Robin Schone by Gabriel's Woman (10 ebook reader TXT) 📕

release, madame?” Victoria asked, body so brittle that it felt like it

would crack.

Gabriel’s molten gaze froze into silver ice.

“That is what un prostitute does, mademoiselle—give pleasure.” The modiste scribbled down

measurements, seemingly impervious to the significance of Victoria’s question. “Le plus pleasure, the

better, oui?

The more pleasure, the better. Yes.

“Has a .. .a patron ever caused you to beg, madame?”

A garrote closed around Victoria’s neck.

“Non, non, do not move, mademoiselle. I must take this final measurement. Voila.”

Victoria stood still.

The measuring tape tightened about her throat—

“When there is mutual respect and affection”—warm breath tickled Victoria’s back—”there are a

thousand methods by which a man and a woman can make each other cry out with pleasure.”

—and then Victoria was free.

The modiste made a notation, a quick grating of lead on paper.

The silver eyes inside the mirror held Victoria’s gaze.

“And when there is no respect...” Victoria dryly swallowed, “or affection?”

“It is a rape of the senses.”

Madame René stepped back.

“Whereas seduction, mademoiselle, is a teasing of the senses. It is painting naked images with words. It

is creating the anticipation of... un baiser, a kiss .. . une caresse, a caress .. . un embrassement, an embrace... That is the art of seduction, n’est-il pas, Monsieur Gabriel?”

“Out, Madame René,” Gabriel agreed neutrally.

Beneath the coldness inside his eyes was the imagery the modiste had deliberately implanted. Un

baiser, a kiss. Une caresse, a caress. Un embrassentent, an embrace.

Victoria imagined Gabriel’s masculine flesh—his bitte—kissing her, caressing her, penetrating her. Eight

inches, nine inches . .. Gabriel imagined Victoria’s feminine flesh embracing his, inch by inch by inch.

The modiste had skillfully forced them to confront their desires.

“I will send clothes for mademoiselle immediatement, monsieur,” Madame René said with satisfaction.

“Au revoir, mademoiselle.”

In the mirror Victoria watched the back of Madame René’s tasseled bustle saucily sway, recede.

Gabriel suddenly stepped out of Victoria’s sight; the French modiste disappeared through the doorway.

Leaving behind her a fully clothed man who denied his desires and a naked woman who had openly

revealed her wantonness.

Victoria dropped her arms. Cold, damp hair tumbled down her back.

She pivoted, hair pitching over her naked shoulders.

Gabriel stood beside the door. The shadow that had enveloped his face in the mirror was nothing more

than the dark stubble of beard. His facial hair was the same color as his eyebrows—brown instead of

blond.

He wore the white silk shirt he had worn the night before. It was minus a collar. Cuffs. Studs.

The shirt was rumpled, as if he had slept in it. Dark hair the color of his eyebrows and beard stubble

curled through the open V of the white silk.

Victoria stared at the dark curls of hair. They would tickle a woman’s breasts, surely.

Without warning, a picture of the combination bath and shower flashed before her eyes. The two sprays

that had been angled downward had been hip high. Had they been lifted, and the cock turned, water would

have sprayed directly between her thighs.

Her clitoris throbbed in sudden comprehension.

Victoria’s head jerked up.

Gabriel’s silver gaze waited for her.

“The Liver Spray... It is not positioned to massage the liver,” she said inanely.

He did not pretend to misunderstand her.

“No.”

Victoria thought of the staid, respectable people who viewed the combination bath and showers at the

Crystal Palace. Did they know that a spray that was advertised to massage the liver, was in fact used for

so-called self-abuse?

Her gaze instinctively dropped down to Gabriel’s thighs.

“Is the spray stimulating for men?”

The black silk throbbed in time to the pulsations beating through her own body.

“Not to the extent that it is for women.”

His voice was cool and composed.

Victoria’s gaze snapped back up to meet his.

“Yet your shower has that accessory.”

“It came equipped with it.”

“Was Michael the man whom you outbid?”

Victoria’s hair stood on end at the electric tension that emanated from Gabriel.

“No,” he said politely. “The man who bid on you was not Michael.”

“But Michael was there in the saloon,” Victoria persisted.

“Michael was in the saloon,” Gabriel agreed lightly.

There was no lightness inside his eyes.

Les deux anges. The two angels.

They are rivals, Victoria had said.

They are friends, Madame René had corrected her.

“The man whom you outbid ... Is he the one whom you thought sent me to you?”

“Yes.”

If I had not bid on you, mademoiselle, you would die a far worse death than any caused by

corrosive sublimate.

Victoria’s rapidly rising and falling breasts belied her outward calmness.

“Is he the one whom you think will kill me?” she asked evenly.

“If I do not keep you safe, yes.”

But he did not know if he could keep her safe.

“How long did you eavesdrop?” Victoria asked before she shattered with the brittleness of danger and

desire.

“Long enough, mademoiselle.”

Long enough for what?

“Do men want to be loved?”

“I would not know, mademoiselle,” he politely evaded.

Neither did Victoria.

“Do you refer to your . . . male member ... as a bitte?

The electric light was too bright.

“No, mademoiselle.” He did not acknowledge her impertinence by so much as a flicker of an eyelash. “I

refer to it as my cock.”

“Do you get