Speaking of lovers, Mrs. St. Vincent definitely piqued his interest.

She was quite lovely.

Rosalind, meanwhile, in the process of mulling over a possible speaker for her Saturday reading group, didn’t notice the duke until she reached the door and looked up to unlock it. Her eyes flared wide and her first thought was: My Lord, Groveland is tall! Her second thought, thoroughly uncalled for and quickly suppressed was: He is as handsome as sin-gloriously so… like a Leighton depiction of some Greek god or Roman gladiator-all overwhelming strength and chiseled beauty.

He was a favorite of the scandal sheet gossip mongers. And whether at the races, some hunt, or a fancy dress ball, a woman was always clinging to his arm.

Not that his looks or his scandalous life should concern her in the least, Rosalind sternly reminded herself; she was well aware of why he’d come.

Groveland was here because he wished to acquire her store-and with it, her livelihood and all that was positive in her life. Not that he wasn’t offering her generous compensation. But she didn’t wish to sell for any number of reasons. Of prime importance, perhaps, was the fact that she’d fashioned a busy, satisfying, and increasingly lucrative life for herself since Edward’s death.

And she saw no cause or reason to relinquish it.

Yes, yes, she understood it might be possible to reconstruct such an existence elsewhere. But why must she disrupt her life and business simply because Groveland was wealthy, titled, and insistent?

She liked that her free library was frequented by so many of the laboring poor; she took great pleasure in knowing that her Saturday reading group was filled to overflowing because she offered speakers and books addressing the pertinent issues of the day. And while her small art gallery in the back of her store had originated by chance, the women artists who exhibited there were drawing increasing critical acclaim.

Furthermore, soon she would be free of debt without the duke’s offer.

But perhaps what may have ultimately sealed her decision was her fundamental dislike of men like Groveland-idle, leisured aristocrats who lived only for their amusements. Noble lords who had never wanted for anything, who expected immediate compliance, who resented challenge or contradiction. Who lived off the income generated by ill-paid retainers.

Good Lord, I’ve become a bona fide radical!

Whether it was Groveland’s rapping on the window pane or the shock of her latent radicalism jarring her back to reality, she quickly slipped the latch free and opened the door.

“A pleasant good morning.” The duke bowed faintly. “Mrs. St. Vincent, I presume. I’m Groveland.”

“Good morning, Your Grace. Are you in the market for some reading material?” Rosalind sardonically inquired. That he looked every inch the exquisite noble from the top of his deliberately ruffled hair to his biscuit-colored summer shoes inexplicably annoyed her.

She is a bitch, he thought. But adept at humoring women, at the top of his game according to Brooks’s betting books, Fitz offered a practiced smile. “Actually, I came to speak with you about your bookstore,” he said, smooth as silk. “I was hoping you would allow me a few moments of your time.”

She found his suave charm and easy smile insufferable, his expectation that she would succumb to it even more irksome. After a deliberately long pause, she said, “I suppose I could give you a few minutes. Come in and say what you have to say.” She waved him in with a flick of her hand. “Not that it will do you any more good than the ten others who came here to do your bidding.”

He flexed his fingers against an urge to throttle her, her tone, her stance, the chill in her emerald eyes, like a gauntlet thrown.

Hutchinson was right. She was audacious.

His mind racing with options other than that of throttling her, he moved past her into the store. Was it possible his architect could redraw the plans and work around her damned corner property? Could Williams design a new entrance to Monckton Row and the luxury townhomes planned for the site. Could he tell this shrewish bitch to go to hell?

The sound of the door closing behind him brought him back to his senses. Marginally. He understood that responding to her insolence in kind would hardly serve his mission, that tact and diplomacy would more likely win the day. But Groveland rarely met a quarrelsome woman; in fact, he never did, the women in his life universally disposed to please him. So he reined in his temper with effort. “We can trade insults if you wish.” He smiled tightly. “I’m more than willing and better at it than you I expect. Or you can do me the courtesy of listening to my proposal. I promise to be brief.”

Rosalind blew out a small breath; he was asking for little. She could at least hear him out. “I apologize. I was unnecessarily rude. I didn’t sleep much last night.” She smiled faintly. “At least I have an excuse for my incivility.”

Fitz couldn’t help but smile in return, although he hadn’t intended to. No more than he’d intended to say in a lazy drawl, “For all you know, I may not have slept much last night either.”

