteps pounding in her ears. She pictured being overtaken, being taken, pressed up against a wall, pinned between unyielding plaster and even more unyielding flesh…

His steady, black gaze never wavered, and instead of running, Sarah found herself turning, pirouetting slowly before him with her arms held stiffly from her sides. She had hoped that when she could no longer see his face, she would feel less threatened by him, less drawn to him. Now, with her back turned and her eyes on the shadowed corners of the gloomy library, she felt the threat of him more keenly. She sensed his eyes moving over her, felt him looming behind her like a beast from some childish nightmare. Only this time, she knew she would not wake snug in her girlhood bed.

His order fulfilled, she stopped once again facing him, her chin raised in defiance and her heart pounding in something else. Her husband sat back in his chair and reached for his brandy.
"You are nearly as pretty as your father promised," he mused, and Sarah had to wonder if he was actually talking to her. "Certainly not the antidote I had half-feared to see. Yes, I do believe you shall suit well enough."

Sarah stared hard at the wall beyond his chair, trying not to watch him from the periphery of her vision. "And for what purpose shall I suit, my lord? You have women enough to please you, I am certain."

A grin flashed across his face. Where it would have rendered another face softer, on this man it simply made him look more sinister, like a pirate. Or a devil. "Oh I have women," he murmured, in his voice as potent as brandy, "but until now I have not had a wife."

He drained his glass of the last of the brandy and stood, giving her the first real proof of the sheer size of him. He was a very large man, and he towered over her, huge and dark and harder than granite. She stepped back, a reflexive act of self-preservation, but it seemed to amuse him, for his mouth quirked with humor, and something infinitely darker.

"Until now, dear Sarah, I have not had you."
     
     
     
     
    Chapter Two
    What made her any different, Sarah wondered? For a man such as this, what made a wife any different from a mistress? Unless he meant to send her off to molder in the country while some opera singer paraded through town on his arm. The thought disturbed her, though it had no right.
    She felt sick to death of "rights."
    "And with so many women, how will you keep up, my lord? Which of us shall suffer from this marriage? Me, or your mistresses?"
    His brows shot up, and his smiled shifted with genuine amusement. "What do you know of my mistresses? A lady doesn't mention such things to anyone, let alone to her husband."
    She felt sick to death of being good.
    "I do not know anything," she said, finally raising her eyes to his and tilting her chin in defiance. "But I have heard-"
    "Ah, you have heard." His eyes narrowed as he stepped closer. He was so much taller than she, so much