Wicked Proposition (20 page)

When she appeared unable to find the item, she
exited the shop. The driver assisted her into the carriage and shut
the door behind her. Catherine was still reeling with what she had
learned. She froze as she slid onto the seat. She stared into the
bright blue eyes in shock, hardly able to react to his presence
there. Her package of books slid to the floor of the coach
soundlessly.

Nicholas lounged on the opposite seat with his
arms folded across his chest. He was dressed in his seaman’s garb,
with an overgrowth of dark stubble on his face. He looked even more
predatory than she remembered. She shivered as the air crackled
between them.

“How was your shopping trip today, Catherine?”
he asked pleasantly, his eyes narrowing.

###

Catherine gaped at him as the coach started
moving away from the curb. She was incredulous he was there. She
quickly got herself composed and met his contemptuous stare
undaunted.

“What do you want, Nicholas?”

“Aside from you telling me why you were just in
Edward Thornton’s office, nothing at all,” he said in amusement as
his eyes lowered and slid over her appreciatively, lingering on her
new gown. “I see he has been generous with you,” he mused as his
gaze flicked over her fashionable silk ensemble. “Gabriel has his
nose so far up your pretty little arse, he doesn’t see you for what
you are, does he?”

She stiffened in outrage as she felt his eyes
move over her insultingly. “I said nothing to Gabriel about your
accosting me, but if you touch me again, I swear I will tell him
all!”

“Accosting you? Is that what it’s called now,
love?”

She glared at his infuriating chuckle. “You know
very well what I meant, Captain Van Ryker! You forced your unwanted
attentions upon me!”

“After what we shared in the gardens, you may as
well call me Nicholas, sweetheart.”

“We shared nothing!” she snarled venomously and
longed to hit the smirking man sitting opposite of her.

“I’m hurt, and here I thought you accosted me
right back, quite eagerly, I might add,” Nicholas mused and smiled
tauntingly. “Don’t think I don’t know how eager you were for me to
accost you against that tree, Catherine.”

“You are loathsome and disgusting!” she snapped.
“What is it you want?”

“I know you have been sending messages and
documents to Lady Iverleigh these last few weeks. I followed the
boy, Catherine. We can dispense with the lies now. The boy gave me
the notes. What were you doing in Thornton’s office today?”

Catherine met his intense blue eyes and folded
her arms across her chest, refusing to speak. She struggled with
some plausible excuse, but knew none would satisfy Nicholas.

Nicholas had been spying on her. He knew she was
working with Lilly now. Panic set it to know what he could do with
such information.

“Do I need to accost you again to get the
answers I seek?” Nicholas asked cheerfully and grinned at her
furious look. “Very well, why don’t you at least attempt to explain
what possible reason you had to go to see Gabriel’s barrister
today?”

“Why don’t you tell me, Nicholas?” she demanded
harshly. “You have already decided you know exactly all there is to
know.”

“I would hear it from you, love.”

“I have nothing to say to you.”

“Catherine, I cannot help you if you insist on
continuing to lie to me.”

“I do not need your help,” she whispered
angrily.

Realizing Edward’s assistant was now posing as
the old man had finally taken hold in her mind. She would get no
help from Edward. Edward was no longer Edward anymore, but Thomas
Sullivan, it appeared.

A sinking feeling was felt in the pit of her
stomach. Lilly knew Thomas was posing as Edward as well. She felt
the tentacles tightening around her then. No, there would be no
help for her. Nicholas couldn’t help her any more than the old man
could.

“Whatever it is they are paying you, I will
double it for you to abandon whatever you are up to.”

“Why would you do that?” she asked
pointedly.

Nicholas appeared angry and confused at her
question. “Gabriel is my friend. I owe the man my life. What other
reason could I have?”

“Why would you pay me off at all?” Catherine
said snidely. “Would it not be easier to run to him with your
tales? Then you would not have to pay me anything!”

“Gabriel deserves better than you. He has been
through enough with faithless women in his life,” Nicholas said
contemptuously. His blue eyes flicked over her in disgust. “I was
hoping to spare him you. It is obvious he seems to care for you.
Learning you are nothing more than a lying, deceitful little whore
might not sit well with him.”

