Shayla Black Read Free

much like you to take advantage of my misfortune.”
    His expression never changed. “A smart man takes advantage of every opportunity.”
    And Maddie knew well he saw opportunity everywhere, even under the skirts of an untried girl. The blackguard had nearly ruined her life when he had taken her innocence, along with her father's money, and left. She would not become his opportunity again.
    “ Stop these games. What do you truly want? I doubt you paid my creditors a staggering eight thousand pounds for my hand because you harbor any feeling for me.”
    He shrugged evasively. “Believe what you like.”
    She never knew what to believe where Brock was concerned. Not five years ago, not now. She had believed in him once, in his brilliant mind, in his determination, to her detriment. The fact the passionately driven boy who had labored in her father’s stables had beaten the odds and became a shrewd man of means only made him more frightening now.
    “ Blast you, what is it you truly seek from me?”
    A thin smile turned up the corners of his mouth as he approached her again with measured steps. Rooted in place by anxiety, she watched him pace a circle around her, his fingers brushing an aging side table next to her. She shivered.
    Brock had a scheme in mind, and he only tortured her by withholding it now for his perverse pleasure, no doubt.
    Suddenly, he stopped before her and met her stare. In his eyes, she saw scalding desire and a frightening determination to possess her. Maddie couldn’t breathe.
    “ We were compatible lovers, sweet girl.”
    She couldn’t hold her gasp in. “Do not call me that!”
    Her memory bombarded her with images of their spring together, the first time he’d nibbled her tingling neck and whispered that endearment. An ache she’d thought long dead flickered inside her.
    “ You liked that name. And I liked saying it.” His eyes burned. “Years ago, your skin tasted sweet as a pastry. Does it still?”
    Maddie gave Brock her back and drew in a trembling breath. He was toying with her, as a cat does a mouse. He wanted her off balance. She must not give him the satisfaction of recalling anything about that night, particularly not the feel of his callused palms sliding across her skin, between her thighs, making her writhe with the sort of pleasure she had never before imagined and never again experienced. Focusing on his betrayal and abandonment would better serve her.
    She whirled to face him. “Certainly you do not expect me to believe that you bought up all of my debt and created some elaborate scheme of marriage simply so you could take me to your bed again.”
    He raised a dark brow. “Why not?”
    “ That is hardly logical.”
    “ I am a wealthy man now. I can afford to be illogical, if I choose.”
    Maddie saw his hand coming, knew he intended to touch her. She couldn’t move. Brock caressed her face with his fingers. Fire screamed across her skin. She flinched at the contact, but he did not let her go, damn him. Instead, he cupped his fingers around her neck and brushed his thumb across her cheek.
    Her heart beat like an anvil, kicking the wall of her chest as he traced a torturously slow line down her jaw. Sensation burst through her. They played a dangerous game. She could not afford to be his toy.
    Jerking away, Maddie sneered, “If it’s a companion you seek, crawl back to the gutter and buy yourself a two-pence whore.”
    He looked unruffled by her insult. “Tsk, tsk, Maddie. That no longer suits me. I accept only the finest; I accept it on my terms. Now—” he brushed her collarbone with his fingertips— “I choose you.”
    She willed her racing heart to slow. But it was impossible with Brock’s commanding gaze squarely on her, sliding down her body. Her stomach clenched. After all the hurt he had heaped upon her, she should never respond to him as a woman again.
    But Brock gripped her wrist in his hot palm, then slid his thumb over the pulse point, a slow journey