“But then no one would expect a man of your proclivities to have spent your night sleeping, would they?”

The little vixen was a flirt. “What could you possibly know of my proclivities?” he murmured, back on familiar ground, seduction his particular metier.

“The whole world knows, Your Grace. You’re infamous.”

“Should I apologize?” His voice was low and velvet soft, his gaze explicitly carnal.

It was unconscionable that a tremor of desire should immediately spike through her senses. That his deep, husky voice and heated gaze should prompt her cheeks to flush rosy pink. That for the briefest moment she’d fall prey to his tantalizing allure.

But she was a woman of resolve, even more so since her widowhood, so she resisted the heady temptation. “No need to apologize, Groveland.” She offered him a bland look and a blander smile. “May I offer you tea?” Clearly, a moment of respite was in order. She understood now why he was the byword for amorous play. He was quite impossible to resist-a wholly inexplicable phenomena to date in her life, but shockingly real.

She really could use a cup of tea if for no other reason than to put some distance between herself and Groveland’s disconcerting sexuality.

“Yes, thank you,” he murmured with a polished bow. He could drink tea if he had to, although cognizant of Mrs. St. Vincent’s tantalizing response, he would have much preferred a taste of the lovely widow’s heated passions.

At his graceful bow, Rosalind immediately pictured him on a ballroom floor, bowing to some woman, poised and elegant in full evening rig. Good God, I’ve been writing fiction too long.

“I heated the samovar earlier,” she quickly remarked, finding the sudden silence disturbing, feeling the need to fill the hush. “I keep tea at the ready for my customers and myself. I’m addicted I’m afraid, and customers like it as well… especially when the weather turns cooler-not that it’s cool today, of course,” she added, chiding herself for sounding like some dithering young miss just out of the schoolroom. “Please, over there,” she restively finished, gesturing to two chairs near the window.

After a cup of tea, she’d politely refuse his offer and send him on his way. She was no innocent maid whose head could be turned by a handsome face and a captivating smile. Truly, seriously, she silently admonished herself.

The lady’s contemptuous hauteur had vanished, Fitz reflected, following her, along with her abrasiveness, and in their place was this lovely, sweet tremulousness. His next thought was bluntly male and hackneyed: What she needs is a good, hard orgasm to calm her nerves.

His third thought was perhaps even more of a cliche considering his reputation for licentious pleasures: Might she be available for a bit of dalliance this morning? He was fresh and rested after a good night’s sleep. Although he fully understood that his lustful desires had more to do with the lady’s fascinating sensuality than a bracing night of repose.

Taking a seat in a worn leather club chair while she busied herself pouring tea, he slid down into a comfortable slouch and observed her from under his lashes. He had only to pull out a few pins and her heavy, silken hair would tumble down her back. His fingers unconsciously flexed in pleasant anticipation. Her blouse buttoned down the front. Convenient. She wore a minimum of petticoats under her simple skirt, too. Really-it was as if fate was taking a hand, he thought, contemplating the ease with which he could disrobe her. He shifted slightly as his erection grew, the image of Mrs. St. Vincent nude vastly arousing.

He shot a glance toward the door, as if he might curtail impending customers by will alone.

“Sugar?”

It took him a second to reply, distracted as he was by his imagination racing full tilt. “Yes, please,” he said, crossing his legs to conceal his erection. “Four.”

Her brows rose in surprise, but she only said, “Milk?” rather than what she was thinking.

“Half milk, please, if it’s not too late.”

She glanced at him and smiled. “You don’t actually drink tea, do you?”

He smiled back. “I do on occasion.”

“When you’re trying to please some woman.”

He grinned. “Yes, mostly then.”

“I could find you some liquor, I suppose.” But even as she spoke, she realized how she’d compromised herself and quickly added, “Actually, I can’t.”

“Tea’s fine,” he murmured, as if he hadn’t noticed her brief moment of unintentional goodwill.

She tried not to be overly mindful of how he casually lounged in her chair as if he sat there often, nor how splendid he looked in his beige linen suit-powerful, virile male outfitted in gentlemen’s finery. And yet the brute animal remained beneath the veneer, London’s best tailors unable to trivialize the underlying brawn and muscle. In contrast-strangely perhaps, given his reputation for vice-he had the look of some troubadour of old as well with his dark, ruffled hair curling over his collar, his grey eyes revealing a hint of soulfulness, his sensual mouth eminently kissable.