Catherine stiffened at the insults. She leveled
him with a cool emerald stare. Why not play the part? She was
already a whore and a liar, why not a thief too?

“How much do you offer me to stop what I’m
doing?” she asked, and inwardly cringed from the disdain in his
eyes.

“How much do you want?” Nicholas countered in a
clipped tone, his blue eyes turning frostier by the second.

Catherine knew unless she gave him a reasonable
figure, he would doubt she was telling the truth. She sighed and
sat back comfortably against the seat.

“Three thousand pounds would suffice.”

“I would ask for something else in exchange for
my silence, sweet Catherine,” Nicholas stated deliberately as his
blue eyes lowered to the swells above her bodice. “One day in my
bed and I say nothing of what you are doing.”

She flushed under his suddenly heated stare. She
swallowed hard from the intense gleam in his stare.

“You would ask that of me?” she whispered in a
shocked voice, her hand going to her throat. “What manner of a
friend are you, Captain Van Ryker? It is beneath contempt what you
ask for your silence.”

Nicholas shrugged and smiled coldly. “Come now,
don’t pretend to care for him, Catherine. We both know differently.
I would think one day in my bed is a small price to pay. We both
know what he will do if he discovers you conspire against him. He
will toss you out on your pretty little ass and you will get
nothing.”

“You are loathsome!” she whispered in a shocked
voice.

“No more loathsome than you are, love, just a
tad more honest.”

“I cannot do it!”

Nicholas raised a dark eyebrow mockingly. “Come
now, had I not stopped what began in the gardens, you would have
let me then. This maidenly protest is unnecessary. I am not
Gabriel. I see you for what you are, love.”

Catherine glared at him. One day in his bed in
exchange for his silence. The thought should have dismayed and
disgusted her, and she refused to acknowledge the thrill coursing
through her as he ogled her bodice.

Gabriel could not discover her deceit. He had to
remain married to her sister as much as it pained her. Lilly had
her very neatly trapped into this. Gabriel acknowledging his
intention to remarry only reminded her they had no future together.
Her sister would never allow her to remain with him when this was
done.

Catherine avoided his taunting eyes as she
looked down into her lap where her hands were clenched. “I come to
you one day, and no more. Then you will leave me alone?”

Nicholas nodded and smiled coldly. “Tomorrow,
you will come to my residence. You have my word he will never know
of it.”

“I will know!” Catherine cried angrily with hurt
flaring in her eyes.

“Such a conscience, love?” he mused thoughtfully
as his large hand reached out to stroke her ivory cheek. “It’s a
bit late for one, don’t you think?”

Catherine refused to meet his eyes, her heart
clenched to know she betrayed Gabriel the minute she entered his
life. He was better off for her to finish this and be on her
way.

She raised her eyes to his, her chin going up a
notch.

“Fine, I will meet your terms. I hope your
conscience is intact, Captain. You are no friend to him.”

Nicholas knew what he did to them both now was
despicable, but he would end his desire for this woman once and for
all. Surely, once he had her he could put this obsessive need for
her to rest? The coach stopped in front of the townhouse and
Nicholas gazed at her with an inscrutable expression.

“Until tomorrow, then,” he said and was
gone.

Catherine felt tears burning behind her lids to
know she had no choice. Fierce waves of anger coursed through her
to know her sister had put her in this impossible situation.

If not for Lilly she would not be playing the
whore, the thief, or the liar.

# # #

Nicholas got into his own coach waiting in front
of Gabriel’s townhouse and Tieghan eyed him grimly. “Must we
continue to chase Iverleigh’s mistress?” he asked dryly. “You
confronted her. Can we go?”

Nicholas grinned at his friend’s words, knowing
Tieghan thought this mission was beneath them both. Tieghan had
declined to participate these last weeks in his pursuit of
Catherine. He knew the man longed to return to the ship.

“Where is the ‘we’ in this?” Nicholas scoffed
with an amused grin. “I did not see you giving chase at all. You
followed in the carriage, not quite the same thing.”

