My Pleasure by Connie Brockway Page A

moments, he held a marchioness in his arms and made her laugh. No,” he mused softly, “perhaps she is not wise. But some things cannot be gain-said, no matter how unwise.”
    His gaze drifted over her masked visage. “Are you always wise?”
    She wanted to tell him no, that she was not always wise, that she wanted—oh, very much!—to be unwise. But he knew nothing about her other than that she was a lady, and the only inference she could make from his interest was that she presented him a challenge. She shook her head sadly, regretful not that he was amusing himself by attempting to seduce her, but that she was wise enough to realize it.
    “Yes, I am always wise.”
    “I was afraid you were going to say that.” He turned away from her for a few seconds, ostensibly to watch the dancers, and when he turned back to her, his charming smile had returned in full force, and nothing clouded the extraordinary blue of his eyes.
    “Where next, little tourist?” he asked. “There is a hermit lurking somewhere nearby who will tell you your future for a penny. Or I believe Mrs. Bland is scheduled to sing some of her famed ballads in the Rotunda, and the fireworks are scheduled to begin at ten o’clock.”
    “Oh, I won’t be able to stay that long,” she declared.
    He frowned. “Why not? It’s only another quarter of an hour.”
    A quarter of an hour?! Dear Lord, how had it grown so late so swiftly? Flora would be beside herself waiting for news of Oswald. She had forgotten Flora. She had forgotten everything.
    “I have to go.” She wheeled about. He caught her arm.
    “No.”
    “I do,” she insisted, guilt filling her. “I have to. Someone waits for me—”
    His hand tightened. “Who? A man?” he asked. “Another adventure ?”
    “No!”
    “You promised me this night. You made a bargain.” He was angry. It flared in his eyes and in the set of his mouth, even though his expression remained cool and his tone offhand. “And I accepted your bargain. Because of your insistence that a woman has a sense of honor.”
    Oh! He didn’t fight fair! “I will keep my promise if you insist, but I would not like to do so when it will cause another pain. She will be most anxious for my return.”
    “She?”he repeated. “You expect me to relinquish what I want simply to appease some ‘she’?” His lips curled. “Clearly our evening together has not brought you any insight into my character.”
    But it had.
    “Be reasonable, Mr. Munro,” she said. “You don’t want me.”
    “Don’t I?” he asked with icy politeness.
    “You want what you bargained for, and now you feel you are being cheated.”
    “Is that what I am feeling?”
    She ignored that, dared not read anything into it. “Yes. I ask again that you release me from our bargain. Please.”
    He studied her behind half-closed lids a long moment before finally uttering in a hard, careless voice, “As you will.”
    “Thank you.”
    Wordlessly, he escorted her beneath the arched passageway that led to the entrance and exit gates. The cobblestones magnified the sound of his boot heels beneath the vaulted ceiling, the light from the lanterns diffuse. From here she could see Kensington Lane, where the hacks and carriages stood in line awaiting their fares. He stopped. “You will have no trouble finding a conveyance,” he said.
    The realization washed over her that her adventure was ending. She hesitated, feeling abruptly forlorn. She turned, looking up into his face. “Goodbye, Mr. Munro.”
    His expression was enigmatic. “Goodbye.”
    She held out her hand, determined that he would be able to recall her as a well-mannered distraction if not the unassailable femme fatale she’d wanted him to think her. He looked down at her hand with a bemused expression.
    She cleared her throat. “You are supposed to take my hand and bow.”
    “Ah!” he said pleasantly. “Thank you for the instruction. One quite forgets what is required of