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

neutrally, silver eyes inscrutable.

But a woman’s virginity is not worth two thousand pounds, Victoria wanted to cry.

She did not.

“I am not experienced in these matters.” She gripped her knitted wool reticule; her ring finger slipped

through a loose purl. “How is it that you intend to pay me?”

“That is entirely up to you, mademoiselle.”

Mademoiselle.

The waiter who had brought her to the man behind the black-marble-topped desk had called her

mademoiselle. He had spoken with an unmistakable French accent.

The man who had bid one hundred and five pounds and then one thousand pounds had also called her

mademoiselle. He had spoken with an unmistakable English accent.

Like this man.

A compulsive need to know the nationality of the man who would take her virginity overcame her.

Victoria swallowed it.

Prostitutes did not question their patrons. And by her actions this night, she’d left the rank of unemployed

governess and become a prostitute.

Deliberately, she reached up and shoved back her hood.

Electricity bolted through the air.

Victoria froze, hands suspended.

The man’s little finger that had bridged the mounded white silk was now buried underneath it.

She had not seen him move, but he had.

“Take off your cloak.”

The order was cold, clipped.

Her gaze shot upward.

His face and eyes were devoid of desire.

The last six months had taught Victoria that men did not need to desire a woman in order to possess her.

Some men took pleasure in power while others took pleasure in pain.

Perspiration pooled beneath her breasts, crawled down her stomach.

What did this man take pleasure in, she wondered: power... or pain?

Why would a man—a man who could surely have anyone whom he desired—pay two thousand pounds

for a woman’s virginity?

His silver gaze did not waver; the long, pale fingers did not move away from the silk cloth.

Soon he would touch her with those fingers, Victoria thought with a growing sense of unreality. He

would knead her breasts and probe her vulva.

Or perhaps not.

Perhaps he would take her leaning against the wall or bending over the marble desk with no preliminary

kisses. No caresses. Their only contact through their genitals.

The woman inside Victoria screamed for her to flee.

The pragmatist inside her warned she had nowhere to run.

An ember sparked, underscoring her decision.

Whatever happened this night, with this man, was her choice.

She would not back down.

Clumsily, she released the wooden buttons on her wool cloak, lips firming with resolve, reticule swinging.

Slipping her left arm free, she transferred the reticule to her left hand, and slipped the cloak off her right

shoulder. Carefully, she draped the moth-eaten wool over her left forearm as if it bore some value.

It did not.

In the last six months she had sold everything she possessed.

And it still had not been enough.

The silver-eyed man briefly glanced down at the hem of her brown wool dress. Dark lashes gouged even

darker shadows into his cheeks.

She knew what he saw.

The skirt puddled around her feet. Victoria had sold her bustle two months past.

Slowly, he raised his eyelids, face an alabaster mask.

Victoria saw herself as he must see her. Her face was gaunt from cold and fear and hunger, her dark

brown hair dull from no cleansing agent other than icy water.

She was not beautiful, but she had not offered him beauty; she had offered him her maidenhood.

Victoria squared her shoulders.

“What is your name, mademoiselle?” he asked pleasantly, impersonally. As if they met at a ball instead

of a tavern of ill repute.

Various names floated through Victoria’s thoughts: Chastity. Prudence.

None were applicable.

A chaste, prudent woman would not now be in her predicament.

“Mary,” she lied.

And knew he was aware that she lied.

“Put your cloak and reticule on the chair.”

Victoria sucked her lips against her teeth to quell a rising tide of anger. He could yet reject her, this

elegant man who was surrounded by beauty and comfort. And not once would he think about the hell his

rejection would condemn her to.

To her left, gold glittered on a wall of embossed leather books. Overhead, a crystal chandelier radiated

heat. To her right, blue and orange flames danced inside a black marble fireplace.

For one blinding second she hated the silver-haired, silver-eyed man for the wealth that he possessed and

the masculinity that he had been born with. She had been reduced to this—selling her virginity—solely

because of her sex and the power a woman’s subjugation gave men.

Victoria stepped forward and draped the ragged wool cloak over the back of the pale blue leather chair

that was her sole means of protection. Reluctantly she dropped the reticule onto the cushion, deriding her

unwillingness to part with it—the only valuable article she had left was her hymen.

And soon it, too, would be gone.

Sharpness abruptly spiked his voice. “Move away from the chair.”

Glancing up, Victoria was pinned by frigid silver eyes.

Her heart leaped up inside her throat.

The anger simmering inside her forced it back down.

She would not be a victim.

Not of this man.

Not of the man who had systematically destroyed her life simply because he wanted for free what the

silver-haired man was willing to buy.

Victoria deliberately stepped to the side of the chair.

“Shall I remove my dress?” she asked brashly, heartbeat drumming inside her ears, her temples, her

breasts. “Or shall I merely hitch up my skirt and lean against a wall?”

“Do you often hitch up your skirt, mademoiselle?” he asked politely, silver eyes intent.

Victoria’s head snapped back. “I am not