“I saw her face, Nick. She was afraid when she
left the barrister’s office. She ran away like the very devil
himself was on her heels,” Tieghan recalled grimly.

“I am paying her off now. It is done. Whatever
she was doing for Thornton and Lady Iverleigh is over.”

“She is Gabriel’s problem, Nicholas, stay out of
it,” Tieghan argued, his pale eyes meeting his life-long friend’s
directly. “You play with fire here, and you know it.”

“I would like her to be my problem,” Nicholas
admitted with a reluctant grin.

“That is obvious. Do not say I did not warn
you,” Tieghan said sternly, and folded his arms across his massive
chest, regarding him moodily.

Nicholas knew his persistent lusting after
Gabriel’s mistress was more than foolish. It was wrong. She
belonged to Gabriel. He should walk away, pay the girl, and leave
it alone.

Coercing her into his bed should be the last
thing he did now. He allayed his own arguments by reminding himself
the girl was playing his friend for a fool.

He should go to Gabriel now and tell him the
girl worked for his wife and Thornton, and be done with it.

Nicholas had believed her a corrupted innocent
after Clarice’s death, and had been willing to dismiss his nagging
suspicions. Now, he knew differently. The girl was as guilty as
sin.

Tieghan’s pale eyes met his across the seat.
“Forget about her, Nicholas. She is not for you,” his friend
informed him with a warning look.

“She is not for him either,” Nicholas replied
stubbornly, his eyes flaring.

“Is she worth your friendship with Gabriel,
Nick?” Tieghan asked in a deliberate way. “Lord Iverleigh has been
like a brother to you all these years. You owe him far more than
you can ever repay him. Think on that before you give into what I
see in your face. The damned wench isn’t worth your friend!”

Nicholas didn’t argue it further, and ignored
the pangs of conscience and guilt eating at him. The way his heart
quickened each time he was near Catherine drowned out the warnings
in his own head.

Nicholas knew blackmailing her into his bed was
beneath them both. He wanted her, and could have her no other way.
She would not come to him on her own. She thought her reaction to
him was wrong from the start.

He consoled himself knowing after tomorrow, he
could put her out of his mind once and for all.

###

Catherine entered the study upon her return
without knocking. She appeared rather flushed as she approached
him.

“Did you enjoy your shopping?” Gabriel inquired
as he paused over his ledgers and documents, looking up at her
under his lashes. “I trust your mood has improved?”

“My mood has improved considerably,” she said in
a silky voice. “I found myself missing you.” She turned
deliberately and came to sit at his elbow, positioning herself on
the edge of his desk. “Surely you can take time away from such
dreary interests, my lord?” she finished softly as she leaned down
and pushed the ledger aside, affording him a good view down the
front of her dress.

Gabriel froze as he met her green eyes and felt
himself grow hard. Her meaning was not lost upon him. He felt her
hand skim below the table and brush his thigh provocatively. All
thoughts of his account books were forgotten.

Gabriel wondered at her initiative as he pulled
her into his arms and kissed with slow ardent fervor. His dark eyes
glowed in delight as her tiny hand reached down the front of his
breeches. He sat back to allow her to fondle him, fully aroused
now.

Catherine tugged at the fastenings to his
breeches now. He smiled as she found him. He groaned as she stroked
his long rigid length slowly. As her hand worked its magic, he
closed his eyes and leaned back.

She took the opportunity to move between his
hard thighs. His hands slid into the raven curls and released the
pins that held the dark bounty, and sighed as she bent to him.
Gabriel’s eyes flew open in shocked delight as she took him in her
soft mouth. His hands gripped her head as she swirled her mouth
around his cock. He was hot and throbbing for her and thought he
would go mad if she continued such torment.

Surely a trip to the booksellers had not
produced such passion in the woman? He did not question her motives
as he hauled her up into his arms and bore her to the sofa.

Gabriel was ripping at his own clothes. He
tugged and pulled at her laces and corset and soon they were both
nude. He tumbled her upon the sofa and soon all thoughts of his
meetings were forgotten as she worked her spell upon him.