No Greater Pleasure by Megan Hart

is worth its weight in gold. More than its weight, as it weighs very little.” Gabriel snapped his fingers for a funnel, which she gave him, and he poured the vial’s contents into a bottle and stoppered it, then set the bottle in a rack.
    “What is it?”
    “A cure for lovepox.”
    Her impressed expression must have pleased him, for he gave her what, for him, was the equivalent of a broad grin, though it really only touched the corners of his mouth. “That will feed this household for the next year and keep it clothed, as well.”
    “That small bottle?”
    He nodded and held out his hands for her to strip the gloves from. “The men with the money to buy a cure, fortunately, are also the ones most likely to contract the disease. One to three drops of it will suffice for all but the most advanced cases.”
    Quilla looked at the bottle, then back to him. “You must feel very satisfied.”
    He’d been looking over the notes she’d taken, but now he looked up at her. “Because my work will provide for my family and staff? Yes. Of course.”
    She shook her head. “I meant because your work will help people. ’Tis easy enough for a man to earn a wage at work that helps nobody but himself.”
    He straightened. “Men who contract the lovepox deserve to face the consequences of their lasciviousness.”
    Quilla hung his long gloves on the rack and brought the basin and cloth to him from their place on the small table near the chaise lounge. “Your judgment is harsh, my lord.”
    He dipped his hands in the water and washed them, then held them out to her for drying, an unconscious action that made her smile inside. He would be allowing her to wash his hands next, without knowing it.
    “Lovepox is perhaps the most easily prevented disease you can get,” Gabriel said, “when all you must do in order not to contract it is bother to bathe. Stick your cock in whatever you please, but by the Void, wash it after.”
    Quilla knew little of lovepox, as it was a man’s disease and not a woman’s. “Yet you make the serum anyway.”
    “Because no matter how simple a thing it is to wash your prick,” Gabriel said, “there will always be men who can’t be bothered to do it. And if their filthy habits can provide coin for my family’s benefit, why should I not?”
    There could be no disputing that logic. Quilla unbuttoned his white coat, and hung that on the rack as well. She smoothed his vest and reached for his black jacket, holding it while he slipped his arms into it. Her hands tightened his tie while she spoke.
    “Surely there are other things you make that have a more noble purpose.”
    He pointed at the wall of cages full of skittering mice, which she had learned were experiments. Not pets. “I’m working on many things. Yes.”
    “So you see, your work is so satisfactory. Because you do help people with it.”
    “Why must you insist on turning what I do into some sort of noble crusade for the good of the world?”
    “Why will you not allow me to admire your efforts?”
    The retort stopped him as he’d been preparing to turn from her. He looked down to where her hands still rested on his tie. “’Tis hardly as wondrous an occupation as filling Sinder’s Quiver.”
    The words were kind, but the mocking tone was not. Quilla took her hands away. “I plead your mercy, my lord. I meant not to overstep my bounds.”
    Something flickered in his eyes. “I do what I must, as we all do. If there is any great benefit to society because of it, ’tis of little consequence to me.”
    “Your work is difficult and tedious, and requires great presence of mind to complete,” she told him, not because she wanted to make him angry but because she thought it was what he needed to hear. “ ’Tis a pity you take so little joy from it.”
    “Joy?” he snapped, and then did turn from her. “Do not speak to me of joy, Handmaiden.”
    He stalked away, and she murmured, “I would teach you of joy, if you would allow