The Secrets of a Courtesan

“I barely know the man,” she snapped. “And what I do know I dislike intensely. It is both insulting and plain wrong to suggest some criminal conspiracy between us.”

Hawkesbury had suggested that Eve might be Warren Sampson’s mistress, a cozy arrangement if they were in bed and business together. And Rowarth was not simply going to accept her word that it was not so. Just the thought of her tumbling between the sheets with Sampson made him hot with rage and thwarted desire. Madness, when he had sworn he did not care and did not want to want her.

“Shall we sit,” he suggested evenly, “and discuss this calmly?”

She gave him another look of searing disdain. “If we must. If it will hasten your departure.”

He bit back a reluctant smile. Never had a woman seemed so anxious to be rid of him. But then, Eve had always been different.

“I shall want to see your accounts in due course,” he said. “I need to trace every one of your transactions.”

“How tedious for you,” Eve murmured.

“I suppose that they are in order?”